Like I said - buy a bunch of warstock off the UK (I think they made about 500,000 SA80 only about 250,000 is coverted to A2). Strip them of everything and build them on a new receiver.
Not that many. 200,000 have been contracted for conversion and the MoD bought 380,000, iirc.
However the main point is that several years ago the MoD decided that all surplus small arms would be destroyed rather than sold as surplus, because of a big scandal where it turned out the company that was getting all the surplus guns was getting the contracts by bribing someone in the MoD and was paying less than the scrap metal value of them. Being the UK, the idea of trying to give the contract to someone else didn't occur to them and they decided to sell them as scrap instead. The MoD still sells off surplus ammunition, but not small arms.
Moreover, ATF decided that the prohibition on the import of barrels under 18 USC 925(d)(3) now applies to all barrels, rather than just handgun barrels, so guns coming up from the US is unlikely as the barrel is the only bit of the SA80 that makes it worth having one.
The L85A1 is perfectly okay for target shooters, excessive weight, protruding controls and occasional malfunctions don't matter to us.
I'd be interested to know where he got his parts from, I know of a prop company in the UK that has a fair few of them and a couple of dealers, but in private hands they're still pretty rare. The only other significant quantity of them outside the UK are the ones in the possession of the Jamaican Defence Force.
