- Location
- On a resonably direct route in NS
I don't know where you're seeing the 33% prevalence of early SVT magazines, but it sure ain't where I'm looking.
The thing about imports of surplus, is that they come from batches stored away in the Motherland. Each cache would likely have been put together around the same time by the same workers at the same arsenal, so they tend to show the same characteristics. If you got a bunch of rifles from Import A five years ago and they had old-style magazines, that doesn't mean Import D on the racks today will also have them.
Neither will I. Until it gets to the point that I can actually get my hands on an SVT-38, which I know is very un-likely, and *need* the magazine.
The high price of original magazines is definitely inflated by the much higher prices for Soviet gear in the U.S.A., where they no longer import. In my experience, I've bought two of the things, one at $85 and one just a little higher, so I'd peg the value at a hundred or so (which is realistically a third of the price of the whole shebang), if you're patient. P&S has had the same ‘extremely rare, very few available’ original mag. listed at $195 for quite a while. I would wager that they took apart a couple of rifles for parts (possibly ones which arrived damaged to begin with), and they're hoping to recoup their cost on the sale of the mag. If they ever actually get anyone to bite on the $200 mag., they can always part more out.
