Absolut
Senior Member
So bought a new camera today (changed from Canon EOS 80D to Sony Alpha 7 R IV) and had to test how it performs. Took one of the recent acquisitions which is an oddball, but unknown to most, so good to document it.
The Austrian Police was looking to be able to shoot tear gas grenades - and they still had thousands of K98k rifles in stock. The person who had the idea to converted a K98k to a grenade launching rifle was a gun collector himself, so he thought for the prototype - since it might not be accepted - he'd take the worst and ugliest K98k rifle he could find, with deep rust pittings and mismatching. So little lost to collectors, plus if it would work with a rifle this ugly, it would work with better ones too. That particular prototype rifle by the way now is in the best private gun collection in Austria, not this one here, but thought the story would be interesting to share.
To get back, the prototype worked, it was cheap and they could convert it themselves, so they converted an unknown number (if I was to make a guess, not more than 150?) of K98k rifles to shoot tear gas grenades. For this the stock was cut down, the front portion of the barrel was replaced with an aluminum tube that has a threading for the grenade cup.
When these became obsolete they were sold off to an Austrian gun dealer. By law being "Grenade Launchers" these were considered military items and could not be sold to civilians. Hence the gun dealer who bought them had to become tricky to sell them. He riveted the grenade cup in place, as well as placed a shim extended with a metal rod in the middle, this way they permitted him to sell this rifle to anyone. By using blank cartridges the grenades were fired - blanks could still be fired, despite the shim and rod since it has gas escaping holes. I've once been told someone has great fun in using this rifle to fire tennis balls for his dog, since the size fits and despite of the rod the tennis ball might be a bit clamped at the front.
Back then I was not really interested in these, but it was nice that recently in an estate one of these turned up, and since I anyway had bought all of the guns this one came into my possession as well. I could finally inspect it in detail and see that typically for the Austrian Police rebuilds all was deep black reblued, and mismatching parts were matched to the rifle. It seems to me the bolt was force matched, and typical Austrian Police also the buttplate got matched to the rifle.
I hope you enjoyed the "Offtopic" and would appreciate also feedback on the pictures, whether they are now better than the older ones, or worse.
The Austrian Police was looking to be able to shoot tear gas grenades - and they still had thousands of K98k rifles in stock. The person who had the idea to converted a K98k to a grenade launching rifle was a gun collector himself, so he thought for the prototype - since it might not be accepted - he'd take the worst and ugliest K98k rifle he could find, with deep rust pittings and mismatching. So little lost to collectors, plus if it would work with a rifle this ugly, it would work with better ones too. That particular prototype rifle by the way now is in the best private gun collection in Austria, not this one here, but thought the story would be interesting to share.
To get back, the prototype worked, it was cheap and they could convert it themselves, so they converted an unknown number (if I was to make a guess, not more than 150?) of K98k rifles to shoot tear gas grenades. For this the stock was cut down, the front portion of the barrel was replaced with an aluminum tube that has a threading for the grenade cup.
When these became obsolete they were sold off to an Austrian gun dealer. By law being "Grenade Launchers" these were considered military items and could not be sold to civilians. Hence the gun dealer who bought them had to become tricky to sell them. He riveted the grenade cup in place, as well as placed a shim extended with a metal rod in the middle, this way they permitted him to sell this rifle to anyone. By using blank cartridges the grenades were fired - blanks could still be fired, despite the shim and rod since it has gas escaping holes. I've once been told someone has great fun in using this rifle to fire tennis balls for his dog, since the size fits and despite of the rod the tennis ball might be a bit clamped at the front.
Back then I was not really interested in these, but it was nice that recently in an estate one of these turned up, and since I anyway had bought all of the guns this one came into my possession as well. I could finally inspect it in detail and see that typically for the Austrian Police rebuilds all was deep black reblued, and mismatching parts were matched to the rifle. It seems to me the bolt was force matched, and typical Austrian Police also the buttplate got matched to the rifle.
I hope you enjoyed the "Offtopic" and would appreciate also feedback on the pictures, whether they are now better than the older ones, or worse.
