Very Rare PPK (NSKK)?????????

[denny 714]

I wonder what the price tag on this PPK is? I have never seen a PPK with this marking!!! Is anybody familar with this mark on a PPK? ? ? ??? [IMG][IMG][/IMG][/IMG]

[oscarmayer]

Nationalsozialistisches Kraftfahrkorps...... there are a couple experts here in all things walther that will surely help you out. not sure myself how common these are but i will say this i do believe it's more common to find a model pp marked this way than a ppk ????

[SSMN]

Oscar,
You are correct. The National Scialist Transport Corps marked Walthers are extremely rare and valuable. In fact, I have never come across an NSKK marked PPK. All which are known or referenced in collector books are PPs. The last Walther PP NSKK of which I am aware went for more than $5,000. If the gun is legitimate and the high polish finish is original (not refinished) the owner has an exceedingly rare and valuable gun.
I will have to say that finding no reference whatsoever regarding a PPK NSKK and the possible rebuff and reblue which seems to be present in the photos leads me to have doubts as to its legitimacy.

I would suggest posting the photos on the P38/PPK forum where the experts can have a look at it. Dieter Marschall among others.

[denny 714]

If this gun is genuine, along with its almost perfect condition, it's possible the worth could be in excess of the $10,000.00 range??? I to have my doubts, like SSMN, as to its legitimacy, however, I have been told that the PPK NSKK did exist, in forum discussions from the past, and this is the only example of one that I have ever seen!!!

Denny

[SSMN]

A legitimate NSKK PP for review.

[Jim K]

I can't be sure without either better pictures or looking at the gun itself, but I think that marking (and the whole slide marking) is pantographed. It is too deep and too precise to be acid etched like the originals, and too close to the original to be hand engraved. There are other possibilities, like EDM, but those too would depend on seeing the gun.

Also, the finish is simply too good and seems to be tank blue rather than the rust blue used by Walther in that period. Then note the total absence of any wear on the corners (compare with #5 for both color and wear). Also, the shadows on the gun in #1 betray a polishing and rounding that are absent in the #5 picture.

IMHO, we have a case of the old saying that if something looks too good to be true, it probably is.

Jim

[Danny]

The 90 degree safety suggests a prewar pistol. Also it must have been dry fired quite a bit from the bluing missing on the trigger. To be honest I have never seen a finish with that much luster. I will try & get Dieter;s opinion on this.
Danny.
Yes Denny I am interested .

[Jim K]

Another good point, and one I missed. How can a gun with that perfect a slide have that much trigger wear? Did someone just dry snap it a few thousand times but never load it or work the slide? I may not be as expert on Walthers as you guys are, but that finish never came out of Zella-Mehlis. Come on, folks, it screams fake all over the place.

Jim

[Danny]

No answer from Dieter as of yet. However in his book, there is not a NSKK PPK mentioned or listed in his data base.
Danny

[SSMN]

OK Folks,
They do exist. A little research found that in 2007 and 2008 discussions were held about this gun and others on the P38 Forum. At that time it was deemed authentic.

Others discussed at that time with photos which I can post are:
#807 292 (In Germany)
#807 235 (In Dieter's Database)
#862 658 (.22 Cal)
#862 654
#807 735
All NSKK PPKs. One was pictured in a 1974 article. One sold in Germany in 2007 for $3,500.00.

Pics to follow.

[Jim K]

Note that I didn't say there were no NSKK PPK's; I said that isn't one. The "almost perfect" finish with "luster" is a hot tank reblue job. The slide was buffed down to remove the original markings and the new ones applied. Like the RZM guns, the NSKK mark cannot be just added because there is not enough room. So the faker removes all the markings, an easy job due to the shallow acid etching, and then re-marks the slide. Since that was the important part to be faked, he didn't bother with rebluing the frame or the trigger, resulting in an anomaly that should be obvious to anyone (OK, so I missed it the first time!).

Jim

[SSMN]

I now believe that this NSKK PPK is legitimate but has been reblued at some point. The NSKK stamp was there prior to the reblue. Earlier pics of this gun prior to refinish are attached.

[SSMN]

One other note: Walther PP/PPKs were NOT rust blued. They were chemical blued in a hot tank. The rust blue process was first utilized for high quality doubles which had side by side barrels soldered together and which would separate from the hot blue process heat.

