Good match, with a few issues
Ok, this butt plate is meant to be a bolt-on replacement for the Ithaca model 37... I don't think it's realistic to expect that a single butt plate will match all the manufacturing variances from the hand-built guns in the late 30's up till the modern manufactured guns coming out of Ohio, let's just say I'm cutting this butt plate producer a little bit of slack. The model 37 that I was trying to match up is a 5 digit serial number made in 1943. So about the butt plate: The first one I received was not ground flat on the stock mating surface. Not even close. A brief call to Brownell's resulted in an instant return label - great customer service. The heel was ground for a "no work match", but the toe was not angled to match the lower line of the stock (its angle was 90 degrees to the stock mating surface). I reordered and received a better butt plate. The heel was ground for a no-work match, but again, the toe was 90 degrees. To make it look closer to what it should, I screwed it in place and removed wood from my stock/butt plate to create a single, clean line. This was not a big issue, since I was getting rid of the 60 year old varnish and had excess stock material to work with. For someone wanting a bolt-on replacement, you may not be satisfied. I have no idea of this butt plate's durability - time will tell. If it chips, I will not try this one again - instead go with a standard oversize plate and grind it the way I want to. 4 stars because the final product looks good, but was a bit of unexpected work to get there.
