17 replies to this topic

[TommyGunner]

I was very happy to find these and thought I would share them with everyone. Also trying to get more info. I came in to the shop today and Tom was all excited about these guages he found in the shop. He forgot he even had them! Tom worked at NAC in the mid 70's and picked these out of the trash. These have kicked around in the shop unnoticed untill now. Needless to say we are currently tearing the shop apart and these things are everywhere! We keep finding more. He assures me that these are not made by west hurley but came in with all the AOC stuff when they bought it out. He said that they had drawers full of original blueprints as well. To bad he didn't think to get them as well.

The first pic is the guages we initially found. The 5 in the bottom right are butchered (I still have to get my shoe out of his ass for that!) He really knew not what he was doing at the time but he gets no sympathy from me!

The second pic shows a radius guage for the radius at the rear of the trigger guard on the frame where the grip fits in. I hope to put this back in service real soon!

The third pic is a closeup of some of the markings I found interesting AOC 21-28. Does anyone have any
info on these markings? Would love to figure this out. The top one is marked Geo. E. Goll so I would assume this was in use in savage production in 1940-44?

Thanks,
Damon

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[TommyGunner]

I have to do this in multiple posts for the board will only allow one pic upload per post.

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[TommyGunner]

and the last one...

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[colt21a]

gold plate them..and lets say $20,000 to the right collector,who cares about the history,the people who made them,the use they saw............its the MOOLAH........

wink!!

a nice set, preserve them and keep them......for the future years...........take care,ron

[billie32]

If you ever decide to sell them, let me know. I just love stuff like that...thanks for sharing!!!!

[full auto 45]

Damon, now you can make those parts to real specs!
Nice find. if you do let any go, contact me. There is a guy in central Indiana that has some of the original jigs they used at AOC for parts. What parts I don't know, but I'm working on tracking him down. I'm told he is within 20 miles of me.

[TommyGunner]

WOW! Been on air all day. In can't beleive that we found these amoung the tons of "junk" that is in the shop. It was right there under our noses the whole time. And we found a few more. And we haven't even finished searching yet. I spoke with Tracie Hill today and he seemed as excited as I. Actually he said he would like a call if we ever sell them and also asked to borrow them for the NRA exhibit in PA in April. He also would like to research and catalog them. Of course I will make them available. When I asked of him if he thought that this find could be important he replied "possibly extremely important" and that he was "tickled pink" that we had found them.

Doug R on the other hand, said that he was not so sure. He cited a case of an experimental m1a1 bolt that he had and no one was interested in it at all. He did ask if I would send them to him so he could look them over though.

Billie, Mike and Ron, If these turn out to be historically important...like the only ones left. Then they will disappear into my private collection and be loaned out occasionally for display. Hey I can't have the real thing...but I can have these! If they are of average importance...they may go up for sale and all will be notified. It is the historical importance that gets my blood flowing. Things that are valuable I will resell but important peices I have a hard time parting with. If they are important and the time comes that I will sell them...I would not just sell them to anyone. Phill My foremost concern is that important relics are preserved and available to share the history...not so much the money...but we sure are curious!

I will take more detailed pictures and post them in the long neglected research center of my site. Will post a direct link when I am done.

I hope in some small way this could contribute to our hobby.

Now if I could only get it into my head that Guage is spelt GAUGE! Nick...could we please have a spell checker?

Mike...please let me know what you find out about thoes fixtures...and what you plan to do.

Damon

[Zamm]

Damon,
That is such cool stuff, man, it's like finding King Tut's tomb in a way!
Fantastic!
More photo's please...
Best , Zamm

[John Jr]

I wonder if these were used to make some of the West Hurley guns pre MG ban.

Nice find.

Jr

[Arthur Fliegenheimer]

I would bet that these gauges date back to the Russell Maguire Auto-Ord era, circa 1940.

[John Jr]

The tooling that colt used belonged to AOC. Those gauges also say 28-21, possibly indicating they were used at colt.

Jr

[Arthur Fliegenheimer]

But since all manufacturing was completed by Colt/Auto-Ord by 1922, Auto-Ord would not need to make up new guages with the addition of the "28" markings after 1928 since the 28 was the same as the 21. Maguire would have them made up for his new crew (see qutoe at bottom of posting) for the Savage 28's and repairs to the Colt 1921's.

[TommyGunner]

John,

I had the same initial questions that you did. I also thought that the 28-21 would be a reference to the 28 and the colt. Tracie hill cleared that up for me. The 28 is the model number and the 21 is the part number. There are also numbers that indicate the operation the gauge (hey I spelled it right!) is designed to inspect. This is one of the things that Tracie is concerned about investigating. He wants to nail down what operations these were for and catalog them. I also assumed that Numrich would be using these as well. Tom said no way in hell when I asked him. He said that these things were scattered around junk drawers and piles...nobody paid any attention to them whatsoever. Perhaps if they did the westys would not need to be tuned up to run.

Arthur, very interesting! I do not have a copy of MR Helmers book. Would you have any refferences to substanciate that?

Zamm, well not quite as glorious a discovery as King Tuts tomb...but I certainly got a taste of the giddy high Carter must have felt when he shone the light through the hole he bored in the door and beheld those "Glorious Things". Unlike Carter however, I get to keep the treasure! I will post more pics soon...I am going to create diagrams of all the gauges with the markings since they are so hard to photograph due to the surface condition of some. Then I will send them off to Tracie so he can get to work on them.

After the search yesturday, we ended up with 13 complete guages (one is broken in 3 but complete) and 2 fragments. We are sure that there are more here but it will take some time to find them all. The treasure hunt continues! Hope that none slip through the cracks!

Thanks for all the reply's. Will let all know when the pics are done...most likely tonight for I have made this a top priority.

Damon

[gijive]

Damon,

Nice find! I agree with Arthur's assessment that these gauges are probably from the Russell Maguire era, but that doesn't make them any less significant.

I'll be looking forward to Tracie Hill's comments on these important pieces of Thompson history. I'm sure they will be the subject of future TCA Newsletters.

[TommyGunner]

GiJive, Thanks for your reply. It appears that Arthur and yourself may be correct about the provenance. I will anxiously await Tracies evaluation before I say for sure though. This is an exciting learning experience for me. Thanks again for the replies.

Damon

[TommyGunner]

Phil,

Thanks a bunch! Fear not for I have no plans to squander this collection. I too think about the important relics that were lost or destroyed and...it bugs me to. I will do everything I can to preserve them and keep them available for us to enjoy. After reading your post...I guess you are right...I have to rethink how I will transfer them to Tracie. BTW...sorry if I gave you guageitis! At least I am not the only one.

We found a couple more today and Here is a pic of all that we have found so far. The ones on the right collum are the fragments. The one on the bottom row third from the right is the complete but broken one. There are some interesting but very faint logo on the back of one of them that says something like "Ne???? NY Tool Co." The first word is very faint and could only make out the first two letter for sure. To bad they did not all have the "GEO. E. GOLL" like the one in the middle.

Maybe if we are lucky we can find one with the elusive but extremely valuable white lettering!

Damon

[Walter63a]

Damon, what a wonderful historical discovery! I hope you keep them in a very secure location and I would second what PhilOhio wrote. Transport them yourself, if necessary. Great story! Thanks for sharing. Regards, Walter

[TommyGunner]

Walter,

Fear not they are "secure". That safes a bitch to get to. And that pitbull has been known to lick men to pieces! Thanks for the reply.

Damon

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