Bought an old Darne ( 1 piece stock; 6xxx SN) on GB last week. I suspected a copy or F. Darne, but I believe it is a true Darne; the logo and all the proofs look correct. It needs a lot of work and wasn't worth it, but I wanted a fixer upper of a different sort to work on for the practice. It was adverised as an R10, but it is marked as R 89 with a single five pointed mark beside it (looks like a star made of sticks). The engraving isn't total, but looks like quite a bit more than is usually seen on an R10. Any one with an idea on the grade marking?

Also odd, the barrels are a tight 16 gauge 65mm chamber. Barrels are marked 17.0,but check out at around .690, even though the wall thicknesses are still relatively robust (I presume they have been honed/bored). Barrels look to have been reblued in the far past, but the color doesn't appear to match (changes at the joint) and the barrels have either been sleeved or this was a monoblock gun. The 17.0 mm marking is on the barrels, not the chamber section. Would this gun have been from the period when monoblocks were used?

Altogether a trainwreck, but I took it on for a reason. Just curious about some of the anomilies.

This one?

https://www.gunbroker.com/item/936264371

That one is a very old 1894 patent R model Darne. The R89 marking is irrelevant to our discussion. The grade mark is the first iteration of the Darne grade identification. If the seller had given us a clear photo of the opening lever, we would see capital block letters that spelled out the name Darne. Later guns have the familiar tail off the D that encircles the name. It is an R10, from the era where an R10 was a fairly high grade gun. The model A and C Darnes were all lower grade guns, stepping up to an R model was a sign you were at the higher end of the working class. Note the 6.5 chamber length markings, and the proof with powder S. I’m a bit concerned that I can’t see the barrel serial number. You want it to match the sliding breech number.
An old bird, for sure. Very early 1900s, perhaps specified with proof using powder S, or, built just prior to 1900. Hard to say for sure.

But, I’m in the ball park.

Good luck. Model A and model C Darne photos attached, just to give the barn hinge gun guys nightmares.




Best,
Ted

That's the one. The engraving and action are in pretty nice shape. All the numbers match and it all fits and functions well. As I mentioned, the barrels are not in the condition he alluded to in the listing. They are solid, but the bores have a lot of pitting from one end to the other. That said, I have rebored three older guns in the last 2 months,and this one has much more pitting than them but none of the pits are anywhere near what they were as far as depth. I would estimate based on those barrels that .002 to .003 will clean both barrels up and leave MWT at over .035 in the front and .050 in the middle with excellent thickness left in the chambers and forcing cones. Surprising since the barrels appear to have been bored .030 already, based on the barrel markings. They were double proofed however, so they apparently had very thick walls to start with. If If the barrels clean up with good thickness, I may have someone repair the rib. If not, I will just do it myself (I have done this a few times in the past) and shoot the gun with subgauge tubes. If they clean up well, I will limit them to low pressure loads.

This is the first Darne I have owned. I have owned a couple of Charlin before, and am surprised at the difference in action . The Charlin are the smoothest operating guns I have seen. This one is in the same leagueof smoothness, but it is a distinct two stage process., It is very stiff and abrupt in coming to the extraction point and then quick and smooth in moving to the open position. The 2 Charlin seem like one smooth process.The Charlin are old lower grade guns with no safeties.

I was surprised that this gun was for sale not far from where I live, in light of the fact that I passed on buying one like your bottom photo just a few months ago on GB. It was even closer to me and sold for less than $500, if I remember correctly. It struck me at the time as being a fundamentally weak design.

It may be I live in a hotbed of ROD's (Real Old Darnes).

I haven’t met any “fundamentally weak” French sporting firearms designs. I’m guessing French proof laws weeded that stuff out.

I wouldn’t lose any sleep over shooting a gun with .050 wall thickness after a pit cleanup hone.

You no doubt grasp that a Charlin and a Darne are completely different designs at this point. It is hard to explain to someone who may have seen one, or, the other, or, more often still, neither. The smoothness thing isn’t really a thing unless the gun is cocked, and you are just cycling the action. Opening the gun after the shot, when it recocks requires the same effort in all of the sliding breech designs

Good luck with your new project. I never recommend sliding breech guns as projects, but, do enjoy it.

Best,
Ted

6.5 chambers = 1889 to 1912 per our previous dating early French shotguns line.

The gun is early enough they are still noting the gold medal they won at exposition, pre 1900, and late enough that it has barrels that were produced in-house.

Unique gun that should be a lot of fun once it has a bit of cleanup.

