Are the C&R military rifle days over?

after reading Doug Bowser's post "A story from the 1990s" I could only begin to speculate once again: are the C&R military rifle days over?


I am a C&R guy myself. Very happy with the ffl03 privileges. I have been wondering about the next batch of c&r surplus rifles to be considered relics...after reading this post (which was Scharfschütze's reply to Doug Bowser's thread) + my already lingering suspicion, I sighed in disappointment.


Do you guys really think the "well is running dry" on the surplus rifle inventories? Are there any surplus rifles (I guess 1962 thru 1970) that I should expect to look forward to? Does anyone know if any or what nations manufactured bolt-actions into the 1960's? Are there any other "SKS-type" carbines to look forward to that I have not discovered? Or are we entering an era of only select-fire military rifles? I know civilian manufactured rifles will be here and there, but what about the historical military ones?

Is there any hope for a new, solid batch of C&R's waiting for the 50yr mark to hit? I usually try to figure: (1) what wars were going on at that time, (2) what were the arms of choice in these wars, as well as (3) who was producing arms in bulk? I usually reference this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_1945%E2%80%931989#1960.E2.80.931969 to see the list of wars, etc.

Also, the whole Clinton import bans on certain countries will affect this. Will surplus ammo continue to rise in cost at the current pace? Does the price of mil-surp rifles appear as if it will continue to go up? Would a more "conservative" Congress/POTUS lead to a decrease in ammo/surplus costs?

I really hope this isn't the end of the C&R rifle era

Does anyone have any input/insight on this?

The well is going dry....There won't be any surplus AR's...They are evil u know...


Government shred's those that are not serviceable to them

Fortunately there are plenty of surplus Swedish Mausers and such

The days of nice cheap, 1903A3's, M1 carbines and Garands are pretty much over

It is sad! I'd like to pick up another Garand and a Carbine but got too many other wants ahead of them for now.

Childhood memories of staring at an apple barrel full of mausers, enfields, carcano's, etc. 25.00 with a box of ammo

jbpmidas wrote:It is sad! I'd like to pick up another Garand and a Carbine but got too many other wants ahead of them for now.

You can always get custom....

If you want a nice American mil-surp collection - Better not wait around too long on the Garands and Carbines and such

Its amazing how much the good mil-surps have dried up in the last 7 or 8 years

You're right Neck! I hate to put anything in front of a DPR .223, there's already 2 revo's in front of it!

Not wanting to be a pessismist, but rather a realist, I have to sadly answer "yes". A couple of things bring me to this conclusion:

(1)Here are some production numbers to consider: (source: Neutrality Through Marksmanship. A Collector's and Shooter's Guide to Swedish Army Rifles by Doug Bowser)
ALL Swedish Mausers 804,000
M91 Russian 9,360,000
M91/30 Russian 17,450,000
US M1"Garand" 6,034,000 (approx.)
US M1 carbine 6,225,000
K98k German 11,500,000
No. 1 MkIII British 3,000,000
No. 4 Mk1 and 2 Brit. 3,530,000
So the numbers are pretty small to begin with, except for MN rifles, and many of those were destroyed in the wars, same for the K98k German rifles.
(2)Now remember that many of these imported into the USA were "sporterized" or "bubbaized", eliminating their collector value. Shotgun News runs an article in almost every issue as a "How To" butcher a Curio&Relic gun to turn it into a "sporter". From the 1960s through the 90s the NRA magazine American Rifleman did the same thing.
(3) C&R are generally defined as 50 years old or older (there are other criteria so not all are 50yrs old); so if you look at wars or military "actions" being conducted in 1961 as suggested by the OP, you will find most all were fought with semi-autos or full autos,(not counting the bolt action rifles used by irregular forces of course) most of which will never meet the BATFE's criteria for importation. So save for the few Yugo SKS rifles still left, there just isn't any "new" source for old firearms. And remember when the Yugo SKS rifles were $90? I bought several at that price at the Jackson Gun Show from the guy who lived in the castle in Raymond...
(4)Those C&R weapons which weren't imported to the USA went to other countries, and now with the UN's push to destroy "small arms" many countries are voluntarily destroying them. So the numbers are being actively reduced.
While you can still find MN rifles and occassionally even a Swede, the days of $100 Swedes and $90 Makarovs, etc. are over. I therefore recommend that anyone interested in the older weapons get a Curio & Relics license - many advantages to this, which were pointed out in another thread - and purchase what you like. If the current prez is re-elected (God forbid) it is pretty much a given that he will make the USA a signatory to the UN Gun Treaty, which would eliminate sources for any military surplus firearms ever again coming into the country.
Not being pessimistic, just being a realist.

Forgot about the Makarovs. I've always kindof wanted one.