Rust blueing was an oxidation process in which chemicals were applied to the surface being blued to cause oxidation. The parts were then placed in a "wet box" to allow oxidation to take place for a day or two. The barrels or other parts were then removed and the rust carded off. Chemicals were reapplied and the process repeated several times. Finally the parts were boiled in a soda solution to stop further oxidation (rusting).

Obviously all of this labor intensive process was not feasible for a factory turning out large numbers of guns per day. No...Walthers were hot blued.

Also, even during wartime, the factory continued some high polish PP/PPKs. Every bit as highly polished as the suspected reblue which is the subject of this thread. I am attaching a pic of a high polish boxed PP (wartime production)which I own for review.

[denny 714]

One more interesting note: As with RZM PPK's, all left slide inscriptions had to be moved toward the the front of the slide, to make room for the RZM logo. The same has been done for the NSKK mark, and this example falls in the RZM block of serial numbers
(807292). Perhaps the certain number of NSKK marked PPK's fell within this early serial number range!

Denny G.

[Jim K]

Walthers were apparently chemical blued, but I don't think they used the same chemicals used today. The color and texture are too different to be accounted for by polishing differences alone. The current caustic soda hot tank bluing did not come into use until the late 1920's and was not common until the mid-1930's.

But rust bluing was not always confined to "high quality doubles", though it is today. It is slow and labor intensive, but once production is started, the product flow is continuous. Many high volume guns were rust blued, including older Mauser rifles, Steyrs and pre-1930's Lugers. The easy way to tell is to look at the inside; in rust bluing, only the outside was swabbed with the chemical solution, so the inside of the magazine well and the inside of slides will be unblued. In tank bluing, both exterior and interior surfaces will be blued.

High quality American makers used a heat process in conjunction with Carbona blue, which gives a hard black finish, typically seen on older Colt and S&W products. But that process involves heating the gun in a gas oven and is part of the heat treatment process, which is why it can't be duplicated without harming the heat treatment. The same is true of the oil blackening used in the old M1903 and Krag rifle receivers; when those receivers had to be refinished, they were rust blued. I don't know if any European makers used the Carbona process, but would like to have any information on such use.

Jim

[valbehaved]

Jim:
Carbonia blue process(or a similar heat treatment blue process) was used on most European revolvers of late 19th and early 20th century,including, but not limited to: Nagants, some of M1879 and M1883 model reichsrevolvers(not Erfurt made), Webleys, etc, etc.. which was subsequently changed to rust blue(due to its lack of durability and a complicated process) for many in 1910s-1920s...
Val

[Jim K]

I am not sure of that. Carbonia blue was developed by the American Gas Furnace Co. and I don't think that specific process was much used in Europe, though similar processes might have been. It is not just heat bluing, the coloring of steel by simple application of heat, like temper blue. The Carbonia process uses chemicals as well as heat to achieve its coloring. Because the fumes from the chemicals surround the metal, the insides of the guns are also blued, unlike rust blue.

Jim

[Alarich]

Hello,

by chance I saw your postings about this PPK with the NSKK-logo on the left hand side and the serial-number 807292.
Maybe I can help you clearing up some questions, because I am the owner of this specific PPK ( I am from Austria).

The pictures shown in your articles do not descend from me, but in all probability they are from the former owner, an old man from the "Sudetenland" in the Cech republic. These pictures show an nearly perfect status of the slide with the NSKK-logo, surely he took the pictures from a special angle.
In reality you can see a few scratches and other marks of using on both sides of the slide (see pictures below - they show the latest status).

In my opinion this PPK is legitimate, still has the original finish and was not refinished (see the mark "Crown/N" on the right side of the slide and other details...)

I also own a Walther PP "NSKK" and so I could compare the PPK with the PP concearning the lettering, size and position of the NSKK-logo. They are absolutely the same, except the distance between the "K" of PPK and the NSKK-logo.

I presume that the Walther-firm produced for the first time in 1933/1934 a few PPKs with the NSKK-logo as "prototype" for presenting to the NSKK-organisation. But the NSKK-leader obviously decided to introduce the Walther PP for their organisation. The first NSKK-PPs also were produced in 1934.
Another NSKK-PPK was sold at an RIA-auction on August 2004 (more than 10.000 USD).

I hope, this helps to clear some obscurities concearning this rare PPK.

Best regards
Alarich

[Alarich]

Another pictures ...

[Jim Hauff]

Alarich,
Welcome to the forum - AND - danke for posting that information and the pictures!
Very nice pieces you have there.