The rifle has an interesting story.
Rick called me saying that he had a call about a G43 sniper and he was an hour away from grilling out a steak at home and an hour from a scoped G43 that was claimed to be an all matching vet bring back. He asked if $1200 was a good deal. I said go immediately and get it for $1200 unless something was obviously wrong and it would be a good deal($2000-3000 value with repro mount, which I said that it was likely, if not almost certain) and if as represented it would be a steal($6000 ish but I pointed out that original matching mounts are very rare and unlikely what it would be). He elected to go home and get a steak. By the next day the owner had done some homework and the price was way up.
It ended up on gunbroker at $4000 opening and $4999 BIN. I took a quick look at the auction pics when he called again I told him the mount did not look good and I did not see any matching number on it. As I had said before and restated, original mounts are very hard to find and I had every expert known to man to check mine before I bought it at SOS a year ago. Then I had Bruce, Dave and Mike S. confirm that it was OK again later. I had previously told him almost all German snipers were fakes or enhanced, including a RC ZF41 he got a week or two ago on a 1938 RC.
Rick asked it I though that if would be worth it to go do a hands on inspection and I said yes but to get it way under the opening bid to be safe if he was not sure, like sum of parts, $2K rifle if no obvious issues, $200 mount, $500-700 if good scope. I also told him take it apart and check numbers everywhere-stock, dust cover, locking lugs, mount, etc. anywhere he could find them. Supposidely the mount was numbered to the rifle but the lousy GB pictures were not real good and it looked number free(the area where many are numbered was all goofy looking). I also pointed out to Rick that it was unlike any mount I had ever seen, although there is much variation(see Robert's book). I was busy when he called and I just took a quick look at the Pics with my focus on the mount, which is a huge part of the value. I did not do a good survey of the not so hot pictures taken indoors. There was no good detail anyway.
Rick went to look at it and got it pretty close to the sum of parts and called me on the way home after purchase. He still could not tell me the verdict on many of the things I recommended that he check, stock numbers, dust cover, bolt lugs, not sure if mount had a number but he had not found it. Interestingly, apparently someone hit BIN by the time he was getting ready to leave and the seller was trying to stop the auction.
I am no expert on these and never claimed to be. I was asked for help and gave it best I could with bad to iffy information given to me. I think $1200 for a scoped G/K43 is pretty much a no brainer and not bad advise. I also think those that condemn someone's help should know a bit more of the facts before the condemn the helping party. Maybe getting the facts first would be more wise.
That is a summation of the rest of the story.