There's a pile of Garands...I think maybe Korea...but Big Brother has talked of not allowing them to be "re-imported" back into this country

I'd like to add a couple of Swedish and K98 or two to the pile

After a while it kinda gets to be a PIA keeping up with all the varieties of ammo over here

I think at one time I had 60 + calibers of ammo

so basically, the only ones that are readily available are the Mosin Nagants, Swede Mausers and Carcanos...I have never seen Carcanos around much. The Yugo SKS have gone up nearly 100-150 this year They were going for as low as 269 plus tax/ship and now only SOG has them for that price (279)...JG had them for 269 and now they are 330+tax/ship. On Black Friday JG sold Yugo SKS for 199 + tax/ship. I bet they continue to rise in price. I really wonder when they will hit the 500 mark.

That was a great point made above....the numbers of production rate. That's the bummer.

I guess the C&R collecting will be primarily Pistols now. The main issue with collecting C&R pistols is how unavailable ammunition is for most of the calibers.

msredneck wrote:There's a pile of Garands...I think maybe Korea...but Big Brother has talked of not allowing them to be "re-imported" back into this country

I'd like to add a couple of Swedish and K98 or two to the pile

After a while it kinda gets to be a PIA keeping up with all the varieties of ammo over here

I think at one time I had 60 + calibers of ammo

It was Big Sister, Hillary Clinton.

Over here we have a interesting situation. The old milsurp rifles are getting rare except the MN rifles but you won´t get a good Swede for a normal price, for example: i purchased my Swede M38 in collector grade 2 years ago for 330 Euro´s and today they want for the same 700Euro´s. But the real interesting thing is that you can make good deals with elderly shooters which can´t effort the money to buy them gunsafes, which are a must for our new gunlaws. The gouvernment sends controllers to the shooters to look for the safes. If any of them hasn´t a safe, they´ll collect the guns and give them 14 days to sell the guns otherwise they are going to be destroyed without paying any money back to the former owner. For that reason you can make a good deal and if i get the chance to buy such guns , i´ll give a realistic price to the owner because i hate to act like a vulture.
The market for good and original M1 Garands or 1903 Springfields is soaked up and you have to search for years in my case and won´t find a good one. Sometimes i wish we could easily import guns from your country!

Scharfschütze wrote:Not wanting to be a pessismist, but rather a realist, I have to sadly answer "yes". A couple of things bring me to this conclusion:

(1)Here are some production numbers to consider: (source: Neutrality Through Marksmanship. A Collector's and Shooter's Guide to Swedish Army Rifles by Doug Bowser)
ALL Swedish Mausers 804,000
M91 Russian 9,360,000
M91/30 Russian 17,450,000
US M1"Garand" 6,034,000 (approx.)
US M1 carbine 6,225,000
K98k German 11,500,000
No. 1 MkIII British 3,000,000
No. 4 Mk1 and 2 Brit. 3,530,000
So the numbers are pretty small to begin with, except for MN rifles, and many of those were destroyed in the wars, same for the K98k German rifles.
(2)Now remember that many of these imported into the USA were "sporterized" or "bubbaized", eliminating their collector value. Shotgun News runs an article in almost every issue as a "How To" butcher a Curio&Relic gun to turn it into a "sporter". From the 1960s through the 90s the NRA magazine American Rifleman did the same thing.
(3) C&R are generally defined as 50 years old or older (there are other criteria so not all are 50yrs old); so if you look at wars or military "actions" being conducted in 1961 as suggested by the OP, you will find most all were fought with semi-autos or full autos,(not counting the bolt action rifles used by irregular forces of course) most of which will never meet the BATFE's criteria for importation. So save for the few Yugo SKS rifles still left, there just isn't any "new" source for old firearms. And remember when the Yugo SKS rifles were $90? I bought several at that price at the Jackson Gun Show from the guy who lived in the castle in Raymond...
(4)Those C&R weapons which weren't imported to the USA went to other countries, and now with the UN's push to destroy "small arms" many countries are voluntarily destroying them. So the numbers are being actively reduced.
While you can still find MN rifles and occassionally even a Swede, the days of $100 Swedes and $90 Makarovs, etc. are over. I therefore recommend that anyone interested in the older weapons get a Curio & Relics license - many advantages to this, which were pointed out in another thread - and purchase what you like. If the current prez is re-elected (God forbid) it is pretty much a given that he will make the USA a signatory to the UN Gun Treaty, which would eliminate sources for any military surplus firearms ever again coming into the country.
Not being pessimistic, just being a realist.

And from those raw production numbers one has to further deduct the many thousands (tens of thousands? hundreds of thousands?) that ended up on the bottom of the ocean from supply ship sinkings; destroyed in bombings of supply dumps, etc.; lost in the mud, muck, and water of various battlefields; furnished to "allies" never to be seen again like all that stuff we sent to the Nationalist Chinese whose troops were busy surrendering a full brigade at a time; were intentionally destroyed in areas where gun ownership was outlawed; and those that ended up back here after the wars only to be bubba'ed to death by short-sighted "gun enthusiasts".

