Ghost

[CARBINE]

Took some pics of a chinese ghost I got with some cool markings...

[CARBINE]

Looks like a marking on a russian.....

[Phosphorus32]

Nice!  Really low SN on your ghost, very cool 

That does look like a Russian stock. My matching ghost, 39653, also has a Russian stock but it doesn't have any marks around the cross bolt.

[Dannyboy53]

Yep, Russian finger prints all over that carbine.

[running-man]

It's a great looking ghost Tony! 

The front bayo lug has the lightening cut, but I can't tell if it's the late angled ear version or the early-mid '52 straight eared one.

What do you think that the chances are of getting a wood sample from this stock (like under the buttplate, or somewhere else semi-unnoticeable)?  It would need to be a fingernail sized piece or so unfortunately (though bigger is always better, I think that's the biggest that you'd be able to take from it w/o totally ruining it).  This is the exact orig early ghost stock we need for the final sample to send to the lab for analysis. 

[CARBINE]

  This is the exact orig early ghost stock we need for the final sample to send to the lab for analysis.

Ummm hmmm, I figured this was coming...... let me see a picture on some of your other samples to see how big we are talking about........ If I could just core out the hole a little deeper somehow so one wouldn't know I did anything I would be on board with it, any Idea's?

[Loose}{Cannon]

Nice one Carbine....

RM.. I have one just like that with the crossbolt stick stamps etc, if carbine cant/wont get a sample from its butt, lemme know

[running-man]

Ummm hmmm, I figured this was coming...... let me see a picture on some of your other samples to see how big we are talking about........ If I could just core out the hole a little deeper somehow so one wouldn't know I did anything I would be on board with it, any Idea's?

Laugh. Kind of like getting hit with pressure to buy after going to a timeshare seminar just to get the free toaster eh?! 

All my other samples are full buttstocks. We (well the guys who donated them) are basically sacrificing them in the name of science.  From such large and quality samples. The lab should be able to tell us full family & genus. If we are lucky and the technician is good, we may even nail down the species. Either way, we should be able to use the 4 stocks I've currently got as a benchmark to set the 'standard' for 2mil Chinese, six digit/3 mil Chinese (likely the same but you never know), late Chinese (again likely the same but no guarantee), and finally a true Russian.  Then we can take a very small sample of the early ghost stock and see whether it matches with any of the other 4 samples. This enables us to take a very small sample so as not to sacrifice the entire ghost stock.

I have no idea what the best way to get a non destructive sample is. Your idea of going deeper on the buttstock lightening hole is good, but you would need a core drill of some type I'd think. 

[martin08]

I've got just a few Imperial and Soviet Mosin Nagants, and the wood that is revealed underneath the flaked shellac on your stock looks just like the Russian arctic birch of the 1890's through late 1940's.