An Interesting Romanian Find and Other Stuff

Greetings and Salutations!
So a change of speed tonight. I got together with a bro who I met through this here blog, who’s a local, and a really cool cat, so he came by on his way out whilst ‘oot and aboot’ as for the most part, I’m a bit of a shut-in.

Not that I don’t like meeting folks and hanging out, but mostly I prefer on MY turf as I’m… I dunno… still wrapped a bit tight when it comes to local meet ups. Like my other buddy B who lives right up the street… he asks me over on the regular, and I feel bad in not going by, but I’m I dunno… PTSD? weirded out? Being off Ye Olde Home Turf… it’s not comfy for me yet.

Leaving the Area altogether? No issue…

I can pack up as y’all have seen and gone ‘downrange’ out of pocket with no issue… but going up the road to someone else’s A.O.? Someone I’m -just- getting to know? For whatever reason, it weirds me the fuck out. (Hope that Helps you understand me a bit more B! It ain’t a you thing, it’s a ‘me-being-cray-cray’ thing)

Anyways, b/c of this, Mr. Man came by with some books and a show and tell… we exchange good reading on the regular which is cool as we BOTH have a love of literature as well as weaponry. He’s prior service as well, so hanging with a vet is a plus too… in today’s case, he had (what he thought) a Russian rifle with him that he wanted me to check out. A very basic .22 rifle.

Come to find out, it was pretty f’n cool!

The rifle itself appeared to be based off of a Mauser-looking/styled bolt, and had a stepped-down barrel. The markings on it were at best, somewhat crude in their stampings, and the overall condition, well to be honest I’d rate it at NRA Very Good to almost Excellent.

Now MY mistake was to forget to take pictures as I didn’t realize I was going to do a poast about it. He’s sending pics to me NOW as I write this, but my bad in not realizing just how neat this thing is.

The stamping on the barrel collar has a marking “IMC2” and “1978” prominently on there, with what appeared to be a 5 digit serial number. I checked out the IMC2 and found out that it’s NOT a Russian rifle, but a Romanian rifle.

Found on the web BTW…

The Romanian M69 was produced from 1969 to 1989 to serve as a training rifle for the Romanian population. In 1968,Ivan sent tanks into Czechoslovakia to put down a minor ‘disagreement called the “Prague Spring”… i.e. the usual Springtime Student rebellion kind of thing that happened in the Warsaw Pact throughout its entire lifetime…

Seems Romania was on the Czech side on that one, and their DotGov called to rally the people to join “paramilitary Patriotic Guards” groups in order to bolster the defense of Romania itself. The problem however was that Romania at the time was flat-ass busted broke as fuck. NO $$$ for weapons. And when they called for people to do their patriotic duty? Suddenly they had hundreds of thousands of people, men and women, who joined up to the point every community and factory had its own Patriotic Guards unit!

Which meant they needed something to train the Volk on.

Enter the M69.
A .22 caliber, Mauser styled rifle fed by a 5 round magazine. It has a 23-inch barrel, which uses a hooded front sight, and a three-position rear folding sight.

Now while typing this, Mr. Man sent me one of HIS rifle itself, taken just a few minutes ago:

Now his has the bolt to the rear, but as you can see, for a rifle made in 1978 it’s pristine. And the rear sight that I just mentioned, as well as the barrel-band markings (minus the S/N) is as such:

And yes, I know the pic looks like it said 1973, but trust me, it’s 78…

So the overwhelming attitude towards these things is positive.

The major negatives are the trigger (heavy and a looooong pull) and the style, is that it’s very “Warsaw Pact” in its raw, almost brutalist manufacture and utilitarian design.

The trigger at best has a LONG assed pull before engaging, and then once it does actually engage, it feels like it’s being pulled over sandpaper or broken glass… yeah… it’s that gritty.

And as to speaking of the “style” of said-rifle? When people talk up Communist era rifles they like to brag about function over form, this rifle takes that to an extreme even for Ivan and his subsidiaries… I mean even the buttstock has an AK/SKS style spring loaded steel round ‘door’ with a storage compartment for cleaning supplies… I wouldn’t doubt if that butt plate was interchangeable with Romanian AKs and SKSs of the time TBH.

Overall, for what he paid for it? It was a steal.

As I told him, he’ll be able to pass it on to his Grans, and if maintained, they’ll be able to pass it on to their Grans as this thing, as far as I can (and reports about it) say that it’s pretty much unkillable.

And for shits n’grins, I pulled up the M69 on Gunbroken (intentional misspelling as that’s a pretty accurate description these days) and found that there are the usual Fudd “I know what I got!” assholes selling it at retarded prices, and one that while still having 8 days left in the auction, is at least, for now selling for what -I- consider a reasonable price for a non-rare Soviet Era Warsaw Pact .22 training rifle:

The $299.95 is not the Fudd Gun I was talking about but THIS one here:

Looking at the pics, it is in NO WAY in as good a shape as Mr. Man’s nor the other rifles in the auctions I poasted about above. In fact that $425 one is fucking worn the fuck out that I can tell…

ANOTHER thing that’s coming in the near-future is going to be what I’ll call “The Great Gun Depreciation” when the majority of the BoomerFudds start dying off en mass. And no, none of y’all here are of that ilk… so don’t start with me on the “You hate all Boomers!” and whatnot…. this’s a straight observation and I know I’m dead-nuts-on right about it…

See, the MAJORITY of gun-toting Boomers?