I hate to imagine how scanty the adjusted numbers are.

Get 'em while you can.

Tree of Liberty wrote:after reading Doug Bowser's post "A story from the 1990s" I could only begin to speculate once again: are the C&R military rifle days over?


I am a C&R guy myself. Very happy with the ffl03 privileges. I have been wondering about the next batch of c&r surplus rifles to be considered relics...after reading this post (which was Scharfschütze's reply to Doug Bowser's thread) + my already lingering suspicion, I sighed in disappointment.


Do you guys really think the "well is running dry" on the surplus rifle inventories? Are there any surplus rifles (I guess 1962 thru 1970) that I should expect to look forward to? Does anyone know if any or what nations manufactured bolt-actions into the 1960's? Are there any other "SKS-type" carbines to look forward to that I have not discovered? Or are we entering an era of only select-fire military rifles? I know civilian manufactured rifles will be here and there, but what about the historical military ones?

Is there any hope for a new, solid batch of C&R's waiting for the 50yr mark to hit? I usually try to figure: (1) what wars were going on at that time, (2) what were the arms of choice in these wars, as well as (3) who was producing arms in bulk? I usually reference this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_1945%E2%80%931989#1960.E2.80.931969 to see the list of wars, etc.

Also, the whole Clinton import bans on certain countries will affect this. Will surplus ammo continue to rise in cost at the current pace? Does the price of mil-surp rifles appear as if it will continue to go up? Would a more "conservative" Congress/POTUS lead to a decrease in ammo/surplus costs?

I really hope this isn't the end of the C&R rifle era

Does anyone have any input/insight on this?

Coming forward through the years, the C&R list is going to stagnate at the point when the M-14, FAL, G-3, etc. were introduced. They'll never be included in C&R because even if they don't now have select-fire capability, they were designed with it and parts exist to easily make them so.

Looks like anything new added to the C&R list will probably be limited to pistols. Maybe Hi-Powers from the Brits, or are they still using them? What did the Germans use throughout the 50s and 60s, some early H&K service pistol design, prior to the VP70?

Yup. For example: 77,000 Swedish M1896 rifles were sold and 7,900 Swedish M1896 rifles were donated to Finland during the Winter War 1939-40. After WW2 the Swedish government bought back 1/3 of these, ie 28,000. That is only 3.4% of all rifles produced. And only a few of those were mixed in with the rifles imported to the USA. If you find an SA marked Swede (or other non-Finn rifle, for that matter, marked SA) you have a rarity in your hands-better buy it while you can. I am fortunate to have one in my collection only because I knew what it was when I found it (thanks for the "education" on Swedes Papa Doug)!

Brutus wrote:[Coming forward through the years, the C&R list is going to stagnate at the point when the M-14, FAL, G-3, etc. were introduced. They'll never be included in C&R because even if they don't now have select-fire capability, they were designed with it and parts exist to easily make them so.

Looks like anything new added to the C&R list will probably be limited to pistols. Maybe Hi-Powers from the Brits, or are they still using them? What did the Germans use throughout the 50s and 60s, some early H&K service pistol design, prior to the VP70?

The German police generally used the "P1", ie the postwar (and some refurbished wartime) P38, often put together from wartime parts + a mix of new production parts. After that the various states in what was "West Germany" adopted various pistols, numbered 1-8 or higher (can't remember right now) which are NOT C&R. For example the P6 (SIG 225) pistols which were imported about 5 years ago from the state of Nordrhein-Westfalen (North Rhine / Westfalia). "East Germany" used everything from WW2 leftovers of the Walther PPK, P38, P08 "Luger", then transitioned to Warsaw pact weaponry such as the Tokarev "TT" and finally the "Pistole M", what we call the "Makarov".

Can we get POTUS Obummer to change his view on the surplus M1's that Korea wants to give back?

revreb15miss wrote:Can we get POTUS Obummer to change his view on the surplus M1's that Korea wants to give back?

There was actually legislation proposed to allow that but I can't find it right now, maybe someone with a bit more time can find it.

I found this letter Senator Rand Paul urging everyone to protest President Obama's ban on 1 million M1 Garand/Carbine rifles when it went down.

http://takebackbergenfield.com/did-you-know-that-%E2%80%93-president-obama-bans-m1-garand-and-carbine-rifles/


cannot find anything on a bill changing the current ban.

too bad....that'd be one million pieces on history ready to come back home to us Americans.

My understanding there were some prohibitions placed in the 2012 Defense Authorization Budget to prevent the State Department from expending any funds to stop the import ... we will see ...