Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Savage Collectors CE< PE< DE

Anybody hunt one? Curious if any make it out in the woods.

Anything to talk about, or post mil pos?

I have a 99DE in 308 that had been hunted when I bought is for $375 at a gun show in Wichita, KS, back in 1992. I hunted with it once or twice and then cleaned it, sprayed it with Rust Guardit, and put it into the box where it has been for the past quarter century.

The DE is the model with the scroll engraving on the side rather than the game scenes, iirc. Looks a little like the early Savage scrollwork.

No love for the first engraved 99 since the 1940's.

Not much interest on my part, but high end guns never really turned my screws.

I think the PE, DE's only had exterior changes and shouldn't hunt any different than the standard products of the time...other than for the more reflective surface.

Given the increase in value, even for "hunted" rifles, the majority have been retired to the collectors rack.

Hand engraved or machine made on these? Murrays book shows the DE @$285 and the PE @ $360 in 1970. Inflation calculator shows a multiplier of 6.3 for todays $. A couple grand for an engraved 99 with high end wood? Seems pretty cheap to me.

*Answered my own question by reading the fine print in Murrays-

Hand engraved on the PE, scroll engraved on the DE. I'm guessing hand engraved on the CE.

I've heard rumors that the PE and DE receivers were sent to Germany for engraving. David

Also what I've heard. Rick, did JTC pass that tidbit along to us?

The one PE I have says 99M on the receiver like a DL.
Different game scenes on the receivers of the PE and CE, although both have an elk on one side and a cat on the other. The cat's different.

DL, PE and DE's all are marked 99M. The "M" stands for Monte Carlo as in Monte Carlo stock. John Alan may have told me that they were engraved in Germany. The engraving on the PE and CE are similar but not identical. See pages 98, 99 and 109 of my book. The elk on the left side of the RMEF commemorative is similar too, see p. 110. David

David I can't find your book since I moved, along with a few other things like the rangefinder. They're probably all together, somewhere.

I thought that the early PE, DE's were German engraving but they were not fast enough and later ones were done in Japan. Might be why there are bright and dull finishes (?). A lot of nice Winchester reproduction rifles have come from Japan. I have a couple of the Browning Winchester Model 52C Sporters, Model 53 (sold) and a 65.

Rick what were the early blued ones? The German ones?

I wondered why the PE was dull and the CE was so bright and shiny.

My DE is really bright. We had a heck of a time toning down the bottom of the receiver to get the photo of the deer that is on p.97, fig. 7-10. We never could get rid of the shadow below the deer. David

They went to the salesmen. Not sure what the serial range is on these rifles (13 ea.).

Should collect the data on serials for bright, dull, blued, oak/pine, etc. to see if there is a pattern.

John Alan has/had some of the blued ones. Maybe you could get serial number data from him. David

All of the last of John Allen's engraved 99s went to Texas! 26 to same buyer I believe? He would still have his records.

Hope he stored them on the second story.