Auf widersehen winter! K98k in the snow

[Blicero]

A few weeks ago we got pummeled by snow. According to the almanac, it was the most snow to hit North Carolina in the last 744 years. OK, that's probably not true. But it was the most snow I've ever seen.

I managed to snap a few pics of a rifle in the picturesque backdrop. It's a Gustloff Werke/BCD k98, showing the rough external finish typical of late war Mausers. The bolt is mismatching but the pitting on it matches the wear & pitting near it on the receiver bridge, so it's been mated with gun for a long time. Gustloff is noted for making the lowest quality k98ks...something about their barrels...but you'd never know that if you spent some time behind the trigger on this one.

By this point in the war, arms manufacturers had a bear of a time cycling their products into service, thanks to useless destroyed rail lines wrought by Allied bombers. So it's possible this rifle just sat in the Gustloff yard until it was 'liberated' at the time of surrender. Who knows?









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[Loose}{Cannon]

Man..   cyanide pitting all over that nazi bastage.   

[Greasemonkey]

Man..   cyanide pitting all over that nazi bastage.   

Naw, thats where the snow flakes landed, melting it. That thing was shivering and had flashbacks of it's ancestors in Stalingrad, freezing in the cold, slowly dying and loosing to the paddle rifles.

Nice example Blicero

[Phosphorus32]

That's a beautiful K98     Love that laminate stock and cupped buttplate.  The winter backdrop is a nice touch.  The cold scene is definitely appropriate for a '44 K98, with the "Thousand Year Reich" quickly disintegrating around it's architect the year this rifle was made.

[Dannyboy53]

Very fascinating Blicero, rough machining for sure (lathe operators dodging bombs  ) but it is a beautiful specimen!

[sheepdog]

Oh I like that one.