Metal Dummy Guns.?

gerhard · Nov 11, 2011

Do any of you."older guys"..(I turned 70 last September)..remember back in the 50s when you could buy solid metal replicas of military pistols.?...they sold for about $3.00 in the back of magazines....Ive got a Luger...45 ..P-38 and Broomhandle mauser....but ive been looking for a solid metal K Model S&W Revolver...absolutely no luck on the internet at all...Ive found some solid rubber ones....but i would like to get a solid metal....Ive got a small military antique business and set up at our Annual Military Show....and sell military holsters....and like to shape them when i get them in.....just picked up the shoulder holster for my new S&W Victory .38 and would like to shape it...but dang sure not gonna put it in a soaking wet leather holster.....does anyone have one of the solid metal .38s k Model they would want to sell....or maybe could just point me in the right direction.?...as always ...I appreciate anyone taking the time to answer........Thanks....Hans Fischer

rburg · Nov 11, 2011

I see them occasionally at gun shows. Not for sale, but in holster makers booths. I think the leather guys use them to fit their holsters. I've also seen the same thing in plastic (like the guns they emulate.) Not a show coming up for a while.

I know some grip makers buy the worldly remains of demilled guns, those crime guns a court has ordered destroyed. Some of the guys with the contracts make a torch cut or two, but will leave the grip frame intact if asked so they can sell them.

I'm interested in your answers. The ones I've seen look like cast aluminum.

Jhp147 · Nov 12, 2011

I have seen aluminum guns used to make holsters purchased from Duncan Customs, Inc.
but have no idea if they have exactly what you need.

Bell Charter Oak Holsters · Nov 12, 2011

Duncan's is the only dealer I know of who casts solid aluminum dummy guns in quantity. Problem is, they usually only produce a limited run of a particular weapon, so if your late out of the starting gate, you may not get what you want. Another source, but also somewhat limited, are the polymer cast dummys manufactured by John Ring and a few others who sell them. They are cheaper than the aluminum dummy's, but not always dimensionally accurate, depending upon who makes them. Ring's have been good but I can't speak to others being accurate replicas dimensionally.

In decades past, we used to have to beg the manufacturers to demill or dewatt a production gun or worse, purchase the actual production gun and beat the hell out of it in the process. But back then, you only needed 20 or so for the majority of your business. Today, we use over 300!

I doubt Duncans even has a Model 10, definitely not an M&P 1905 4th. dummy like your Victory model. Checking their most recent list, all I see in the K frame size is a Model 66 in 6"barrel .357 cylinder. Best of luck and I'm sorry I can't be more helpful.

Cheers;
Lefty

CajunBass · Nov 12, 2011

When I was a kid back in the 50's, 60's, "we" had a "community gun". No idea who actually owned it, it just sort of passed around all us boys. It was a cast aluminum, full sized Luger. Nothing on it "worked" it was just a hunk of aluminun, shaped like a Luger, that had been painted black at one time. We carried it in an equally mysterious GI holster that no one seemed to actually know where it had come from. We used to argue over who was going to take it home.

I've often wondered what happened to it.

gerhard · Nov 12, 2011

Dummy Guns...

Thanks for all the notes guys...I appreciate it.......I found on the internet the "Blue guns"...some even made of rubber.....its no big hurry...and we have our Big TMCA Military Show in Franklin Tennessee the friday/saturday after Thanksgiving........Im going and plan to do a lot of walking around....at the last show...found a solid metal Beretta Model 34....for $20.00..(Dealer said it was a paperweight)......it never ceases to amaze me tho at some of the prices asked.....Im sure we have all thought the same thing when we go to Shows....Especially Military Shows.....thinking.."Ive got two of those at home and they are selling for what.??????"..

Texas Star · Nov 12, 2011

The guns you mean were sold by Lytle Novelty Co., which I think is long out of business. When I was in jr. high school, I acquired a few. They never made an M&P, to my knowledge. They did have a Spanish copy, but I forget the name of the maker. Odd choice.

Their literature badly mispelled the Beretta name on their copy of the M-34. The "guns" were cast aluminum.

I painted the grips of the black guns with brown paint that I also used for model airplanes. I wanted them to look like wooden grips. An irritating little brother lost two of the "guns" while I was away in the military, but I still have two. They're an important part of my youthful memories. I'll probably give them to my son or a grandson.

Some toy guns of that era now sell for large sums. Alas, my gun-hating mother gave my Hubley Colt. 45 (really a Colt M-1860 Army .44) to my brother's kids, who promptly lost or trashed it.

