Good points Robb.
I also understand the lawyer angle.
However,, say person A inherits an OM Ruger,, sees the ad offering the free safety upgrade. Ships it in, and gets his gun back converted & marked.
Person A later gets in a financial bind, and sells his OM to Person B in a private sale,, with the OM parts added.
Later on Person B,, re-converts the OM,, and enjoys it for a while. He passes away,, and a family member, Person C, who has little or no firearm knowledge (for whatever reason,) inherits the OM. They then sell it legally via an auction house to person D. Person D, enjoys said firearm, and later on sells it to person E.
Person E is a firearm idiot who fails to understand the "Load one, skip one, load four" mantra for an OM Ruger. And proceeds to accidentally shoot Person F. Person G is upset, and wants to sue somebody because Person F was their baby.
Who is liable?
This was a discussion I've had several times due to the age of the OM's,, and the timeframe of the safety conversion.
Ruger is "off the hook" because they did the safety conversion.
Person B is off the hook because they are dead.
Person C is not a gun person & had no knowledge of such issues.
Person D may never have had the gun apart,, nor knew about the former conversion or even the safety upgrade. Questionable,, but still plausible deniability.
Person E is liable,,, for failure to follow known firearm safe gun handling rules.
I know this does not include the known professional who does modification work on OM Rugers so marked with the "R".
But is does beg the question; "If that professional does modification work on an OM,, does he get the customer sign a waiver knowing they have a firearm that has been legally determined to be unsafe?" (The original reason Bill Ruger was sued & lost,, giving us the billboard warning and the safety conversion set in the beginning.)
All this is a fun discussion because Miss Penny used to work for a lawyer as a paralegal. We've had several "what if" discussions about this very subject.
To the OP,, sorry for the "hijack" a bit. But it has a little bearing on the POTENTIAL value of an OM. That is why I added the comment; "serious collector" to my response. A serious collector already knows about the safety issues etc. and accepts the legal responsibility.