These are some of the loose scopes I have in one of the safes, I really need to work on getting more rifles so they'll have a home! Some interesting scopes in the photo are the 2 original Malcolm scopes at the bottom (these are from the 1870/80's and are my oldest optics) and the OPL M73B2 (top middle of the pic). And no, I'm not Flip, and those S&B's aren't for sale. Those specific scopes will be going on my clone rifles (M40A3/5/6, Mk11 Mod 1, M107 and M39 EMR) when those builds are done.
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I actually did just purchased a new rifle, it's a B&T APR308S. Pretty cool rifle and very rare, there's only about 8 of them in the country. Ridiculously long silencer, I just hope it works well. This one is mine (with the silencer on and off), I still need to do Form 4 paperwork on the silencer (barrel is 16", so no SBR paperwork):
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Here's a photo from the internet showing what it looks like with the silencer removed:
I bought the B&T APR308S because it's an interesting rifle and I think it will go well with the B&T SPR300 that I have sitting at my dealer waiting for tax stamps to be approved (2 stamp, SBR and silencer). This one is in .300BLK, whereas the one above is .308. Here's my B&T SPR300 at my local FFL:
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I am moving one rifle out of the collection, a close friend made me an off I couldn't refuse. It's 1 of 3 Mk15 Mod 1's in private hands that actually has a legit McMillan M88 SASR PIP receiver and built to current Crane specs. Never thought I'd ever part with it, but here we are. I think this is going to be one of those that I'm going to regret in the future, but I know it's going to a great home.
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One final thing for this post. Last month the gun club I'm a member at had their very small annual gun show, and I was able to set up 2 tables to display some of my vintage and modern US sniper rifles. By small gun show, I mean like 4 people with displays and an FFL seling some pistols, lol. Besides the sniper rifles I also included some archaic firearms to show the lineage from 6 centuries ago and I brought in a few other items that tied everything together. I know that DMR’s aren't a true sniper rifle (literally a designated marksman rifle), but I wanted my USMC black stock M14 DMR there because I was just extremely proud of this build and I wanted people to see it! It felt right to include it in the display and I'm glad I brought it!
This is the first time I've ever done a display like this and this is the first public appearance for almost all of these firearms (I had a USMC display last year that included 3 or 4 of the guns that I brought again this year, everything else is new to display). This is a small portion of my collection, but these are some of my most important pieces of history. I talked to tons of people and I let everyone handle these rifles, look though the scopes, dry fire them and have their photos taken with their favorite ones! It's not everyday that someone can see these original rifles, especially being able to touch them and hold them! Normally guns like these are seen in museums behind a wall of glass and you're still standing a few feet away. Some of my rifles may have gotten a few new scratches or wear, but I didn't want them to gather dust sitting in a gunsafe forever, I wanted to share them with my community and educate people who were interested about our military's sniper history. This was a truly unique opportunity for everyone who attended the gun show!
I brought all sorts of amazing original sniper rifles, some of which are extremely historically significant like my Krag sniper rifle that was used in the Army tests in 1900 that paved the way for all of our military's sniper rifles (link to the article on my rifle at the end of this post, that's my rifle in the article)! Other items on display included an original handgonne from the 1370's, an original musket from the 1570's, 2 original USMC M40's, 2 original USMC Winchester M70's, an original IBA XM3 that my sniper platoon had in Fallujah, Iraq (I'm holding this war used USMC XM3 in the photos below), and other amazing firearms. So, tons of great stuff for people to enjoy! And of course people always want to know what guns like these are worth, some guy almost dropped one of my M40's due to shock when he asked me what that specific rifle was worth and I gave him a number, lol.
I wish I could show this stuff to you guys in person, photos don't do any of these guns justice! I'm just happy to have been able to share these pieces of history with people during this event!
Here's an article on the Krag sniper rifle I brought with me and put on display. Only 2 are still known to exist, my rifle and the one in the Springfield museum! This is where US sniping started, this is the beginning of it all. Without these Krag sniper rifles and the early Army trials, who knows when we would have developed sniper rifles and what configuration they would be in. This is a great article, please take a look if you're interested in early US sniping history!
https://www.americanrifleman.org/co...-rifle-the-telescopic-sighted-krag-jorgensen/
I guess since this post is already long enough, it wouldn't hurt to finish off with a few high resolution photos of my Krag sniper rifle. This is definitely a precision rifle, so it fits this thread, and it's probably the oldest "modern" precision rifle in this thread (magnifying optic, metallic cartridge)! This is my rifle, it's the rifle that's featured in the American Rifleman article linked above. My father took the below photos, the photos that are in the American Rifleman article were taken from the auction house where I acquired the rifle.
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That's the latest stuff from me, I hope you guys enjoyed seeing some of these rare rifles and scopes!