Best,
Ted

Ted, in which world's fair did Darne win gold medals? Just curious for history. 1889 - the "Tour D'Effel" fair?

Ted know Darne's. Hurricanes come in September. But this French site is pretty cool:
http://www.littlegun.info/arme%20francaise/artisans%20c%20d/a%20darne%20fr.htm

Ted knows all things Darne. An important Darne Tedism: To remove the barrel: Never depress the action spring with anything harder than a plastic top to a Sharpie. Thumb is better. The spring is serrated on the free end where it is slotted and a metal tool can break the spring and good luck finding a replacement. Whoever reblued the barrels had the good sense not to blue the sliding action. Gil

Thanks for all the information.
As to projects Ted, I appreciate your stand on project Darnes, but in my mind that is most apropo to the actions. I have worked on and built guns for most of my life, including some target rifles that have won national championships. I really don't see that barrel or stock work should be any different than any other shotgun. In fact, the French guns I own have had rather robust barrels to work with. This gun particularly having only a top rib should be an easy rib repair. I agree totally about the actions though. Given the rarity of parts and the general strangeness, I would not buy one if that were the problem.

Darne part are for the most part custom made replacement items. There are just no vast number of donor guns here to draw them from. Interesting design and a classic looking gun that other than Charlins have no similar competition. I thought about buying a 24 ga. Darne at one time until it dawned on me that the 24 was a under performing 28 for what it could do. Stuck between 20 and 28 with both doing the same job, for less. Still it would be nice to have a long barreled, small bore to add to the collection. So many guns, so little time. Good luck with your project.

Salut,

Un vieux Darne comme je les aime !

D'après les poinçons, ce fusil Darne modèle R11 a été fabriqué dans la période 1902/1907.

Si tu observes avec une loupe l'étoile qui désigne le modèle, tu feras une petite découverte.
Fais-en part au forum ;-)

Je rajoute à cette liste une médaille d'or à l'exposition de Saint-Etienne en1904.

Bonjour Fab, Bon vendredi! Merveilleux de voir votre écriture. Je reste un étudiant en développement de la Darne. Très sincèrement vôtre,





Best,
Ted

Gene,
Fab beat me to it. I have the same page from a catalog around here, somewhere, that I was going to post.

I’m a Darne student, same as all of us.I just caught the bug earlier.

Best,
Ted

Salut Ted,
Nous sommes tous des étudiants.
Bon week-end avec un peu d'avance.

"Gagnant des Grand Prix de Tir aux Pigeons de Monte-Carlo"

M. Jornu won the Grand Prix du Casino in 1896; M. Moncorge in 1899. I haven't found the guns they used.
There were of course other Prix each season including Prix de Monte Carlo, Grand Prix de Cloture and Grand Poule D’Essai

Gene,
I poked around that site, the little straight stocked 20 gauge with proof marks for powder M caught me eye. That would be a neat little Grouse gun in this part of the world. I’m thinking 15.8 is actually 19 bore, but, the Grouse and woodcock wouldn’t care.

Thanks for linking to it.

Best,
Ted

After I started this thread and time went by, I realized that in unpacking the gun and immediately going to the markings, I completely forgot to examine the stock inlay in the heel end of the comb. You can see it in part of the third picture in the listing. I went down and examined it this morning and was really impressed. It is a silver stock medallion (for want of a better term) formed of two interlaced highly stylized capital R's. It is formed in a completely filligreed style with the interlaced letters completely inlet into the wood, including the tiny islands. The whole thing is secured with the tiniest pin I can remember and there is even a small amount of engraving on the letters. The inletting is absolutely perfect all around the tiny details. Total size is a little over 3/4" x 1/2". Wish I had an easy way to post here and show this detail. It's the kind of thing that puts me in awe of old craftsmen.

You can email me the pics, and I’ll get them up for you.

tedjs@usfamily.net

Many French guns have those wonderful interwoven initials in gold and silver inlaid in the wood. It was a thing up until about 1920. I’m not a fan of gold on guns, but, if I found a gun that had it, and I wanted the gun, I’d deal with it.

Best,
Ted

I decided to try imgur and will give it a try here.

Here is the stock shield I mentioned. The dark backgrounds are the stock wood itself, the shield having been totally inlet, including the filligree. The color has changed, apparently from the effect of silver tarnish.




Note: I tried the preview and the image appeared in the note. I had never considered trying this because I see so many posts on the internet that have lists of links to imgur where you have to click on each image link and return. I realize now that a lot of people are simply listing the link and not the proper imbedding link.

Would be cool if your initials are PR.

