Everything you ever wanted to know about a German Schuetzen Rifle, but were afraid to ask;

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Bob

Go to Google and put in Feuerbixler and then hit translate.

Mike

Dave,

My German is far from perfect, so I'm not sure;

"Pictured here is a very beautiful "Büchel Original Master" made in 1939, with a special order adjustable (Tyrolean) cheek piece. This Schuetzen rifle has a five lever trigger and original color case hardening. Adjustable cheek pieces or adjustable hooks are not allowed in our current traditional schuetzen matches."

Bob

Schuetzendave wrote on Apr 23^rd, 2010 at 1:53am:



Well Dave I searched till I'm frazzeled out. How do I find this " Verstellbare backe " reversed cheekplate rifle. I did a search also and it gave me a ton of hits. I just plain got tired of looking.  I'm thinking it's the rare over the shoulder backwards training stock.  Is it a Zimmer? 

   Joe


       

Thanks Biggi. 

Found it, 
Daves "reversible" term is what had me in the dark. I dont see where its reversible but rather will utilize different shapes of cheekpletes.

I have five German rifles. Four have the Swiss buttstock which I prefer. My zimmerstutzen has the Tyrolian style. Lucky for me the Zimmer fits like a glove.

The " Feurbixler " site is fantastic!  My German/English dictionary is never very far away.   


       Joe. 

   

Welcome to the Forum, Biggi.   

The ASSRA and the ISSA ( (You need to Login or Register to view media files and links)) are both shooting as well as collecting organizations.  The ISSA championship matches in Raton, New Mexico, have had a special 200 yard offhand match just for European Schuetzen rifles for a few years, but both organizations allow their use in any match where the caliber and sights are appropriate.   

David

The Historic Arms Meeting at Bisley (10 / 11 / 12 July) has 200yd off-hand Schutzen competitions. I have a small scope sight (ISKOP, Wetzler) which is made to fit on the tapered rib of the Buchel Meister and so I can compete in Iron and Optical sight classes. I have the open field target sight which also fits on the rib, but there is no separate class for these.
Fred

This is a good one;

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Bob

Biggi,

     I am delighted to see you joining in the conversation here.  You have so much to add on a subject that has tantalized many of us for many years!  Please know that you are as welcome "as flowers in Spring" as we say here in the South Eastern US.

     I have a question about a zimmer that I would like to ask of you and your group, and that has to do with the parlor pistols.  I saw a little break top pistol at an auction, and it just seemed to follow me home.  It appears to be intended to shoot a round ball about the size of #6 shot (American sizing) using little or no powder and the ignition provided by a #10 or #11 percussion cap.  It is unmarked as to maker, but appears European since we never had that sort of thing here as far as I can determine.

     Would you or one of your organization be interested in discussing this piece with me with the idea that maybe I can someday figure out how to shoot it safely?  Thanks in advance for any help you may provide and again welcome to the ASSRA forum!

Regards,
Charlie Shaeff
aka Green Frog

Thanks for the quick response, Biggi!  Yes I do have this little pistol at home, but am at a shoot right now about 300 km away from there, so will have to wait until Sunday afternoon (our time) to shoot a picture and post it.

Thanks for gently reminding me about my English... I tend to use a lot of idiomatic phrases as I post, but that is not at all polite to our guests who speak English as a second language.  If we had to depend on my very poor German, I would take all night just to send greetings, I fear!  I am very grateful to have a German speaker to make it possible for us to connect with the classic information from the old European hot spots of Schuetzencraft. 

In one of your posts, you asked about the target we shot here, and I got excited about my question and forgot to answer.  Most of our shooting is done on a target series referred to as the "German Ring Target" which was standardized in its American version about 40-50 years ago and is printed under ASSRA control to insure that everyone associated with the association shoots under equal target conditions, at least.  If I remember correctly, they are available for 200, 100, 50 and 25 yards, simply scaled up or down in size as appropriate.  They have a white center ring valued at 25 points, then each ring out reduces in value by one point until you run out of paper, this value is 15 points on the full size paper.  Any hit on the paper but outside the scoring rings counts as 10 points.  The shooter puts 10 shots on the target usually, and extra hits are penalized by counting the lowest 10.  The Western edition of ASSRA, called ISSA, has a nearly identical target and scores it the same way, as does Wyoming Schuetzen Society and probably some others.

