MilsurpDan
Ultimate Member
Snagged this at the HoCo show early Saturday morning. Looked it over pretty well and it seemed like a good deal so I jumped on it. I wanted to get outside to take some photos but as you all know, the weather isn't having it.
I took too many pictures so I just put them into a imgur album to make it easier. Click on the link below.
https://imgur.com/a/w3SnFp5
K98k rifles are one of the most popular milsurp rifles on the market and one of the most heavily faked, so unless you're buying a common import (Russian or Yugo Capture), it's good to know what to look out for. K98k's are especially tricky due to all of the variations. Late War rifles are a very interesting sub-group, especially all the differences between the manufacturers.
This one is a "bcd 4" coded rifle made in 1944. bcd was the code for Gustloff Werke. Towards the end of the war, Gustloff was one of the manufacturers who started switching from a traditional blued finish to a "bonderized" phosphate finish.
This one was probably made in late 1944. Somebody more knowledgeable could give a better guess but my estimate is November-December of that year. Gustloff switched to a 5-digit serial number group of which this rifle is in the first batch. Apparently the factory was using the same firing proof stamp at the beginning of 1944 and it began to wear out at the end of the year. You can see in one of the pictures where the "dirty bird" has its upper half missing. The stamp was replaced at the beginning of 1945.
At this point in the war, they only numbered some of the bolt parts and the barrel and used a mix of blued small parts. This rifle is all matching. It's also got the correct Astrawerke and other subcontracted parts so it appears to be an all correct rifle. Unfortunately the cleaning rod is missing but that should be easy enough to find.
The stock is in great shape and has never been messed with. All of the edges are crisp. One interesting thing of note is that it appears to have some kind of unit emblem on the side of the stock. Does anyone know what unit it could have belonged to?
The bore is in excellent condition. I originally thought it was frosted, but I pushed out about 70 years of dust to find it spotless.
Let me know what you guys think! I paid $700 for it which I think was a pretty good deal.
I took too many pictures so I just put them into a imgur album to make it easier. Click on the link below.
https://imgur.com/a/w3SnFp5
K98k rifles are one of the most popular milsurp rifles on the market and one of the most heavily faked, so unless you're buying a common import (Russian or Yugo Capture), it's good to know what to look out for. K98k's are especially tricky due to all of the variations. Late War rifles are a very interesting sub-group, especially all the differences between the manufacturers.
This one is a "bcd 4" coded rifle made in 1944. bcd was the code for Gustloff Werke. Towards the end of the war, Gustloff was one of the manufacturers who started switching from a traditional blued finish to a "bonderized" phosphate finish.
This one was probably made in late 1944. Somebody more knowledgeable could give a better guess but my estimate is November-December of that year. Gustloff switched to a 5-digit serial number group of which this rifle is in the first batch. Apparently the factory was using the same firing proof stamp at the beginning of 1944 and it began to wear out at the end of the year. You can see in one of the pictures where the "dirty bird" has its upper half missing. The stamp was replaced at the beginning of 1945.
At this point in the war, they only numbered some of the bolt parts and the barrel and used a mix of blued small parts. This rifle is all matching. It's also got the correct Astrawerke and other subcontracted parts so it appears to be an all correct rifle. Unfortunately the cleaning rod is missing but that should be easy enough to find.
The stock is in great shape and has never been messed with. All of the edges are crisp. One interesting thing of note is that it appears to have some kind of unit emblem on the side of the stock. Does anyone know what unit it could have belonged to?
The bore is in excellent condition. I originally thought it was frosted, but I pushed out about 70 years of dust to find it spotless.
Let me know what you guys think! I paid $700 for it which I think was a pretty good deal.