I went to a gun show and didn't see a single Garand offered by a vendor.

[Bob Womack]

First day of a Norfolk, Virginia, USA gun show. Not a single Garand offered. For that matter, I didn't see an M1903 or an M1917. That was amazing and a first for me. There were a couple of Carbines and one booth had SMLEs. Didn't see any Kar98ks either. It was kind of strange. There was ammo of most types though some were in limited supply. My son couldn't find the .357 ball he was looking for but there was plenty of hollow point. .223 ammo went from $19.95 to $24.99 per box.

At the end of my stay I passed a show attendee with a Garand over his shoulder so it wasn't a total loss for me.

Bob

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[Salt Flat]

Bob, I have noticed the same thing at our shows here in the northwest. Milsurps in general have just about vanished at these shows. Also, I used to find lots of Enfield, Springfield, Mauser parts but now very little. This seems to coincide with the recent buying panic. I think so much now is sold online that used to be taken to the gun shows. Once in a while I find something in a pawn shop. When you do find something that you want, the price is over the top. I hate to be negative but I think the good old days are gone. I can't buy too many rifles at todays high prices. Thanks for listening to me whine!! Salt Flat

[lude92]

I guess they all came to Alabama cause down here at gun shows I go to there are tons of them. at the last one i went to there was especially alot
of ar-15s for sale but there was still alot of 1903s m1 carbines m1 garands there too

[emmagee1917]

After having a perfectly good , solid , original sling suddenly rip in half and dump a OOW BAR onto the dirt , I thought " Why am I risking them ? " .
I tested a line of M1 Garand slings a friend sells ( sling around rafter , me , 300+ pounds , yanking and hanging from it trying to cause it to fail / slip / break ) and ended up ordering 35-40 of them for all my rifles , including a BAR length one and a half dozen or so that were custom cut between M1 and BAR length for trench guns and Enfields .
As I had the guns laid out on a counter changing the slings over , I realized that you just didn't see the guns in this condition any more at the local shows . It was kind of sad to me that that may be the big reason I don't buy that many guns anymore , but also very happy that I was able to get what I've got and how lucky I've been.
Chris

[Patrick Chadwick]

I keep a file on each one of my rifles, and add in records of prices actually achieved in online auctions for examples of the same type. So I have observed that, for instance, Sniders and Martinis, both of which I searched for over a long time, have (statistically speaking) disappeared from the open market. I think the trend is for people to hold on to what they have, on the basis that "if I sell it I could get a couple of hundred. But I'll probably never be able to get one like it again." And the suspicion that if, for instance, you sell a semi-auto you might simply never be allowed to get one again, regardless. Plus, of course, those who just plain hoard multiple examples of the same type.

[boltaction]

I admit it, I hoard.........

Here in Canada, there seems to be less good stuff around at the shows, but there is a very brisk internet market. Prices have certainly climbed--I still can't believe a "Russian Capture" mismatched refinished kar98k is going for $600+.... I think it's going through a cycle right now where the milsurps are in collections for another few years until the current owners die or whatever, then there'll be a little bump of them on the market again. But, there's always attrition. Every year, some of these fine old guns are lost to fires, floods in basements, theft, and just plain old ignorance. Bubba is still active, and family members who don't like guns call the police to pick up and destroy old guns when owners pass away, instead of calling the local gunshop to come and sell them to someone else. The ironic thing about Bubba is that Bubba was really active years ago when nice original milsurp Lee Enfields and Mausers were pretty cheap, and now even the crappy mismatched stuff is so expensive I don't think Bubba will buy it for a deer rifle.

I suspect we may see the same thing with the SKS's, though. Right now they're cheap and plentiful, seemingly limitless, so guys buy them, put synthetic stocks on them, refinish them, mount scopes on them, lose the accessories, etc. I bet that in 10-15 years, we're going to be looking with nostalgia at ads from today when you could get a completely kitted out original (as refurd'd) SKS for $250, and they'll be pushing $500 at shows in unmessed with condition......... I wish I could go back to 1985 when one could pick from racks and racks of Swedish Mausers and AG42B's for $60 each and whisper in my own ear "buy 60 of them with bayonets and cleaning kits and put them away until 2012; forget the RRSP".

Ed