It seems from your statement that you have become a sort of "Mother Superior" to a bunch of shooting enthusiasts... bless you for your patience and willingness to serve such a function.  I'm out of letters now but will write more with the picture.

Froggie

A belated Welcome to this forum, Biggi.  We at the Redwood Gun Club and the associated Long Prairie Gun Club in far northwestern California have 6 or 8 Schuetzen matches a year, all offhand shooting and all using the ASSRA or Wyoming Schuetzen Union (WSU) target.  The WSU target differs only in the shade of red used on the colored portion.  We have 12 or 15 regular shooters and 6 or 7 of us use the old German rifles regularly.  We elderly shooters all shoot offhand, but sometimes we sit down between shots. Our oldest competitor is 82.  Our 200 yard matches are 30 shots.  We also shoot an all-day, 100-shot match in early October.

A few of us also have an informal practice each Friday at noon, weather permitting.  We shoot 22 rimfire Schuetzens at short range, 50 shots, with 2 shots at each of 25 targets.

Our range is 100 & 200 yards, but only about 200 yards from the sea.  Wind is often a problem.

Mike65 wrote on Apr 23^rd, 2010 at 11:42am:


Thanks Mike! Not perfect but gets the job done.  Now I'll never learn German!   

         Joe. 

Hello together!

First I have to thank the forum-writers, who gave me in the posts a lot of information to the ASSRA-targets with the circles and the different distances.
Perhaps it is possible to post some photos of your 200 yard target? (If I can get enough information about traditional shooting in US, I would create a new headline on my homepage with the facts of "Stutzen-Shooting in USA" or something like that...)  


If you have questions: ask me! I'll try to answer to all your questions.


But I have also a question to your shooting-practise: How do you check the shot into the target by the long distance? Do you have a telescop? Do you have "scorer-boys" near the target (don't know what is "Zieler" in English) who display the hit in any way? You have mobile targets on wires, which you can move to the shooter?

About ammo: 

We have only the already at-home-prepared ammo (bullet and powder in the jacket). An other kind of shooting is "Vorderlader", where you put bullet, powder and the primer separately into the rifle. 

For preparing the cartridges at home, first you have to make a preparatory training and take a examination, if you are able to make it. Then you have to apply for a license at the responsible authority of your city. If you are "clean" (not a known murder or bank robber or drinker... *big*grin*), you can get a few months later your "Pulverschein" for buying the powder. And you have to pay about 200$ for the powder-license.

Then you buy all components for the reloading-machinery, the jackets, the bullets and all you need - then you can start! But you need a lot of practise, until you have found the best adequacy of powder and plugging.

So long, have a nice day!

Biggi

Hello waterman!

Our shooting is always like this: one serial is 5 shots. Our target has 10 circles. So you can hit maximum 50 circles. Normally we shot 6 serials, this are 30 shots.

Our ranking depends on "best serial with five shot" and not the total 30 shots sum-up. So we have to change the target all five shots. On our 100meter/90yard ranges in Germany we have target holders on wires with an electric motor to pull in the targets for changing each five shots.

In Austria, there are those fantastic old historical ranges, where the "scorer-boy" is sitting under a safe-protection below the target. After the rifleman's shot, the scorer-boy checks the result and puts a special target signaling-disc into a board, so you can see what you hit. In the clubhouse behind the rifleman is sitting a "writer", who writes down onto your personally "scoring card" the hits you reached. So in Austria only the scoring-card is the valid voucher-document (called "Bolette") for your hits. You never see the target (telescopes are forbidden!) and you have to trust the scorer-boy what he shows with the signaling-disc.

You can see that on my homepage in headline "Wissenswertes" ("Worth knowing") in the chapter "Zieler-/Schreiber-Stände" ("scorer-writer-ranges"). There I explain the historical ranges, how it works.

In Bavaria, there are only two old scorer-writer-ranges left. All the other ranges are with wire to pull-in the target. In Austria there are still a lot of those historical ranges (about 10 or more I think).

Ääähhhmm, I hope you understand all this about the writer-scorer-ranges, what i try to explain...


Greetings from Bavaria
Biggi

Hi Bob.

Yes, I see some of you know the old regulations of historical shooting. *great* Thanx for explication of the former and nowadays regulations in USA.

Also in Germany, the old 1900's schützen-clubs (for 8.15x46R center-fire) were only for the high society. The normal worker didn't have any possibility to go there. The working class rifle was only the zimmerstutzen. 

