Hi Fontainebleu,

Firstly welcome to the forum, that is a very interesting Merkel and well worth the dollars if it shoots as well as you were told it did.

A couple of things I noticed was that you are getting an Emmebi case which is currently worth about 320 Euro the second thing is the later Merkel use Recknagel Q.D. Pivot Mounts with both the bases already on the rifle but this one has 'Claw' mounts which as you stated was 'Slapped' onto the rifle by the gunsmith. Claw mounts can not be 'Slapped' onto a rifle, they are very fiddly to get right. It may be an earlier Pre War model as mentioned. Why not ask 'Merkel' they would keep records as to when that serial number was manufactured.

I owned a Chapuis 'Brouse' in .375H&H which is there African Model and a first class weapon. The 9.3x74R (and smaller calibers)was always made on a smaller frame size and was always a cheaper model and as with all of the Chapuis Double Rifles, they have 2 'Cut Outs' with infills screwed into the rib so that the Recknagel bases could be mounted without a problem.

Your Merkel seems to have a higher grade timber on the stocks and a lot more engraving than on a standard 140A as you know. So let's see how it shoots and I would suggest that it be a part of the purchase agreement that the complete load data is supplied before settlement as if the guy who currently does the reloads gets hit by a bus, there goes your reloads.

I hope that this is of assistance,

Cheers for now,

Jeff Gray

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