With Lefevers it is inadvisable to say Never or Always. Some I grades have surfaced in 16ga. To the best of my knowledge the I was not listed in any LAC catalogs, only the DS. Bob Eliot pictured one in his book with a SD&G mark, but as I recall it carried the regular Lefever Arms Co name on it.
Also to date I have seen no reference to any grade of Lefever ejector gun which had the gun itself stamped with the grade + E as IE, FE etc. The were lisred that way in the catalogs, but the guns seem to carry only the grade mark.
I personally never heard anything about the I being a replacement for the G. When the G grade was introduced in the early '90's (with damascus bbls) it was the lowest grade. The H came along about 1898 with twist bbls while the I/DS came on the scene around 1901 & generally had steel bbls, though a few were made with twist. Also though there are exceptions here as well, they normally lacked the doll's head, cocking indicators & had an uncapped half pistol grip & a forend lacking either a metal tip or escutcheon & were devoid of ngraving. The H & G both stayed in the line-up till production ended, so I can see no evidence of the I replacing the G. Unless something has come up recently I have an H grade with the "Two" highest SN's known to be in existence. It is stamped H & has H features of doll's head, cocking indicators, twist bbls & scroll on the sideplates. On the other hand the wood, both stock & forend, seem to be of DS configuration.