In our competitions nowadays, we shoot on the one hand with Feuerstutzen (only 8.15x46R with lead bullets) and on the other hand with Zimmerstutzen (4 millimeters). Normally there are only two women who shoot there with Feuerstutzen. In Zimmerstutzen-competition there are about 10 or 15 women. 

After competition, the organisation-committee with his scoring-experts get the targets (when shooting onto paperboard-targets) or the shooting cards (when shooting with a writer on old scorer-ranges) for calculating the final scores and the ranking. Sometimes we have also a protest period, but only in Germany, unusual in Austria...

Biggi

I don't know if I know him... cannot check his face on your photo... 
If he was already a traditional German shooter in the 1980's, then he might be still alive. Some folks of us were in USA in former years. But I am only until three years together with the traditional Feuerstutzen shooters.

Do you use always the telescope mounted on the rifle (on photo it seems like this) and a hand-support for the left hand?

We have only a peep sight ("Diopter"), in Germany the telescope is forbidden. In Austria they use it sometimes on a Feuerstutzen. But we say, this is not original and not traditional. We try to shoot like in the 1900's at the "German Bundesschiessen".

Biggi

Here is a serious shooter shooting the iron sight benchrest competition. 200 yards. He's using a real tack driver rifle,,, oh! Oh thats my rifle he's using ha ha ha. No wonder he did so good!
 
Many of our shooters are very serious competitors. Way to serious to drink beer while shooting 

  Joe.

Joe (Westerner),

The fellow you indicated with the arrow is Reiner Odebrecht, who attends the ISSA (International Single Shot Association) Schuetzen Match in Raton every year, and yes he's from Germany.

Bob

I am enjoying this thread very much.   

After our 30-shot matches, we also shoot at an "honor target".  It does not have concentric circles.  Instead, it has some "traditional German-type" design, usually taken from a book about 1900s shooting in Germany & Austria. The design is grapes and leaves or flowers or just about anything.  All agree about some point near the middle of the target that is to be called the center.   

Then each shooter takes a $1 paper bill and write writes his or her (we have 2 women shooters) name on the bill.  All the bills go into a large jar.  The Schuetzenmeister draws one bill at a time from the jar and calls the name of a shooter.  The person called shoots one shot at the honor target.  All the other shooters watch through their telescopes and try to see the shot.  Then the Schuetzenmeister marks the shot on a copy or sketch of the target for all to see.  The process is repeated until everyone has their turn.  All the $1 bills go back into the jar.  The honor target is recovered.  Each shooter signs their bullet hole in the target.  The shooter who hit closest to the center point gets to take home the honor target and perhaps the money from the jar.

Our regular match is at 200 yards, but with the honor target, bullet holes are difficult to see.  So we place the honor target at 100 yards.  This makes it more difficult, because the rifle sights are set for 200 yards.  With Schuetzen cartridges (8.15x46R or 32-40, etc) sight settings that allow hits at 200 yards will hit very high at 100 yards.  So the shooter must aim at some point below the honor target.

Sometimes a shooter will bring a Mauser "wehermannsgewehr" in 8.15x46R to our matches.  Are those permitted?

Bob, sympathically photo of original bavarian-austrian hand-posture and the good old peep sight... and free-hand! In this way, we like it!



waterman: Nice idea to shoot the honor target on half distance for better check the bullet wholes on it. *grin* Is it allowed to screw at the peep sight for 100 yards? Or you have to let the peep sight (or other optical sights) adjusted for the 200 yard distance?

Biggi

Sorry, no possibility for response, the ASSRA forum was down last evening...

Yes, I understand. Click-sight might be adjustable. With old sight and screwing is difficult without test-shots.

We have a complete "rules of procedure" for our traditional shooting competitions. And we normally use our rules also for price-shootings. But not each organizer of a shooting-society demands all topics of the rules, so that sometimes the participants can nearly do what they want. And we "hardliners" don't like this, if there are participants with sport clothing, without hat and with modern components on a traditional Feuerstutzen...

You can also observe a big variety of different hand-hold-methods in Germany and Austria. I would not be able to shoot with finger-balance. The palm rest is forbidden in Germany, but in Austria they use it. 

I've never heard about this German term about the palm rest. I've translated it for me, but it makes no sense for me. Perhaps I would say "It is the handle to throw it away!" 


Biggi

.
Hi Joe!

