My granddad had a Remington 870 12 ga. 2 3/4" with a PXX barrel code. (June 1951) Originally it was a full choke gun, but he added a Lyman adjustable choke in the 60s. I shot my first pheasant with it almost 40 years ago. The barrel and receiver have matching ser. #s...108018V. It was always well cared for, but...it was in a house fire about 6 years ago. No fire damage, but it has rusted some from the toxic smoke. I know it's not worth much as a collector, but are these things still desirable as a shooter? I was thinking of having the metal reblued and just refinishing the stock myself. It has the original cut checkering that could be recut and made half way decent again. Any thoughts?

Thanks in advance.

6.5Gibbs:

I think I may be somewhat older than you and have to ask. Are you sure it's a an 870 - and not its predecessor, the Mod.31? I used a Mod. 31 in that time (1951) and frankly, I don't remember the 870 until much later. The point may be important because perhaps a Mod. 31 may be worth something to a collector. The Mod. 31 was originally designated in advertising as the "Wingmaster" and the name was carried over to the 870. Just a thought.

Didn't the 31 have an aluminum receiver?

Yep, it's an 870 Wingmaster. I always thought he had bought it in the early 60s...only because I thought that's when they started making them. I went to Remington's website and it showed that they started making them in '49 (same year production ended for the model 32). Here is the link to their site:

http://www.remington.com/library/history/firearm_models/shotguns.asp

After thinking that they started making them in the early 60s and I checked the PXX date code and saw June of 1951 I thought "what the heck???", which led me to Remingtons site. I still have the original owners manual and the date of publication is "Rev. 4-14-50"

Thanks though!

PS I'm surprised you even answered after my goof on the other post!

PSS I'm 47, so you must be a tad older.

I have shot more game with my old 16ga. wingmaster then my newer one. It is deadly accurate with slugs and it does a nice job on bunnies and pheasants. It is true Remington started making the 870 in 1949. maybe you might want to get er reblued and keep it around a while

Sounds like a 100 dollar gun to me.
lots of them around them one has damage

Hard to say without seeing a picture, but based on rust commetn and the polychoke (nothing wrong with how they work though), I would say $150 to $200 TOPS.

Great shooters though.

How did you look up the serial #'s?

I have an old 870 that was my grandfathers. He won it as an employee of the month, those days are gone, history happens. I also have a model 600 that has a four digit serial # and have wondered about date of manufacture on both of these. Nate

6.5Gibbs:

I was astonished that the 870 (a great favorite of mine, incidentally,) had started manufacture as early as 1949. I stand corrected and apologize if I started you off on a wild goose chase about the Mod. 31. (Yeah, I do have a few years on you. I'm 76,soon to be 77)

onefunzr2 (Dave)

I am quite sure my Mod.31 did not have an aluminum receiver. Whether there were optional Mod. 31s that did- I just don't know. In fact, I don't remember any aluminum receivers on an American shotgun in the '40s or even the '50s. ( Typing this I was thinking about the Ithaca "Featherlite", Mod.37 and even that one I don't remember an aluminum receiver. {I owned one for one season so I can't claim long experience with it} I'll stick my neck out and say that I think most shotgunners were traditionalists and the idea of an aluminum receiver would have made many of us very wary -me anyway!

quote:

How did you look up the serial #'s?

You can't look up the serial numbers...you look up the 2 or 3 digit letter code on the left side of the barrel next to the receiver/action. Go here to check your codes:

http://oldguns.net/sn_php/remdates.php

or

http://www.remingtonsociety.com/rsa/questions/barrelcodes

It's kinda fun finding out when some of those Remingons were made.