doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Model 50

Mention of Carbine Williams on Jim's thread reminded me of a question that I always wanted answered: Why did the Model 50 fall out of favour?

I bought the first model with metal barrel in the early 50s, stuck on a Polychoke, and it performed flawlessly with extraordinarily soft recoil, passed it on to my son.

It was different!

Simple....bad designs don't stand the test of time.

Because of the 1964 Winchester direction change. Even though the 50-59 platform had so many firsts, they bet the farm on the 1400. Even those that get the big bucks aren't right always,, ever?!?

Winchester has had a long and sad history of Fubared autoloaders- bet Old Bennett was kicking himself in the ass for turning down John Browning's great Auto-5 design circa 1903- he was too cheap to pay John a royalty on each one- the rest is history.

Cabelas had a Model 11 for sale- in the lower-tier price level outside the Gun Library here in MI- I finally convinced the Gun Dept mgr. that it was known as "The Widow maker"- and was not a safe design- Then the Model 40 came along pre-WW21. Replaced at a loss to WRA, by a Model 12, as they had many bugs that developed in the field- WRA has always been in a hurry to have a good performing autoloader-such is life.

I have friends who still grouse hunt and like the Model 59- I can't shoot one worth sour owl shit- too damn butt heavy and muzzle light- now a Model 12- that's a whole 'nother ball game.

I hate the swing and handling of the Model 50/59's. To me that alone killed them. Some guns just are an extension of your arm and some are not. I never picked up a 59 that I wanted to shoot and by the time I was buying my first gun the 59 was a dead horse. Heck even the used market was almost zero for them.

The failure to agree with John Browning cost Winchester more than just the A5, which was a huge, but it closed the door to most of John Browning's designs going forward. He had sold them countless designs before, many they never put into production and his A5 design and patent made their attempts to get around his patent very problematic. The Widow maker was one such attempt. In short the failure to grant him a royalty for the A5 cost them millions of dollars and made their rivals much stronger in the end.

Look at it this way. Winchester has a very loyal collector/shooter following who think every thing they every made is worth a premium price. Browning has a equal strong collectors/shooter group. Now if he paid the simple royalty both those groups would be one bigger Winchester group which would dominate. Winchester would have dominated the US gun market for decades and Remington might have stayed the a minor half of the ammo/gun maker group.

Thanks, all hands. I bought mine new, used it two-man provincial skeet competitions but still would have put only three or four thousand rounds through it, competition and afield. It would have had the bad trigger, later anticipated by shooters and reason enough to give it a pass. Question answered; thank you.

What is this bad trigger you speak of? Please elaborate. I acquired a Model 50 a few years ago and gave it to my son. If there's a safety issue I'd like to know!

Steve

The words may not have been appropriate concerning the trigger and the model, rockdoc. See Researcher just above, please. I gave mine to my son, too, and he had no complaints.