I love reviving old guns to shooting condition and needed a beater to leave in my cabin. I've always, like many country people (former, in my case) kept a single shot .410 for "things that go 'bump' in the night," and wanted another.
Found an Iver Johnson "Champion," a very common gun behind the back door of ranches and cabins when I was a kid (they came in many hardware store brands, too. The one I remember was "Bay State"--they were made in MA).
This one cost well under $100, including all the CA tax and background check bumf, so I got it. It is complete and functional, with a chip off the tip of the forend, a chunk off the plastic buttplate, and the whole gun brown "patina" with only minor pitting. Bore is clean except darkness in the choke area.
Serial number is 68601A, and a source on the internet tells me that those with s single letter suffix on the serial number were made between 1909 and 1919. That makes it a gun made before Winchester introduced the 3" Mighty Magnum shells in 1935, and it is not marked "For 3" ctgs." like most of the guns made for them are.
But a 3" snap cap drops right into the chamber, so I take it that the gun was re-chambered for 3" shells at some point. I've seen IJs and other cheap singles that have been fired with 3" shells WITHOUT rechambering. Sooner or later they "shoot loose"--a space develops between the barrel and the standing breech and case heads start bulging ahead of the rim. I've never see any worse symptoms than that, but suspect that there may have been some, especially with the cheapest guns (there were much worse-made guns than the IJ....). I once saw a Winchester Model 20, cute as can be, but wrecked that way--you had to knock fired cases out of it with a cleaning rod!
I intend to shoot only 2 1/2" shells in this gun--they are enough to kill varmints like snakes and possums and old Mr. Coon at very close range and clean the rats and pigeons out of the barn. There are "home defense" loads (I have some) that will serve for social interactions of the middle-of-the-night variety--if not I always bring a heavy-frame Ruger DA.38 when at the cabin. The IJ is tight at the breech, so I suspect that that 3" shells weren't fired in it much before the rechambering, but it's 'way over a century old and I'm too old to be an experimenter.
I intend to refinish the wood, replace the buttplate with one from Classic Gun Grips, and remove any surface rust with bronze wool, Kroil, and elbow grease. Then I'll Cerracote it matte black and shoot it with a couple of skeet 2 1/2" shells and a borrowed welder's visor.
FINALLY to my questions: 1) can anyone get a more definitive date of manufacture for the serial number? 2) Am I right about 1935 being the first date that factory guns were chambered for 3" .410 shells? 3) What's the best way to get rid of the roughness (lead fouling? Plastic?) in the choke area without making the barrel walls too thin? (I don't care what choke this gun is--the less the better in my experience of many .410s....
Thanks for any insights you can spare, except please don't advise me to take up rescuing cats instead of clunkers!
Mike Armstrong aka Mesa
Last edited by Mesa; 06/04/21.