Those woven precious metal inlays seemed to be a feature that disappeared around 1920.
The same can be said of sculpted detonation (breech balls) another stylistic feature that either fell out of fashion, or, cost too much money when everything was said and done. Earlier still, those trigger guards with the extensive metalwork on the front, the French name of which escapes me at the moment, went away also. I would think the things just got in the way, but, don’t know if tastes changed or the economy simply wouldn’t brook artwork on a consumer shotgun.

Photo of the aforementioned detonation. I like it:



Best,
Ted

Just wanted to resurrect this thread to mention a reprinted catalog I just bought. Cornell offers a copy of the Darne 1909 catalog and I got a copy when oredering some other items. It came and I realized it was connected to the gun discussed in this thread from August. As luck would have it, from the catalog I deduce that 1909 was the year they brought out a new model of the R series. They offer for sale the Model C 1881, the Model D 1909, the Model A 1907, the Model R 1894, the Model R 1909 and the Model P 1898. Certainly an interim year. I read enough French to just barely get the gist and often am wrong, but it appears that in those years, they Model R 1894 was available in grades R11 to 14 and the Model R 1909 in grades 15, 16 and Perfection. The Model P 1898 was offered in grades 17 and 18, although the Model P is referred to as the Perfection.

I find it odd that the catalog shows no listing at all for an R10. I thought that maybe the base gun was an R10 and the others upgrades, but the main sections list a price range for each Model, and they match exactly the tariff listed for each specific grade level, leaving no room for a base model in the range. I have to take this to mean there was no R10 grade during this period. The 2,3,4,7 and 8 are for the older models. Found that interesting in light of the fact that most people assume an unmarked older gun is automatically an R10. I am not certain that is always the case. A base gun is still a base gun, but not necessarily the specific model presumed.

There is also a chart in the introduction which shows powder and shot loads for proof levels 1 through 10 and the upper ones look pretty severe. They present a sample proof record of a set of 12 gauge barrels from 1908. The barrels were 66 cm., the barrelsweighed 1450 gm, and the gun was assembled and finnished. The gun passed 7 successive proofs, the first was a light charge. The 2nd through 7th were proof levels Premiere thru Sixieme. A normal proof was20 gr of powder and 120 gr of shot. Level 6 was 30 gr of powder and 200 gr of shot. Even the desireable triple proof was 24gr of powder and 150 gr of shot. Pretty impressive. Reminds me of someof Sherman Bell's work.

Ted, one final question, I had not noticed your comment above in the previous post, but what would be the possible significance of a PR crest? That is actually what I had assumed it represented.

AGS, if you'd like to post photographs of the catalog, I'll read through it over the holidays and post the important parts. FAB500 will know this stuff but you can never tell what's in it and you can't really use a photograph in Google translate. Gene

It would more than likely be someone’s initials. The higher the grade of French gun, the more likely you are to see those intertwined initials, usually in gold. I’ve seen them with three initials, as well. Anyone, who had anything to do with this gun, when it was new, is no longer alive to tell us anything about it.
It would be nice if the guns could talk. But, they can’t.

Do enjoy your Darne.

Best,
Ted

Three initials would be a monogram

I will try to post it when I get a chnce. I can decipher a little French (thanks public school) and am pretty sure about the things I posted. The thing I gathered from the product section was that it seems obvious that while people talk about grade levels, it doesn't seem that during this period of their history Darne made a lot of grades in each Model. They offered multiple Models with generally 2-3 grade levels within each Model. The grades increased sequentially through all the Models, ordered by percieved quality of Model. The grades were not complete, with gaps between Models.

Keep in mind that they sold several lines of completely different and unique actions at the time the 1909 catalog was current. As the years went by, the model A and model C dropped out of production. Eventually, it was just sliding breech guns, the model R, P and V.

The grades fill in at around the time of the 1936 catalog. The Halifax model appeared around the turn of the century, and some years, one, two or three models of the brazed barrel Halifax were cataloged.

Sometime after the war, Darne began cataloging and selling an O/U, known as the SB. They were cataloged and grade marked separately than the sliding breech guns. I imported and sold exactly one of them, a straight stocked 12 with double triggers. Mechanically, it seemed to be similar to a Winchester 101. I’m not positive, but, that may have been the only SB ever imported to the US. Wes Gilpin told me he never had anyone interested in one. The gent that ordered the SB fell off a ladder before the gun came, and never was able to use the gun due to his injuries. Last I spoke to him, his father used the gun, but, he is all of 80 years old. It was a bit of a sad story.

Best,
Ted