scratch and dent.....

do you mind scratches and dings on your guns?

  • Yes

    Votes: 31 13.6%

  • No

    Votes: 56 24.6%

  • Depends on the induvidual gun

    Votes: 141 61.8%
  • Total voters
    228
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bluestarlizzard

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Oct 25, 2007
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Location
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my dad has a friend. lou has some guns and he likes his guns. he has mostly hunting rifles, as well as a couple handguns. Lou often will refinish a gun if it gets the slightest scratch. if a gun in his house gets scratched he flips out.
my dad, on the other hand, could care less. he scratched the slide on his 1911A1 the other day and just shruged "its a 1911A1, its not supposed to be pretty". holster wear, scratches and dings don't even rate a frown.
i would say i'm in the middle. my revolver had heavy holster wear when i bought it, my 10/22 doesn't have any scratches but i won't care if it does and my 4/10 gauge was a 90 doller gun (although i did give dad crap when he spilled a little gun scrubber on the stock and messed up the finish). but there are guns out there that i would consider works of art and if i had, say a pretty 1911 (and i'm a girl so its not a pimp gun if i do!) i would hit the roof if it got dinged.

so i wanna know what side of the fence you sit on. are all you guns as shiny as the day you bought them or do they show signs of wear?

* by the by, i'm talking PURELY COSMETIC boo boos, and not anything that would impead the function of the firearm.
 
For the most part, no. I voted for "depends" though.

The only guns I try to keep pretty are my grandfather's 10/22 (mine is kinda beat up though), and my blued Thompson 1927. All others are tools, and treated as so.

I'd say most of us have at least one or two we try to keep pretty, the votes reflect that so far.
 
I own a few pistols and rifles. One of the rifles has a stainless action and barrel, and one of my pistols (a 1911) is stainless. If either of them was to get a ding, I wouldn't like it, but unless it were severe, it would not affect the degree to which they would be protected from the elements. I know that it's not the same thing as aircraft grade stainless, but it is still better than unprotected metal. But the other guns are all blued, and anything that marred the finish and exposed the metal underneath it seems to me would make them more susceptible to rust. I would want to get them refinished as soon as possible, or at least re-blue the damaged area.

The lone exception is my old 1943 Ithaca 1911A1. I try not to scratch it because it still has most of the original finish, but neither do I want to refinish it. So I don't shoot it as much as I used to, and I keep it cleaned and oiled.
 
Most of my guns have wear and it doesn't bother me. I purchased them to enjoy.

I try to limit the wear on a few of my guns, but not at the expense of enjoying them.

When I'm buried with them, I won't be able to clean 'em anyway.........;)
 
The first scratch usually hurts a little after that I'm good

But almost all of my guns are bought used so someone else has taken care of that issue anyway
 
I've been contemplating the same thing with my 25-20 Savage.
The metal work had been painted over with black laquer when the gun was new, by the original owner to avoid rusting while hunting in rough weather and cold dewy mornings no doubt. When I removed the last shreds of the paint I found the bluing to be 100% on the Barrel/receiver and only very slightly worn on the triggerguard.
The stock is in very nice shape as well except for one glaring scratch which looks to be about thirty or forty years old. I can't tell if the stock has ever been refinished or touched up but I think not.
The bore is perfect, whoever owned it before me had taken very good care of it. I'd bet they shed a tear when they put that scratch on the stock.

Though I could easily refinish the stock, that would take away some of its character, which is more important to me than its collector value.

Don't know what I'll ever do with it, should be good for Turkey and Ground Hog though.
 
The nice 1911, the trap gun, grandpops 30-30....yeah I like em perfect.

The Glocks, shooters, CCW, AR's - nah...use em and have fun!
 
This is kinda like having a brand new car. Sooner or later it's going to get dinged, and after that, all the other inveitable nicks and scracthes don't really bother as much.

I view all my shooters as tools that are going show some wear sooner or later.
 
it depends if I am trying to buy it or sell it!

look, wear happens, but it also affects the value of a gun. Two equally mechanically sound guns, one where the owner was extra careful and there are no dings and scratches, the other banged up, to me, the 'clean' one is worth more.

Does the deer care? No. Does the bad guy care? No. Does the paper target care? No.

but the pocketbook, it cares!
 
I try to keep my Colt 1911 Combat Commander in shape - just a couple of minor dings on it since I bought it new in 1982.

But almost all of my guns are bought used so someone else has taken care of that issue anyway
Click to expand...


I try to keep them nice, too, but it doesn't really bother me if they get a little worn.
 
I have a few guns that only see the range and are kept perfect. My run of the mill carry and hunting guns have "character"
 
I have several (especially my carry guns) that I don't care about.

Strangely enough one that I try to keep pretty pristine is my old CZ-52, but that's 'cause it's really in such nice shape right now).

I'll also cry when my nickel CZ-75B finally gets a scratch. Other than that I guess I really don't care.
 
Guns, to me, are just tools. I don't much care about cosmetics as long as they work.
 
It seems every gun I purchase I keep with an idea that I may have/want to sell it one day; I try to keep them all looking as new as possible (including all boxes paperwork etc.). Maybe its the EBay mentality, or a throw-back to when I had to trade something in to get something new (which was too often).
 
Yes. Mostly. Some give character. Normal wear is OK. Abuse is hard to look at.
 
Honest wear = Character, a good thing. Stupid scratches from careless handling... grrrr, kinda annoying... especially on an otherwise pristine finish.
sigh

Scratches on old S&W or Colt deep blued highly polished handguns :eek:
 
I voted "depends."
I have an M-1 Carbine my father brought back from Korea. The wood has ... well, some scratches. Now the stock is perfectly serviceable, and there is nothing major. Those dings and scratches tell a story. The gun was used in late WW2 and Korea, and if it only could talk ... if it only could talk ...

I also have a Uberti 1873 Winchester, which has a couple minor tiny dings which truly DID annoy me ... and if it got another ding that would still annoy me.
 
Every single one of my guns has a flaw, and it really doesn't bug me too much.

Read a great sci-fi novel once. Main character was an OSS-type in the future, and before heading out on his next mission, he stopped by the quartermaster to get fitted out for his infiltration into a pirate organization. Before he left, however, he also procured some brown shoe polish, a chisel, some tape, and (I tihnk) some random wire. He then proceeded to beat the heck out of his pristine, new, M2212-B Gauss Rifle much to the shock and annoyance of the armorer and quartermaster. :p

"What happened out there?"
"I felt like destroying something beautiful..."
- Brad Pitt and Ed Norton, Fight Club
 
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