The first, "big dollar" (for me at the time) Winchester I bought was a M1886 SRC in .45/90 (gunshow in Houston, TX). My Dad's '86 in .33 WCF is the gun that started it all for me when I was a very young boy. Anyway, when I started collecting (in my late teens) I wanted to add 86's to my collection. The time came where I had added a few rifles but the SRC was a holy grail for me - and one in a .45/90 really got my blood going. I ended up selling two nice Winchesters at the show (one was a M1895 .405 takedown) just to get the cash to buy this '86 SRC. I got it and later discovered that two tap holes had been welded up for a Lyman receiver sight. Sometimes guns can be very forgiving and the cost of tuition on this incident turned out to be zero. I got my money back out of it - with full disclosure of the holes!
By the way, back to LBK's gun, I will say that we are looking at pictures here and pictures are not always completely accurate. I noted that Rory's very first post that poses the question about LBK's wood possibly having been sanded, acknowledges this:
"gorgeous rifle but that picture does make it look sanded."
