First time shooting my P.08 Erfurt Luger

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spacecoast

New member
One of the Lugers I recently acquired is a "shooter" grade P.08 Erfurt with the date removed from the chamber and a non-matching barrel, likely replaced a few decades later (bearing a Nazi-era proof mark). I had a chance to shoot the gun for the first time yesterday (55 rounds) and was generally pleased with its performance. I have two later-issue magazines, one a WWII-era fxo (aluminum bottom plug) and the other a post-war Erma (plastic plug).

The pistol's accuracy is quite good, producing about a 3-inch group offhand at 15 yards without much effort on my part to hold the same spot. It shoots about 3 inches high and to the left with fixed sights, probably not optimal for precision shooting. The trigger is heavy, but seems well suited for military-oriented use. The bore's rifling is quite good, with some frosting in the grooves. I had a few feeding (not going fully into battery) issues with my rather mild plated round nose reloads (115 gr., 4.1 gr. of AA#2), and may step those up a bit in strength the next time I shoot it. The magazines could probably also use a good cleaning. However, extraction was perfect. The gun does beat up the webbing of my hand a bit, maybe my hands are a bit larger than those the era in which the gun was issued.

The gun also got quite a bit of attention at the range, several guys commenting it was the first Luger they had seen there (or anywhere).

The more I handle these Lugers, the more I like them. The complexity of the design, the takedown sequence, how radically different they are from other semis and the attention to detail and workmanship is really impressive. If you've never handled or shot one, especially an original P.08, I highly recommend that you do.

photo88_zps3251dad3.jpg
 
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RickB

New member
My rebarreled gun shot quite a bit to the right, so a little drift (actually, a lot of drift) got it on target. Unless your front sight is staked in place, it shouldn't be difficult to get it zeroed for windage.
 
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RickB

New member
Any "non-marring punch" should work. I don't remember if I used plastic or brass, but it wasn't too difficult.
My front sight had been recently installed on the new/old barrel, and it might have been more difficult to move the sight when it had been in place for 70+ years?
 
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8MM Mauser

New member
That's really cool. Sounds like an amazing time shooting a real peice of history! A friend of mine's father in law (who is not an enthusiast) has a Luger his dad brought home from WWII; but he refuses to do anything with it except leave it locked in a basement case. He won't even have it inspected by a gunsmith or have the value appraised. It is, of course his own deal and I would never push him on it, it must have sentimental value; but I do wish he would let me handle
It, just once.

In any case, congradulations!
 
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JeffK

New member
Nice! I'm curious, and came across this forum and thread by way of google, but I just picked up a 1937 S/42 that looks very nice but obviously hadn't been fired in many years. Smelled like a moldy basement, lots of pitting in the bore, but it cleaned up nicely and I took it out to the range yesterday for the first time, firing 50 rounds of Magtech 115gr FMC. Compared with my 357 Sig P226, it kicked like a capgun, but I noticed that the first magazine load basically disappeared - at 10 yards, I hit the whole square target sheet like twice at the end. Amazing. Meanwhile my Sig had just grouped in a silver dollar pattern, so it wasn't me.

After the first magazine load, the grouping tightened right up, and by the end it was almost but not quite as accurate as my Sig. But at first, it was totally wild and unpredictable, who knows where the rounds went - a few times I say dirt clouds, but the rest must have gone over the first berm and way downrange.

Did you notice anything similar firing your luger? I was amazed at how inaccurate it was at first, just wild.
 
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JeffK

New member
So I shot another box of ammo through my Luger today, and by now it is noticeably more accurate than my Sig P226. Bore is now clean and bright, sharp rifling, still somewhat pitted but it looks vastly better than it did when I bought it. Really a fine pistol, still quirky and complex but nicely balanced and very accurate.

Can anyone explain what is happening as I fire more rounds through the gun? I understand that in principle the luger can be more accurate than the Sig, because the barrel always stays pointed in the same direction, but I'm not understanding how it's gone from being wildly inaccurate to very accurate over the course of 100 rounds of ammo. Bullets are scraping off decades of accumulated crud? And no, it ain't me - I'm not doing anything differently. ;)
 
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44 AMP

Staff
Welcome to TFL!



This is my 1936 S/42 (military contract gun).

As to why yours got more accurate as you shot it? No idea, for certain, but most likely a matter of crud in the barrel (which you might not even see) being "scraped" out. Possibly the working parts "settling down" against each other, and even possibly a result of your shooting (even though you might not have noticed doing anything different).

The more one shoots any unfamiliar handgun, the more one gets experience with it, even if below a conscious level. Just consider it you and the gun, "waking up" to each other.