I'm the only one of three brothers who likes guns, although one has a couple, purely for defensive needs. Thankfully, my son is "into" guns.

don95sml · Nov 12, 2011

Like you, I had a cast metal Luger when I was a kid - around 70 years ago. In my mind it was as good as the real thing.

lawandorder · Nov 12, 2011

Picked up one.............

at Tulsa for a Colt DS. I try to find them for my wife who is starting to make holsters.

Armyphotog · Nov 12, 2011

Yeah, I had a Luger when I was a kid back in the early fifties. Can't remember what it was made out of, but I seemed to remember it being heavy and was a dark grey metal.

raven818 · Nov 12, 2011

Armyphotog said:
Yeah, I had a Luger when I was a kid back in the early fifties. Can't remember what it was made out of, but I seemed to remember it being heavy and was a dark grey metal.

Wow, so few post and so many Lugers. I had one also. Never lost the love for the look of the gun.

Gutpile Charlie · Nov 12, 2011

When I was in the seventh grade in jr. high, we had to take "metal shop". In the one year class we did basic sheet metal forming and aluminim casting. (That was in about 1953-54)

Now guess what we cast? Well, we did the obligitory trivet hot plates for mom and grandma, and we all cast a semi auto pistol. We had a choice of a 1911 or P-08.

Yuppers, right there is school we were making toy guns.

Things certainly have changed.

The casting was the sand casting method as is used in many industrial applications. You have a two pieced metal frame called the "cope" and the "drag". You fill each with fine wet sand, compact it with a wodden mallet and screed it off level. Then you mash the pattern into the sand, cut sprue channels and then bolt on the other half of the mold.

Next you melt the aluminimum over a gas fire and fill the mold. When it hardens, unbolt the mold, break away the sand, cut the sprue off and file the edges. That's all there is to it.

We need to start teaching stuff like this in school again. Kids today dodn't have any idea how things are made.

Bell Charter Oak Holsters · Nov 13, 2011

Texas Star said:
The guns you mean were sold by Lytle Novelty Co., which I think is long out of business. When I was in jr. high school, I acquired a few. They never made an M&P, to my knowledge. They did have a Spanish copy, but I forget the name of the maker. Odd choice.

I have one made by them, cast from a spanish copy of the Colt Police Positive. I think the spanish gun company was Orbea? It's not dimensionally identical to the Colt, but pretty darn close.

Cheers;
Lefty

Texas Star · Nov 13, 2011

oldflatfoot said:
I have one made by them, cast from a spanish copy of the Colt Police Positive. I think the spanish gun company was Orbea? It's not dimensionally identical to the Colt, but pretty darn close.

Cheers;
Lefty

Lefty-

Could be. Orbea sounds familiar, but maybe because I recognize the Eibar (?) company's name.

The model I mean was definitely a S&W copy, but they may have made a Colt one, too.

My Lytle models were the Luger, Mauser M-96, and a P-38. A pal had a Colt 1911 and a Cobra or Det. Special. The last had the short ejector rod used prior to 1958.

Lytle used to advertise in the back pages of, Field & Stream, I think, and in gun magazines.

Scary Gary · Aug 24, 2012

I just picked up a cast aluminum P-08 Luger and a Colt Cobra or Det. Special .
I found them at a military antique store The Raven here in Portland.
I'm so glad I found this thread my boy and I find this all very interesting.
My boy wants to know if anybody knows how much they are worth?

jlrhiner · Aug 24, 2012

Every now and then, I tinker around with lost wax casting. When winter gets here, I may try a gun shape.

Bat Guano · Aug 24, 2012

Back around 1959 I got an aluminum copy of a Colt Walker; "aged" it somewhat and removed enough aluminum from the grip area to put on some wood grip slabs; it actually looked pretty realistic. My folks had a wall display case made up for it and all in all it was good enough to fool the uninitiated. It was actually a bit smaller than the "real thing", aka current full size replicas.

Still have it, although it hasn't been on the wall for quite a long time. now.

Scary Gary · Aug 25, 2012

My boy and I just love these kinds of things.

cowart · Aug 25, 2012

Texas Star said:
The guns you mean were sold by Lytle Novelty Co., which I think is long out of business.

A blast from the past:

Texas Star · Aug 25, 2012

Cowart-

Wow! Thanks! Where'd you find that?!

That made my day and brought back many memories.

A pal who later became a lawyer had one of those Cobras. I defied him to wear it concealed at school, figuring he'd be caught and griped out. He wasn't detected.

The idea was his; I wasn't trying to get him into trouble. I was impressed at his getting away with it.

But back then, we even could bring historic guns to history class for Show and Tell. One fellow brought a Colt Navy .36 and a Spencer carbine that'd been in his family for generations.

Metal Dummy Guns.?

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