I am learning patience if nothing else.

Rifle #1 last ditch Nagoya ground off mum, poor bore, painted brown $100.00
Rifle #2 Kokura intact mum, mismatched bolt, bad bore, rusty metal $100.00
Rifle #3 Nagoya intact mum, mismatched bolt, missing hand guard, dirty bore $130.00
Rifle #4 and the first I had an interest in, Kokura intact mum, mismatched bolt, with dust cover although it looked to be a repro, nice metal, excellent bore, decent stock $400.00
Rifle #5 and the second I had an interest in, Kokura with struck mum, matching bolt, excellent bore, mono-pod, good metal, good stock and leather sling $475.00
Rifle #6 Kokura missing mono-pod, mum ground down but visible, matching bolt, excellent borre, decent metal $225.00
Rifle #7 Nagoya with mono-pod, mum ground off, mismatched bolt good bore $300.00
Rifle #8 and the third I was interested in, Kokura missing dust cover and cleaning rod, mum intact, later war so no monopod or aircraft sights, unfinishish safety cap good bore but action was very stiff, this is the one that the stock had been refinished and looking closely at it I'm pretty sure it had been, finish was inside the letters $375.00
Rifle #9 Kokura, no dust cover, cleaning rod or mono-pod, mum ground off, very crude stock that looked like a tiger stripe $150.00
Rifle #10 Kokura missing dust cover, mono-pod and cleaning rod, matching bolt, excellent bore, mum ground off $200.00

After inspecting them again today I decided against rifle #8 early on as I hadn't noticed it was a late war or that the action didn't work right. I had decided to concentrate on Rifle #5 because even though the mum had been struck it was still there, all the numbers matched and it appeared to be in excellent working condition. I would have gone with Rifle #4 only if it followed the examples of #'s 1 through 3 and gone low.

Taking condition and missing items, ground mums, etc into account, rifles 1-3 and 9 were probably bargains, 6 and 10 just a bit high but close 4, 5, 7, 8 very high.

I had priced a mono-pod last night at $65 if you can find one. Repro slings and cleaning rods are available reasonably but the mono-pod seemed to be the killer if it were missing.

Granted I don't know a lot about them, I don't know if there were rare series rifles involved in there but I don't believe so Production figures for all Nagoya and Kokura rifles seemed to be the same for all there today.

I also take into consideration that this is the same auction that two Mosin Nagant import 91-30's were bought for $350.00 each very recently.

I guess it's time for me to abandon this auction and head for the gun shows.