Ah, a rifle of endless debate.... and collecting variations.

I have a number of these rifles also S marked, and was told to NEVER fire milsurp ammo in them. The S was the culmination of improved steel and barrel design... but NOT necessarily bore diameter. Remember that the Turks did some gunsmithing on the their own, to these rifles.

I was always told to "slug" the barrel of these rifles, to insure you know what the true diameter is..

Many people that I had met, would cast or get bullets that were diameter and powder charge reduced... to fire in these grand ole rifles. But many people claimed to fire full power loads in them all day. Wishing to have all limbs intact, I have always taken the road of caution when shooting rifles over 100years old...

If you didn't know, check the barrel bands... you noticed the XX out markings. These are the previous "Germanicon" units that the rifle had served in. Each time it was removed from a unit, the old marking was stamped out. Some expert around here will tell you what units its served in. There should be 2 digits on the band, which match the receiver's last 2 digits. If a complete rifle ran out of barrel bands to stamp... sometimes units would start stamping the buttplate.

As to worth, it depends on the bolt also. I used to get these without bolts for like $40.00 in extremely rough shape. They were even cheaper when first imported (without bolts) from South Americaicon. I have seen some examples at gunshows go from $275 to $500+ in great condition. These good condition examples are typically of an earlier import. The last mass import I believe was from a South American Country where they were stored on a dirt floor. Turkishicon modified riles seem to bring somewhat less than one in pure "German" configuration, at least in my area.

Technical folks claim that this really isn't a Mauser. And it is referred to as a Commission Rifle, often. The barrel shroud is novel, but makes field maintenance a problem. Most that I have seen, had really bad shrouds, but somehow the barrel outsides look good. Shroud removal is easy, if you have the tools. Otherwise don't mess with it. It would be a tragedy to crush a shroud in a vise....

As to the bore diameter? The story is that the early Gew88's had a smaller bore than "modern" 8mm's... along with a lower pressure.

Snap more photos! You seem to have a nice example there!!