I can imagine that a palm rest would be very comfortably, if you shoot at these traditional shooting ranges in Austria. There they have not so much plain lowlands because everywhere are hills and mountains. So they built since all times the shooting ranges steeply uphill. Because of this you have an unorthodox attitude while shooting. And then it might be more comfortable with palm rest... (view photo attached).

If you want to go to Bavaria for shooting, you need the hat and your traditional rifle without any modern or unusual components. The lederhose is not soooo important, a quite normal pair of black trousers and a wool jacket also works. But no jeans, sports clothes or military/camouflage wear! You can check the pics in our photo-gallery and you can compare with the content of your wardrobe. And a glass of wine (Austria) or beer (Bavaria) we'll find for you! 


Biggi

Ooooh, a very comfortable seat in a military cargo plane... like a camping folding chair... *big*grin*
...then you should find a period, when we have some nice Stutzen-Shooting here!

Don't know how to import a rifle and ammo to Germany. They are very restrictive here with all about weapons. But we have a friend in USA, who visits twice a year Bavaria. We should ask him, he will be perhaps able to inform you.

Biggi

Hi waterman!

You cannot buy ready loaded ammo for 8.15er rifles. Nobody fabricates it, because each rifle needs other loading parameters. And each cartridge-bearing/chamber (don't know correct expression, in German it's called "Patronen-Lager", where you put the loaded cartridge into the rifle for shooting) is different to the other. Some are longer, others are shorter. My loaded cartridges have a length of 59 millimeters, others need a length of 62 millimeters. Some riflemen like ammo without plugging, some like plugging with cotton batting, others prefer small balls rolled from toilet paper, others like cut circles from felt-material. And last but not least, each barrel likes another quantity of powder, depending on the used bullet-weight.

You are interested in manufacturing ammo at home? Okay, I try to explain how we proceed. I've already told, how difficult it is in Germany to get the certificate for buying powder. First the 2-day education/training for learning all the operations with the material and the security while working with explosive substances. Then the inspection by government/police, whether you are "clean" and no danger about your past life (as murderer or bank-robber *grin*).

Then you buy all loading tools for it, or borrow it from a friend. You buy the empty "virginal" cartridge cases, for preparing them directly for your cartridge-bearing. The crank at the "bottle neck" of the cartridge must fit into the cartridge-bearing. For that you need the "cartridge sizer". If you don't know the diameter of your barrel, you have to check for it. Perhaps you need .318/.321/.323 bullets. You can buy the bullets ready fabricated in 148 grain or 170 grain. Nearly nobody melt them self, because you need a lot of equipment and more lot of time.

Then you start making the ammo, step by step. Everybody has different methods and ways of handicraft. For a normal shooting day at a price-competition you should have about 100 cartridges with you.

More later!

Biggi

Hi waterman!

What means "breech-seat" in your question-text? I didn't find a translation for this. Please explain it for me, what you mean. And what are those stop-ring-bullets? 

Nice description about you and your schuetzen-friends. *big*grin* Homeless beggars with guns... hahahaaa *lofl*


Yes, I thought so, that the US-riflemen wear always a baseball cap and also military clothing. But don't be surprised: the Bavarian riflemen wear the traditional clothing mostly only for traditional shooting. For the common small-bore cal .22 shooting in the club they wear also quite normal clothing. Other regions of Germany don't know our old-fashioned or typical Bavarian clothing, they think that we are a little bit crazy. And pistol-shooter never wear traditional clothing, they wear jeans and sweatsuit. 

Yes, so it is! We are a marginal group. But we are proud of it!


Biggi

Biggi, here's a link to the ISSA (International Single Shot Association) website photo gallery showing a rifle with the bullet and breech seater (one design of many!) in the relationship they would be in inside the barrel.  (You need to Login or Register to view media files and links) you look carefully at the forward part of the seating tool, you can see a brass piece that actually does the pushing on the base of the bullet.  And here's another photo showing the tool in the rifle, with the handle ready to pull back, which will cause the plunger to push the bullet into the rifling.  (You need to Login or Register to view media files and links)

David

Biggi,

A picture is worth a thousand words in German or English! This is a picture of a mechanical breech-seater made by Russ Weber in Colorado, this particular model is made to fit a Winchester action. #1 you carefully push your lubed bullet base first into the “cartridge case” part of the seater. #2 you then insert the seater and bullet into the action as you would a normal cartridge. #3 then you turn the seater so that lug locks into the action. #4 you pull back on the handle so that the bullet is then inserted into the barrel just ahead of the chamber. #5 you remove the seater and insert a cartridge loaded with powder and you’re ready to shoot. 

