My recommendation for buying Marlins, look for either a "JM" gun (those born before Marlin was purchased by Freedom Arms/Remington around late 2008), or more recently since Ruger purchased what was left after that debacle. To determine year of manufacture subtract the first two digits of the serial number from 100. E.g. my 1895 Guide Gun has a serial beginning with 93, thus it was made in 2007, one of the last of the good ones.