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How to Identify an Old Rifle From a World War

Identifying a World War-vintage military rifle can seem like a daunting challenge. It becomes an even bigger task if you are working alone and relying on traditional research methods such as library searches or the hit-or-miss advice derived from your local gun shop. While these techniques can help to identify your rifle's make, model and history, the most effective method by far is consulting experts via the Internet.
The Internet has many excellent gun enthusiast forums available that are rich with information. But the one forum you can rely on for accurate rifle identification is the "ask the experts" section of Gunbroker.com.

Things You'll Need

Computer
Digital photo software
Internet connection
Digital camera

Instructions

- 1
  Examine the rifle thoroughly. Write down everything and anything that you find noteworthy. Make a note of any unusual markings, serial numbers and how you came be in possession of the rifle.
- 2
  Take pictures of the rifle. Ideally, you should take two pictures of the entire rifle (right side, left side) and complement them with pictures of the receiver, butt stock, type of sights on the rifle and the trigger housing, etc. Include pictures emphasizing any lettering or numbers as well as any unusual markings.
  Download the pictures into your computer and use your photo software to crop and re-size the pictures (if necessary). Posting pictures that are excessively large is considered poor forum etiquette, so try to keep your pictures under one megabyte.
- 3
  Register yourself as a forum user. Once registered, follow the website guidelines and post a general question. Use the notes from your initial inspection and be sure to include the rifle specifications, any known history and the digital pictures.
- 4
  Interact with forum members. You can reasonably expect to start receiving some good information within 24 hours, although it is not unusual to receive feedback within an hour. Not every comment in response to your post may be 100 percent accurate, but overall, this is an effective method that should leave you with an accurate identification of your vintage World War rifle.

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