Bob

Traditional German ringed bullet. May be the RWS bullet.

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     Joe. 

Breech-seating:  There was a different type of tool for breech seating bullets in a Martini.  Would someone please post a pic of the old Ideal bullet seater that you hit with your hand?  The breech seater in Bob's photo works with rifles like the Winchester or Sharps because they have breech blocks that rise vertically.   


Bullets:  Biggi, how do you purchase bullets for the 8.15?  Do you have a large selection? Or are there just the 2 different weights?  And who makes the bullets? Could you post pics of the currently available bullets, like the pics Joe posted of the RWS bullet? Does anyone sell the German bullets in the US?

Biggi, 

My impression is that your modern day safety rules/laws do not allow you to load your rifles in the old traditional way. 

If we people and our machines are not perfect, our goverments and law makers are very very far from perfect. 

Dont get me started!! 


              Joe. 


                 

Topic: Available bullets 8.15x46 in Germany

The situation is like follows: in the cold light of a day we have have only one manufacturer for the bullets. This is Haendler & Natermann in northern part of Germany. They fabricate the lead-bullets in the sizes .318/.321/.323 and all the three sizes in weight of 148grain and 170grain. You can get them in pure lead (greased with the rings) or with a very fine coat of copper (metalized) called "high speed". Normally you can buy them in each re-loader-shop...

...normally...

...but two years ago, the manufacturer gets a new owner and he wants to make the big deals with other bullet-products. The community of traditional shooters is too small, so they fabricate now for the US-market large shipment for special airgun-balls and other things for greater communities. 

If you need now some bullets for your .318-rifle, you have to order 10.000 bullets, then they will produce it special for you. So we organized in February a "omnibus order" via our feuerbixler-website. So we got a lot of orders from the folks to buy the required quantity centralized. That was the only way...

There is another, very small manufacturer in Germany, who produces also 8.15-bullets. He is called "Rifle bullet caster" and wants to get more market share. But some guys told me, that the quality is sometimes poor and the bullets are too different one below the other. So you have a lot of waste and non-precise ammo.

I've to make some pics next week, because the weekend I am out for shooting in Innsbruck/Austria...

Biggi

I've my camera always with me...


...and I think, at the moment my standing in the forum is not sooo bad!


Biggi  

Topic "breech-seater"

Today I was in Austria for shooting with old German fire rifle ("Feuerstutzen"). There at the range I asked some long-established riflemen about your "breech-seater" whether they know this. And they told me, that about 15 years ago, somebody brought such a tool to the range (it seems he got it from US). And they decided to test it.

But they realized that it takes too long time for reloading and the barrel will be really soon full of lead near the mouth (in direction to the cartridge chamber). And it seemed to be less precise than with ready loaded cartridges. So they stopped the tests an went back to their usual ammo.

Nobody knows a German name or expression for it. So I think, that perhaps this is no old German loading tool.

Greetings from
Biggi

Hi Bob,  So it is true? That old saying? Nothing new under the sun? 

You really need to write a book Bob.  I'm serious. 


          Joe.

So much style Biggi !!  

The rules sound strict. Much more so than ours.

What system Martini is your rifle?  Is the Martini system most popular or one of the others. There are so many.  

My Martini is a Stahl

               Joe.  

Another question on rules Biggi. 

Is the barrel sight allowed to be used with the front sight and rear diopter?

Using all three sights helps me see the fine bead sight that my rifles have. Most of our shooting is done outside in strong light.

      Joe.  

Hello Joe.

Sorry, I was out for shooting the last days...

In our rules, we allow only two sights on a feuer-rifle or a zimmer-rifle. The diopter/peep sight with a "Sperber-Röhrl" or a "Seibert-Diopter" (makes a increase in 1.5-times ...don't know the correct expression). And at the front sight a "Korn". This might be a pinhead, a ring/circle or a Balken/beam.

The allowed sights you can find illustrated in our rules:

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A telescopic barrel sight is not allowed. We do not use it, because it is "not traditional" for our shooting ranges.

Biggi 

Which shells a shooter can or should use depends on the type of action.  My very old Martini requires RWS shells or shells with an equivalent rim diameter.  I have some old DWM shells and about 200 old Berdan primers that work also.  If I make shells for the Martini out of 30-30 shells, it requires some work on a lathe to reduce the rim diameter.  One American company, Quality Cartridge Company, makes shells to the same size as the RWS shells, but they are just as expensive as RWS.  An American shooter might just as well buy the RWS shells, because we know they will be made correctly.

