[Archivist Dick]

Madigan Army Hospital, Joint Base Lewis-McCord, Washington State, is all abuzz...buzz...buzz of an anticipated release of 85,000 Garands from South Korean Army reserves.

We've been reading about this for years and how Madame Secretary Clinton had gone out of her way to hold the transaction up.

Evidently, the log jam is broken. Stay tuned. Please overlook if this is old news.

Best regards from Seattle.

 

[BARQS19]

Yeah I've heard but I also heard CMP wasn't touching them. Only importers were going to buy them. Which means they'll be selling for more than what CMP offers, plus have import stamps on them.

 

[curly1]

If they do come in I would expect them to be ridden hard and put away wet.

 

[limpetmine]

About the same quality of the Blue Sky Garands. But there were some gems in that bunch, and if you remember, it was the only game in town for Garands (for more than one per lifetime). It was indeed, the best of times.

 

[HoosierDaddy In Memoriam]

These will not be CMP guns. They do not fall under the jurisdictional guidelines of the program. Nothing about that has to do with condition just the way the program is set up.

 

[Ronbo6]

The second Garand I ever owned was a Blue Sky. It was rough, to put it mildly, but at least it was fixable.

It would actually shoot semi auto after I replaced the gas cylinder (out-of-spec). I had to peen the barrel splines to keep the gas cylinder from wobbling around unacceptably. It would not shift around in the stock any more after I replaced the trigger guard (with its D-shaped locking studs). It would shoot accurately after I replaced the badly shot-out barrel (originally, about a third of the bullets hit the target sideways enough to make elongated holes). Its cosmetic problems (cracked handguards and a missing toe on the stock) were fixed with a reproduction Fajen stock.

I got the rifle cheap enough (under $200) that I still wasn't too deep into it after all the fixes. It is one of my favorite shooters now, and after I replaced the barrel: NO import mark!


Before that, the only ones available to me (or just about anyone else, I got mine in 1970) were rewelds, and I do have (and still occasionally use) one of those as well. Contrary to popular legend, it is holding together (and functions) just fine. There is no evidence of problems at the (barely perceptible) welded joint.

 

[Shoobedoo]

Just to echo what everyone else is saying... CMP will not be involved in this, they will likely be available thru the usual supects, ie. Century, SOG, Centerfire, etc. and Century will almost certainly end up with a bunch of them. It's hard to gauge what they'll sell for, but at least initially, it may be possible to pick up a decent serviceable "shooter grade" Garand for about what a low end CMP Service Grade rifle goes for. Any cherries in the lot will quickly get picked out and sold at a premium, and if any buying frenzies get started, it's sure to drive the prices for average grade rifles up.

 

[limpetmine]

For the short term, if this quantity comes in, it will pressure prices down for a while, then they'll return to normal. Buy when stocks are a plenty.

 

[BradB]

If they are in fact brought in by Century, and have the giant electropencil logo on the receiver like their Mosin Nagants do, I would predict that there will be little to no impact on collector grade Garand prices, and only marginal impact on USGI shooter grade. Most folks that collect US will poo-poo the import marking style for anything other than a shooter which tends to run at the lower end of the price range anyway. As with any collectible, buy the best you can afford in terms of condition and originality and you will likely always get your investment back if you need to sell.

 

[Worland]

One could assume Century is the only importer with enough cash to buy the entire lot of South Korean Garands. Perhaps SAMCO, Inter-Ordnance (Royal Tiger Imports) & TGI may get what falls off the trucks on the way to Century's cargo ship. Since SOG, J&G, AIM & Centerfire are resellers, I'm sure they will be flush with cheap Garands from Century. My guess is that retail will be about $500 like the last batch Century brought in.

 

[Shoobedoo]

My guess is that retail will be about $500 like the last batch Century brought in.

That's a reasonable estimate for the average examples. Import marks on something like this are a fact of life and I won't be losing any sleep over it, I buy my guns to shoot and tinker with, not to archive away like a coin collection in hopes that I"ll turn a profit on them someday. With this many rifles being imported (upwards of 90,000) there are bound to be some better grades among them, no doubt these will command higher prices, but I would have no problem paying more for an import marked Garand in excellent condition.