Questions about new israeli k98...

Chuck3436

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Ok she arrived in the mail and i have officially joined the millitary suprlus club. Very glad too, for ive always wanted a shootable mauser action to play with. I have a thing for 98 actions, beyond enfield or nagant actions. Just the design, heft, reliability and security of the system appeals to me.

Anyways...I have a few questions about her, knowing that theres probably not too much to discern from this rifle since its been reworked a time or 2.

I know that its a czech rifle, it has the rampant lion crest. On the left side by the crest is 2 small markings. 1 appear to be a circle with a symbol that appears to be an El or something like that, and a 5 pointed star (NOT a star of david) witha marking in it of some sort. They are side by side and appear to have been scrubbed 1/4 off the top somehow. Right side appears to have a plethora of usual IDF markings....but....on the barrel below the rear sight on the right side are 3 waffenampt markings. Tiny eagles with Wa### on them, 3 side by side. I thought these were usually scrubbed off? Barrell is Israeli from markings, and i assume the 5-56 is the date of manufacture, which i found odd because i thought most were not converted until the 1960's? Bayonet lug is there, sight hood is not(looking for one). Rear sight does not have markings underneath for range adjustment.

The stock is red laminate with the 7.62 burned in the bottom, but the laminate is starting to peel off in some places.

Anything anyone can tell me otherwise? My best assumption is a post war czech piece together made for israel. Anything on those 2 little markings of the circle and star would be nice and the why the WaA markings are there as well.

Cheers.
 
re star & El

Hi,

I also have an Israeli Mauser. Mine was orginally a Spandu made Gew 98 from 1916.

It has a 6 pointed star with what looks to be a J inside and part of the circle with the El (just the start of the E visible.)

Barrel is stamped 7 - 57

Both the star and circle are stamped similiarly to the 912 which was added at the time of conversion. I believe those marks were added at the time the rifle was re barreled to 7.62.
 
In 1949 the new Israel state received ex-german k98 rifles from czech govt.
They also received the czech Puska vz.24(czech version of german k98).
These were probably used to early 60's by Israel till they adopted FN FAL or converted to .22 target rifles.The markings I'm not familar with.The info is from an article in the May/June 2006 issue of the Armourer militaria magazine.
 
Gotta love a Mauser in 308, less kick than a 8mm
betterpix.jpg
 
It has a 6 pointed star with what looks to be a J inside and part of the circle with the El (just the start of the E visible.)

The strange thing is, my star is a 5 pointed regular star...not a 6 point star with the J.

Do any of you guys have any waffenampt markigns left on your israeli rifles?
 
My Israeli K98 has several waffenamps. There are 3 in a row on the right side of the receiver. On the other side of the receiver there is a pinged out Nazi eagle. It's a Erma 1939
IDF3.jpg
 
No, it would not be unusual. At the tail end of the war, there were plenty of leftover waffen'ed parts to assemble rifles with lion's crest recievers.
 
Israeli Mausers

I have 6 or 8 Israeli Mausers; three of them are specifically manufactured for Israel with the Israeli crest on the receiver. These Mausers were manufactured in 7.62 and not rebarreled. They meaning FN only manufactured a very small amount of the 7.62 rifles and 1,000 of the .22 caliber rifles. I have a couple of the .22’s on my rack and they aren’t conversions like most of the ones you see on the market. They aren’t manufactured with a stripper clip guide or the familiar notch on the left side of the action to facilitate reloading with a stripper clip. I think the 7.62 conversions are of historical importance because these could have been used in the building the state of Israel.

Even the Russian rebuilds are about as good as we can get for Mausers, because we (Canada) don’t have the importers like we had with International or Century importing guns. The good old days of getting really nice collectable firearms are coming to a close. You will have to take what ever you can get. If someone told me fifteen years ago that you would get between $150 and $250 for a Mosin-Nagant most of us would have told them they were nuts. The price of Mausers and Mosin-Nagants have increased because there are new collectors that don’t have the choices we older collectors had. Now you hear stories of the 12-5 collectors purchasing an FN for as little as $150 less than a Mosin-Nagant.

Sorry I didn’t mean to ramble.

Albayo
 
For sight hood, try Marstar. They used to have lots.

The 7.62 K98 was still widely used by IDF reservists during the 67 war.
 
I'm new to the forum, but looking at the pic of DaveM's Israeli Mauser, it sure has some Kriegswaffen details. As you all know the Kriegs were produced near the end of the war by the Germans. Kriegs started coming on line late 1944. The idea of a Krieg or "War Rifle" was to cheap out on some of the usual high standard to speed up production etc. Your rifle has some common Krieg characteristics, i.e. Stamped front barrel band, the bolt take down hole moved from it's usual home in the middle of the stock butt to that little hole on the bottom of your butt plate. All I can see from the pic. But you said it's an erma 1939. If that is the year stamped on the receiver, then we are looking at a mismatched rifle, much like what you will find on an RC. Remember pure Kriegs were'nt produced until around 44. Sorry if I pointed out what you already knew, but as a new guy I was just itching to jump in...

There are other things to look for in a Krieg. Stamped floor plates, trigger housing, no provision for locking screws, lathe marks on barrel etc.
 
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