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quick identification For when you have it .... but you don't know just what it is Is it, or isn't it? Superficially similar guns were made by several Spanish and Chinese factories, and there are some Chinese backyard blacksmith specials around too. There are also many dummy guns, theatrical props, and AirSoft guns bearing a likeness to the C-96. The genuine Mauser-made article isn't too hard to spot. There was some variation in markings in the early days, but some ninety-five percent of C-96s - those made after production settled down - have Mauser markings on the top of the barrel (directly over the chamber) and on the right side of the frame. NOTE - Chinese copies, complete down to the Mauser address and trademarks, are not unknown, and can be difficult to disitnguish from the real thing, but most Mauser copies didn't go that far.
Despite popular belief, the vast majority of these guns are semi-autos. There is a full auto or machine gun version, but those are rare in the United States, and must be registered as machine guns. A hefty number of these full autos have been remanufactured as semi-autos and imported into the US over the last twenty years or so. These remanufactured guns are not machine guns and do not have to be registered as such. Mauser made some relatively weird semi-auto variations in the early days of production, but after 40,000 or so guns, things settled down, and the factory thereafter manufactured only five major varieties of semi-autos. And here they are - |
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Identical to the Prewar Commercial (above)
in all respects, except -
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Identical to the Wartime Commercial (above)
in all respects, except -
but it doesn't show from this view. Congratulations, it's a 1916 Prussian Contract, a.k.a. "Red 9" |
To belabor the obvious just a bit, these guns were not originally manufactured this way. They were earlier guns reworked postwar into this "1920" configuration. |
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| Here are some late guns which I don't examine in detail on this site. |
Identical to M-30, except -
genuine Schnellfeuers (see below) which have had the select-fire components removed and the resulting hole in the frame welded up, and the frame remachined. These reworks were done just before the guns were imported and sold on the American market in the 1980s. I don't examine these guns on this site. |
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This isn't one of the semi-autos, but it explains
where that semi-auto rework just above comes from.
In the United States, Federal law mandates that these are machine guns, and they must be registered as "NFA Weapons." I don't examine these guns, either, on this site. |
| And here are some early guns which I don't examine, as they fall outside the Stable Production Period. |
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If the gun has that strange hammer over there by
the "1", it's nowadays called a cone hammer. The factory never called it anything special; it was always the Military Pistol no matter what hammer it was wearing. Cone hammer guns predate the stable production period. The last cone hammer Mauser was made around 1899. Mauser was experimenting throughout this period, trying to find something which would sell. Features were all over the place - there were 6, 10, and 20-round magazines, strange tangent sights, fixed sights, various grip materials, long barrels, short barrels, etc etc. Markings - serial number locations, mainly - varied widely. The safety, the extractor, and the lanyard loop didn't change much though. But whatever odd features a gun may have, if it has that hammer, it's called a cone hammer. I don't have much to say about cone hammers, as they're outside the period examined on this site. |
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The next major variant was the large ring hammer.
If a gun has that, it's called a large ring hammer, no matter what other features it may have. Like cone hammers, large ring hammer guns predate the stable production period. Mauser was still experimenting, as the customers were staying away in droves. There were 6 and 10 shot magazines (but no more 20-shot fixed mags - those died with the cone hammers), more sight variants, flatside frames, fixed sights, and small-grip guns (later christened "Bolos"), but there was finally a trend toward a bit more standardization in serial number locations. The extractor gradually shifted to the types always found on the prewar commercial guns. The large ring hammer guns lie outside the period examined on this site. All large ring hammer variants were replaced about 1905 by the small ring hammer guns. |
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So, now what? I recommend the FAQ. |