List of Mismatched Upper and Lower S/N's

[Rimcrew]

Is there a listing somewhere of S/N's for mismatched guns, or lowers without a home?

 

I used to spend a lot of time on the FAL forum, and we had a master listing of Argentinian parts kits so that folks could find the matching S/N's for their kits. It reunited some parts and made guns numbers-matching again.

 

I was wondering if such a list exists for Thompson's, and if not, I would be happy to start, and maintain, one.

 

With the large number of mis-matched guns, it would be really cool to see parts reunited, and guns made whole again.

 

 

 

 

[dalbert]

Rimcrew,

 

Sounds like you're on point for this project!

 

David Albert

dalbert@stirmgewehr.com

[Rimcrew]

On it sir!

[gijive]

Rimcrew,

 

Are you referring to the 15,000 Colt guns or WWII 1928/1928A1 Models? If you are speaking of the Colt guns, there probably would be no way to tell how many are mismatched. The few registered Colt Thompsons in collections with mis-matched numbers wouldn't amount to many I would think, maybe a couple of dozen or so? The Colt Thompson grip frames that are in collections are normally from guns that were unregistered and had the receivers destroyed. If you are talking about WWII guns, I don't even think that would be worth the effort. Of all the parts kits returned from Russia in the past decade or so, virtually all of the receivers were destroyed/cut, as well There would be no receivers to match up with WWII grip frames even if you did try to compile a list of the hundreds, maybe thousands of Thompson parts kits that made it back here in the past fifteen years or so.

[dalbert]

Chuck makes good points. It would probably be more useful for mismatched drums.

 

David Albert

dalbert@stirmgewehr.com

[Rimcrew]

Maybe I don't know what I don't know...

 

I was thinking that if most WWII guns went through an arsenal rebuild process, whereby receivers and lower frames were reassembled without regard to S/N's matching, perhaps we could reunite some of those mis-matched parts. The list may become large, but Excel doesn't care and is easy to search.

 

Would the likelihood of reuniting parts be too small for the effort involved?

 

I'd be happy to do something for drums, if that has greater merit, or both - but it looks like I need more guidance here...

[jim c 351]

Rimcrew,

There have been attempts in the past to match up Colt drum's.

A question to ask is,--how successful has this been ?

Jim C

[gijive]

Maybe I don't know what I don't know...

 

I was thinking that if most WWII guns went through an arsenal rebuild process, whereby receivers and lower frames were reassembled without regard to S/N's matching, perhaps we could reunite some of those mis-matched parts. The list may become large, but Excel doesn't care and is easy to search.

 

Would the likelihood of reuniting parts be too small for the effort involved?

 

I'd be happy to do something for drums, if that has greater merit, or both - but it looks like I need more guidance here...

Rimcrew,

 

Yes, many of the arsenal rebuilds would have mismatched numbers, but you can't get the information from BATF on the guns that are registered. You would have to contact the individual owners that have registered Thompsons with mismatched numbers and some of them may be reluctant to divulge the numbers. Many Thomspons that were imported in the1950's and 1960,s were sold to law enforcement by various firms and some of these were likely arsenal rebuilds that may have had mismatched numbers, but the other mismatched parts are probably still in foreign countries or destroyed by now. I am not trying to discourage you but with all the Thomspons made during WWII and the relatively small amounts that were brought back to this country, I think that the odds of reuniting many receivers and grip frames would be pretty slim. Good luck if you attempt to do it, however.

[giantpanda4]

It is possible to match up lowers with uppers. Those of you who went to either TATA or TCA this past year saw my presentation about reuniting three Thompson lowers with their respective uppers. Two of these were Colt's.

 

So... the method I used worked when I had the mismatched (or unmatched) lowers, not the uppers. Then using Gordon's book - try to find out who has the uppers. A little research on one of the lowers led me to all three - even a GI Savage gun.

 

Not an easy task. If you had an upper with a mismatched lower, the lower probably still exists but who knows where. If you had the lower but no upper, as GIJive mentioned - the upper probably does not exist anymore.

 

I agree with making a list - especially of the serial numbers of the Colt guns with mismatched of GI lowers. They stand a chance of being found. There are too many GI guns out there, and so many have their original lower numbers ground and restamped.

 

I also think a Board member here already has a C drum mismatched serial number list. Maybe he will chime in.

Edited February 19, 2019 by giantpanda4

[Autorotate]

I think it’s a worthy undertaking, even if it helps just one gun/owner find the correct and matching lower to his upper or vice versa. Odds are long no doubt, but if you have the know how, talent and time then go,for it!

[Sandman1957]

Does this need to be a "pinned" like thread on this site to make it easy to keep the list and note variations on the lowers. That would make it simpler to add SNs and it will be easy to view.