Lugers are neat guns, with a reputation for being ammo sensitive, and my experience is each one has its own individual quirks. DO NOT use any +p or +p+ ammo in a Luger.

While they aren't target grade guns, the fact that the barrel and the sights are always fixed in relationship to each other means it has the potential to be more accurate than any tilt barrel guns.

No matter the reason, if yours had settled down and is showing good accuracy, enjoy it!
 
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DaleA

New member
The toggle action gun really does have distinctive lines.

Lots of bad guys in movies carried 'em (and some good guys used 'em too) and in the book 'The Lieutenants' one of the heros in the Army takes one 'off the books' from the unit armorer in Greece after WWII just for this reason...that he had seen so many of them in the movies-and of course it serves him well battling the evil commies.

I've seen quite a few but like a previous poster mentioned lots of folk seem to think their Luger, no matter what condition, is a collector and should not be fired so I have never shot one.

IIRC in the 1970's someone was making .22 'Lugers' and I was sorely tempted but the reviews of them weren't very good.
 
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James K

Member In Memoriam
The Luger tends to be accurate for a couple of reasons, mostly having to do with the fact that the rear toggle that has the sight built into it, is very closely fitted to the receiver* which is solidly fixed to the barrel and front sight. This differs from the Browning tilting barrel system, where the sights are on the slide which rarely is very closely fitted to barrel.

But the drawback of the Luger is simply that it was a very expensive pistol to manufacture so, in spite of adoption by several countries, and a widespread fascination for gun enthusiasts, it has turned out to be a dead end. Today, Lugers are mainly collectors items, while the less expensive tilting barrel system is nearly universal in auto pistols, the Beretta, which uses a Walther type locking block, being a notably exception only because of being adopted by the U.S. as its service pistol.

*In the Luger, the receiver is the part into which the toggles fit and which contains the unlocking ramps. The part with the "handle" is called the grip piece or grip frame.

Jim
 
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JeffK

New member
Thanks all, and nice luger 44 AMP - mine could be its twin! Virtually identical down to the different color shadings in the grips, and also (as far as I can tell) a military pistol.
 
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Jim Watson

New member
I think you can theorize about blowing the barrel out, but more likely it IS you. The Luger has made hay on "natural pointing" for decades but its steep grip rake is unlike any common pistol. I think you are just learning how to shoot it.

As far as "more accurate than my Sig P226", remember, the Swiss only accepted the SP 47/8 = P210 when assured it would be as accurate as their Lugers. And we all know how accurate the P210 is.
I don't know what it took to get them to go with the P75 = P220. Money no doubt, SIG tried to quit building the P210 several times but kept bringing it back until they finally shuffled it off on the Germans.
 
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Rick4076

New member
matching numbers

So my 1916 luger has matching serial numbers ever where except the side plate that appears to have a different number does that de-value the gun?
 
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44 AMP

Staff
Virtually identical down to the different color shadings in the grips, and also (as far as I can tell) a military pistol.
Click to expand...

If the toggle is marked S/42, that indicates that it was made under contract to the German military. When Germany began its rearmament, codes were used to "hide" the manufacturers from Versaille Treaty inspectors. Codes of different types were used throughout the Nazi era, on many arms.

So my 1916 luger has matching serial numbers ever where except the side plate that appears to have a different number does that de-value the gun?
Click to expand...

Yes.
But only to a serious collector. (unfortunately everybody seem to think every Luger is worth serious collector prices these days).

Other than a mis-matched magazine (the most common), a mis-matched sideplate is the most common Luger found. Guns with completely matching parts bring the highest premium, and can be worth a lot more, simply because they are so rare these days.

But how much of a difference in price between a mismatched gun and a matching one, depends on other factors as well. You need to talk to some of the collectors/dealers in Lugers to get a proper idea of the difference.

Lots of things affect the value. Mismatched parts is one. Reblued is another. Original holsters and accessories can add a lot as well. Some Luger holsters (really rare ones) can bring as much several hundred dollars all by themselves.

As an example, a new looking, nicely reblued Luger may be worth $1000 in today's (inflated) market, while an identical gun with most of its original finish can be double that, or more.
 
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JeffK

New member
Yup, S/42 with what look like standard military stamps, all numbers except magazines match, the barrel may have been reblued but the rest looks like no. I'm not an expert, so it's hard to do more than guess based on pics I see of known original vs. reblued parts. My opinion is, these guns were meant as precision tools, and their makers would roll in their graves over guns left to rot in the name of collectability - so I'm quite happy to clean it up and fire it and see it perform well, though I'll only be firing it rarely now that it does perform well.
 
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