wayupnorth
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Northern Alberta
Someone call 1984 and the A-Team, alert Hannibal and the FaceMan because i have arrived!
I finally got myself a Stainless Ruger Mini 30!
I know, i know, big whoop.
but for me it is.
yes, ill probably rarely if ever shoot this rifle but its one ive always wanted.
and it is kind of a funny story behind me getting it.
so sit down and i will tell you a story of a boy and his rifle.
so growing up in the 80's i of course watched the A Team and loved B.A. Baracus and his stainless mini 30 and its folding stock blazing away and saving the day.
so from those days forward i always wanted a mini30.
years later i picked up a mini14 and i really enjoy that rifle but the desire to get a mini30 in stainless still haunted me.
so about 10 years ago my boss wanted to sell a rifle he had to fund a new rifle he wanted.
i at the time needed a new hunting rifle and the price was super good so i purchased it off him.
talking with him he told me that the new rifle he just special ordered in was a Ruger Mini 30 and he was getting it at cost because he knew the local gun store owner.
sure enough a couple days later the rifle arrived and i was with him when he went and picked it up.
and upon seeing the nice shiny rifle my desire from the 1980's was restocked.
now i dont see my boss very much, couple times a year.
but i made a point when i did meet up with him to ask him how my Mini30 was doing, or ask him if he was ready to sell me that mini30, or ask if this was the year that i would get the mini30 as a Christmas gift from work.
just slowly planting the seed.
years roll by and i found out that he only shot the rifle with maybe 5-6 mags worth then into the safe it went and never came out again as his tastes moved on to something else.
so i slowly started to increase my asking about the rifle and started to express my seriousness of wanting it.
id start offering low ball prices or silly trades for really crappy guns i had laying around.
then today it happened.
i ended up having to do a small road trip with my boss and while chatting he was telling me how his investments actually tanked last year and he lost a not so pleasant amount of money.
nothing serious but enough that it embarrassed him and stung his pride a little.
i asked if he was offsetting the loss by selling off stuff he never used, to which he said he hadnt thought about doing that but it might make him feel better to do something like that.
so i decided it was time to strike.
after 10 years of laying in wait i looked him in the eye and made a nice low offer that would make my scottish grandparents smile in their graves, i said "you know what would make you feel better.... $500 in crisp new bills fresh out of the bank machine in your hand" and he smiled and said yes, that would probably make him feel better, so i said that i could make that happen, if he sold me his mini30.
so there it was.
my lust was out on display.
i had let my desire take over for a second and it drove right at the heart.
everything stopped, i could feel time stand still as he looked in shock at me.
"do you really want that rifle?" he asked.
"yes, yes i do" i said.
he said that he hasnt used it in years but still $500 was a significant loss to take on a pretty much brand new rifle.
so i agreed and said "well then, let me pull into the bank machine up the road and lets make it $700 right here and now and call it a deal"
he smiled and said "sure, why not"
and there it was, the deal was struck!
i had to drop him off at home so the sale was quick, he walked into the house and came back out with the rifle in the original box and another box as well.
it seems that when i took him out to the range a year ago with a couple AR's he got the bug to modernize his mini30 and he put a ATI stock on it.
not my cup of tea, but stocks can come off.
so the mini30 is a 2006 which is a interesting year for them because it was the start of the new better barrels and it was also a year or 2 before the prices shot way up on them.
so its the best of both worlds, better barrel and still low price to buy.
so for my $700 i got a mini30 that has maybe 60 rounds through it and a brand new ATI stock.
so i think i did pretty good, to buy a mini30 now would run me $1250 and the ATI stock runs $170.
so i paid around half price for it!
and that my friends is how i sold my wife on it when i got home and didnt even get yelled at for bringing home a new rifle!!!!
my plans for this rifle.
gonna take it off that ATI stock, not my cup of tea like i mentioned, want to put it on wood but the original stock is black synthetic.
so either im gonna try to flesh out of of those wood stocks with the under folding metal butt or i have a mini 14 stock sitting in the shop, thinking maybe to refinish it with a lighter stain and put that on it.
then try to flesh out a stainless 20 round pinned magazine.
like i said, i dont imagine i will shoot this gun much but it feels so nice to finally have it.
one of those purchases that make you smile when you think of it and im already smiling thinking about the odd summer day when i will take it out to the field and play the A Team soundtrack and rattle off some rounds.