But for my Original Aydt, 8.15 x 46R shells made from American or Canadian 30-30 cases work even better than RWS cases.  That is because of the gap between the face of the breechblock and the end of the barrel.  The rims of the American cases are slightly thicker and are greater in diameter than the RWS 8.15 cases, and so they fill the gap better.  Making the cases from 30-30 is quite easy.  You can also trim the American cases a bit to fit the length of your chamber exactly, if that is necessary.

Personally, I would like to try some of the .318 diameter & 170 grain greased lead bullets, but I do not know any of the problems with importing them.

And the more you practice, the luckier you become.

waterman

H&N swages their bullets - I also use them for some applications (.22 Hornet, 30-20, 38-40).  Even the GG bullets are swaged.  But it is a quality product indeed - it shoots at least as well as hand-cast stuff.
Their Hi-Speed bullets especially are pretty good - if a bit pricey...

Joe, I think you are correct.  That looks like tissue paper filler, probably used to keep the small powder charge near the primer.  If you do that with black powder, the tissue paper comes out on fire.  Don't ask how I know that.

Gert, are the H&N bullets exported to the US?

There is sometimes a discussion about "chamber ringing" on this forum.  I will let someone who knows more about it explain that.  But I think the use of a slice of cotton from the rod to hold the powder in place has the potential to damage the rifle.

Hi Tom,

nice that you could increase knowledge to our favourite hobby "Old German Schuetzen Rifles" on my website feuerbixler. Sorry that we have no English-Edition until now...


You need a diopter? I still have one for Zimmerstutzen. 


Biggi

Hei Biggi, it's hard to tell from the pictures of the diopter sight, but while I can see the diopter blocker for iron sight matches, I can't tell if it is one of the "focusing diopters". I've got one on my AYDT Zimmerstutzen and it is great for old eyes. You've shared some neat stuff. Do you have any way of checking a maker if I give the name and city? Thanks friend.

Trapdoor Dick NieKamp
Just an olde Dutchman

Biggi, I had a cousin who was in the US Army Military Police during WWII.  One of his duties as the Army came into Germany was to collect firearms from the civilian population, place them on the curb of the road and have a 2 1/2 ton truck or half-track run over them to destroy them.  Made him cry to do it, there were some absolutely beautiful rifles & shotguns, but it was his job.  Thirty years later, when he told me about it, he was still upset that it was done.   

David

Biggi
Sorry to be so vague. I was refering to something like the Sperber optic. I bought a reproduction on E-bay, but could use another. I have seen German sites that have the rear sights as well as the front inserts, but have not been able to get them to respond to e-mails.

Thanks Tom

Biggi,

Yes, there were many fine guns lost in the last world war, but luckily many GI’s brought German Schutzen rifles back from Europe as souvenirs and even today, 65 years later, there are Aydt rifles that show up here locally that have been in storage since the war. Unfortunately, most of these old rifles are missing their original sights and so we are always looking for replacement diopters, etc.

Bob

As far as I know the told story, in 1945 in Germany the things happened like follows:

The Allied forces collected all the weapons, also the sport arms or hunting-shotguns and fire-rifle/zimmer-rifle. Not all were destroyed immediately, but the expensive-looking ones and also the sportarms wehrmann-büchse / wehrmanns-gewehre were collected separately.  In that offices or storehouses the rifles were separated from the diopters. With wehrmanngewehr (very military-looking!), they proceed like that, they put the lever-bolt out and stored them separately from the rifle in different crates. They wanted, that the arms are at the moment not able for shooting. 

In US (or perhaps also in GB), the crates came to different storehouses. Lot of years later, they found again these crates with the fire-rifles, but they didn't look for the crate with the diopters. So the fire-rifles went out without the peep-sights. Nobody knows, where the crates with the peep-sights are went to...

Also the wehrmann-rifles. They put together the lever-bolt and the rifle, but didn't look about the hammered type-numbers. So all the collected wehrmann-rifles (which came back to the shooters) have nowadays different numbers from lever-bolt and rifle. If you find one with equal and correct numbers at all marked parts, you know that this wehrmann-rifle wasn't collected in 1945 by the Allied forces. So it's a rifle, which was hidden stored in an attic or cellar.

Would you be so kind to look about those lost crates with the diopters?  


Biggi