The UK's Finest Independent Forum for Shooters and Gun Owners. Est 2010.

If you've got that much to invest and you can't get it into a property personally I'd be buying gold.

Its quite easy to make small amounts on a shotgun, even a cheap one. I bought an AYA No4 for £170 and sold it for £200. If I could do that ten times a week I'd give up my day job! Its much harder to make thousands though unless you are incredibly lucky. The best most of us can hope for it not to loose anything. An old English gun will maintain its value if you look after it. But the market is changeable - short barrelled side by sides are out of favour at the moment. Double triggers don't seem popular either which does mean you can pick up some real bargains.

A friend of mine bought a Wilkinson shotgun circa early 1800's for 3500 quid, not as an investment but purely because it was nice.
A bit of digging for some provedance at the Royal Armouries produced a page from Wilkinsons ledger showing the serial, year and who commissioned it.
My mate was well miffed as his gun was the only one not to be commissioned by a viscount, earl or lord of the period and was commissioned as one of a pair to some frenchman staying in London.
Further digging proved this frenchman was a bit of a cad and took France to the cleaners for a lot of cash and then vacated the premises to America.
It turns out this "frog cad" was Napolean Bonaparts cousin.
Said shotty with provedance was taken to Phillips I do believe and valued at between 40 and 60k
My mate was in a dilemma now as he wanted the cash from the gun but it turns out he was going to pay nearly a quarter of it in auction fee's and being as tight as a nuns wouldnt sell it because someone would make as much as him for doing nowt!
He died shortly after aquiring this shotty so I dont know who has it now.

RIP Mr Bampton

Gazza wrote:A friend of mine bought a Wilkinson shotgun circa early 1800's for 3500 quid, not as an investment but purely because it was nice.
A bit of digging for some provedance at the Royal Armouries produced a page from Wilkinsons ledger showing the serial, year and who commissioned it.
My mate was well miffed as his gun was the only one not to be commissioned by a viscount, earl or lord of the period and was commissioned as one of a pair to some frenchman staying in London.
Further digging proved this frenchman was a bit of a cad and took France to the cleaners for a lot of cash and then vacated the premises to America.
It turns out this "frog cad" was Napolean Bonaparts cousin.
Said shotty with provedance was taken to Phillips I do believe and valued at between 40 and 60k
My mate was in a dilemma now as he wanted the cash from the gun but it turns out he was going to pay nearly a quarter of it in auction fee's and being as tight as a nuns wouldnt sell it because someone would make as much as him for doing nowt!
He died shortly after aquiring this shotty so I dont know who has it now.

RIP Mr Bampton

I know of the chap you were talking about and I know exactly where said gun is sat. It's currently (far as I'm aware) in a very reputable gunsmiths cabinet waiting for someone to decide what to do with it. My understanding is no one is quite sure what to do, it's possible it might get forgotten about as the current 'owner' isn't into firearms (from my understanding of the situation) but hopefully the rightful owner does benefit in the long run. Things may have moved on since November when I last heard of it.

I recently saw a youtube vid of a gun shop in the US where a guy was asking $1000 for WW2 german Mausers. They were in nice condition and all but I thought that there were always cheap as chips. Are they going up in price?

Ive been told that my L98 is now worth considerably more than I paid for it (almost double), on the other hand the L1 that I have has probably lost money as I paid top dollar and everyone who wants one has got one. As others have said though it only takes a legislation change to make them worthless so I am not counting on them for investment return. If I did want to buy something on the hope of it rising then it would be a No4T. That said havent they stuck at around the 3.5k mark? I havent seen one for a while but they always used to be in that ball park. (Thats not investment advice btw so dont sue me if you buy one and it tanks ).

JS569 wrote:

Gazza wrote:A friend of mine bought a Wilkinson shotgun circa early 1800's for 3500 quid, not as an investment but purely because it was nice.
A bit of digging for some provedance at the Royal Armouries produced a page from Wilkinsons ledger showing the serial, year and who commissioned it.
My mate was well miffed as his gun was the only one not to be commissioned by a viscount, earl or lord of the period and was commissioned as one of a pair to some frenchman staying in London.
Further digging proved this frenchman was a bit of a cad and took France to the cleaners for a lot of cash and then vacated the premises to America.
It turns out this "frog cad" was Napolean Bonaparts cousin.
Said shotty with provedance was taken to Phillips I do believe and valued at between 40 and 60k
My mate was in a dilemma now as he wanted the cash from the gun but it turns out he was going to pay nearly a quarter of it in auction fee's and being as tight as a nuns wouldnt sell it because someone would make as much as him for doing nowt!
He died shortly after aquiring this shotty so I dont know who has it now.

RIP Mr Bampton

I know of the chap you were talking about and I know exactly where said gun is sat. It's currently (far as I'm aware) in a very reputable gunsmiths cabinet waiting for someone to decide what to do with it. My understanding is no one is quite sure what to do, it's possible it might get forgotten about as the current 'owner' isn't into firearms (from my understanding of the situation) but hopefully the rightful owner does benefit in the long run. Things may have moved on since November when I last heard of it.

Ahh yes, the same place as the " I can hit anything with that" 20 bore that he was going to sell me but never did due to some serious long term haggling
Anyway, slight derailment of the thread..........
If you want to turn your 20k into more quickly and want it to be gun related then dont bother with shotguns or shaky legislated firearms. Buy some shares in the top arms manufacturer at the moment and get a slice of that saudi cash

Rolex watches hold their value if I had the money I would invest in a sea dweller 2017 limited edition

Charlotte the flyer wrote: If I did want to buy something on the hope of it rising then it would be a No4T. That said havent they stuck at around the 3.5k mark? I havent seen one for a while but they always used to be in that ball park.

All matching numbers mint 4T, with good barrel, scope and transit chest with all the bits inside are now easily double that figure or more.

3-4k range is now for the bottom of the range condition 4T's.

Bloody hell!

Mine was £800 complete when I bought it and I thought that was lot of money then.

Now that rifle surely has been an investment.

Better get it flogged and buy a couple of pretendy ARs.





Nah, only kidding.

dromia wrote:
Better get it flogged and buy a couple of pretendy AR's

Indeed, modern materials, ergonomic design, cheaper ammo.
Makes sense to grab as many AR's as possible instead of that old Wooden rubbish