German K98

[Bizio]

WoW, so he admitted it.?

No, the friend who sold me the rifle is in good faith and trust as well.

I have posted same photos on Italian guns forum and someone realized that serial numbers are reprinted over old serials.

Please check here the second "6", it has a "," which is what remains of previous serial.


And here is the same story.


The stock has be renumbered as well.

I compared all photos with the Mauser K98 owned by Badger and while his Mauser brings a wallnut stock and has Waffenamt all equale to WaW 63,
mine has WaA 63, WaW 655 over the bolt group and WaA 412 over the bolt secure. It's a mix. Not worth the money I payd for it.

[Badger]

Yup, after seeing your excellent close-up pics of the bolt face and shroud, I agree with Sarge13 that unfortunately, these have been scrubbed and renumbered ...

Reduces value considerably ...

Regards,
Doug

[Bizio]

IMHO it has really a very law value.
I would prefer a rifle with a different numbered bolt but *original* rather than scrubbled and renumbered to make it matching.
I will return the rifle and will be refunded without problems.

[Bizio]

Before returning the rifle I took some photos of the stock and of the parts hidden by the woods.

[Badger]

I think the rifle is all original except for the bolt of course...

I believe what's happened, as happened a lot with K98k's, is that the original bolt got separated from the rifle and whatever replacement bolt was used to make it operable, created a miss-match.

So, some enterprising gun hustler decided to be creative and faked a matching real K98k bolt to "up" its value.

Other than that, it's a really nice looking 1938 Oberndorf manufactured rifle ...

Regards,
Doug

[Badger]

I have a 1938 "Obie" in my personal collection as well, although I don't think I ever created an MKL article around it...

1938 Code 42 K98k - Serial # 5896s (289 pic photo montage)
(Mfg in 1938 by Mauser Werke AG, Oberndorf a/N)

(Click PIC to Enlarge)(Click PIC to Enlarge)

Regards,
Doug

[Bizio]

I agree with you, Badger.

In Italy the value of a mismatched Mauser K98 is about 400-500 euro.
The value of a fully matching Mauser K98 is about 1000-1200 euro.
So whoever did the dirty job earned the difference between the two prices.

---------- Post added at 06:45 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:40 PM ----------

Also the bolt catch lever is not original.
It brings a different Waffenamt from the original WaA63 : WaA 214, same year but different manufacturer.

[Brian Dick]

There are folks who excel at doing that over here too. Caveat Emptor. They even weld up the old numbers before they finish and restamp them. Some are very hard to detect.

[Bizio]

There are folks who excel at doing that over here too. Caveat Emptor. They even weld up the old numbers before they finish and restamp them. Some are very hard to detect.

In Italy the "Caveat Emptor" rule does'nt work.
Erasing, restamping serial numbers in order to increase the value of a rifle and earn more money than due it is considered a fraud, a crime (Art. 640 C.P.)

[Brian Dick]

As it should be really. There used to be a guy here in the southeast USA that excelled at renumbering bolts and barrel bands. It finally got to a point that I wouldn't even look at his rifles anymore although he had the odd honest rifle mixed in.