When they die? The MAJORITY of their weapons are going to start showing up either at Polizei gun turn ins (worst case scenario) OR more than likely, sold in HUUUUGE masses via consignment by their kids and/or grandkids who never got “into” guns like the majority of us who come here and love us some firepower… A LOT of Gen X never got into weapons. AT ALL. And since there’s no connection nor interest, they’ll be dumping Dads or Uncle Johns VAST collection of firearms on the open market.

And what happens when a LARGE amount of -something- that was previously hard to come by ‘suddenly’ gets dumped in large amounts on the open market?

Prices crash.

The same thing is going to happen with Classic Cars.

In fact, I’ve heard that the Classic Car Market has already crashed the fuck out, as NO ONE can afford to spend $40-50k on a 1969 Camaro in this current economy. Why wouldn’t the same happen with ALLLLLLL them M1 Garands that the Boomers bought for $25 post-war when they were 16 and held on to? And you and I know there’s a metric fuckton of them floating around out there in various gun safes nationwide….

I’ve already seen this in action in a smol town by one of the Hot Springs north of me… it has got, or I should say had a VERY LARGE Veteran Community that in the past 5-8 years has seen a massive die off. Now when I say “Veterans” I mean the majority were World War Two and Korean War vets. Since this’s a Hot Spring that I’m talking about, a LOT of these vets moved there specifically for the rejuvative and medicinal qualities that a natural Hot Spring can provide…

And when they cashed in?

Well, the majority of the relations took the firepower Grandad and PawPaw down to the local gun shop and put it up on consignment. That’s where -I- had stepped in and went “Oh Holy Hells!” when I got there.

See, Gretchen and I had taken whatever holiday it was off (a 4 day as I recall), and gotten a hotel room, and had passes for the weekend to the Hot Springs. -Somewhere- in the trip, I realized I had fucked up and not packed the proper ammunition for my 9mm. I had gone to the range the weekend before, and the magazines were loaded with 115 grain FMJ ‘training rounds’ if you will. NOT ‘warshots’ as I call them.

I know it sounds really dumb, but IF I find myself away from the house, and don’t have ‘good man stopping ammunition’ for my weapon, well… that’s wrong, wrong, and wrong in my book. Sure, 115gn FMJ is fine in ordinary circumstances, HOWEVER it’s not great for a one-shot situation. I prefer a round that’ll fuck someone up to Hell and gone over just a solid FMJ ball that just ‘goes right on thru’ so to speak….

So I mosied on down to the local firearms store to get some good defensive 147gn +P Hollow-points to insure I had the kind of defensive round I prefered. And as I said, I was amazeballzed by the weapons they had on hand.

Oh Holy Hells!!! was an understatement

The front counter had a no shit M1918 BAR sitting on the display case as I walked in:

No shit, it looked just like that.
Just newer if you can believe it…

It was a WW2 ‘bring-back in a duffel’ and had the amnesty paperwork to go with it… Of course I think they wanted like $20,000.00 for it which was a <gulp!> OMG lot of $$$ for it, but it ALSO came with ALL the accoutrements/extras and ‘stuff’ that would have been issued with it…

File under “Thank The Good Lord I don’t have great credit nor a credit card that could support such a purchase.” amiright?

This store is Trouble with a Capital Boldface “T” for people like us IMO. Mortgage? Electric Bill? Water Bill? I know not of what you speak of. “….did I show you my AWESOME Reich-Marked Kar98 I got with this 1941 matching number Walther PPK that has bring-back paperwork showing it was a Gestapo Agents personal weapon??? How cool is that!?!”

Yeeeeeeeeeeeah…..

So…. back to the BAR. Grandpa wasn’t fucking around when he brought his BAR home I can say that for damned sure. There were ALSO in the various display cases a HUGE amount of Luger P-08s (to include a RARE Long-Barreled Artillery Model), Walter P-38s and surprisingly a slew of Mauser C96 Broomhandles for what -I- considered to be short $$$ at the time… like $3k +/- each, some of which even had number matching buttstocks w/integrated holsters or in one case, the wooden holster that WAS/IS the buttstock itself (rare AF for a original to be around still)

Never mind the GINORMOUS amount of Nazi Flags/Memorabilia and the like… it was a WW2 time-warp. I talked to the owner who explained that generally, when ALL these local old timers “kicked off”, the majority of the kids were from New York or Jersey. And because of the draconian gun laws up there, and well… the overall general negative attitude towards guns that folks from that neck of the woods have if you will, they have/had no interest in, nor ability to deal with ANY and ALL the guns and such that they found in Dad/Grandpa’s stashes postmortem.

So they invariably found their way to Mister “Local Local Local Gun Dealer” who then took them on consignment.

Which reminds me, now that I have a positive cash flow, I need to look at heading back up there… I have a ‘secret lust’ for a C96 personally… I’ll take one in either caliber, just as long as it’s functional and sexy looking… in fact I personally think the Mauser C96 is one of the sexiest handguns ever made.

Change My Mind
(Not!)

I think it’s because it was used as the basis for the BlasTech Industries DL-44 that my main man Han Solo was slinging back in Star Wars…

Childish?
Maybe.
But oh so cool IMO

So on that note, I got a ton of ‘stuff’ to deal w/tonight.

Took the dogs out for the evening deuce, and needed to recheck the perimeter as there was a ‘probe’ the other day which I’ll maybe go into at a later date. Nothing big, but enough to be worrisome. Not enough to deploy any countermeasures yet but enough that I added a camera and some new coverage of what was a minor blind spot.

So More Later
Big Country

31 thoughts on “An Interesting Romanian Find and Other Stuff”

  1. I am your unkle boomer fudd. No kids, no wife and a passion for what goes bang. The nieces and nephews are going have a good time when I shuffle off as they have been raised right and love them some boomsticks also. Winchester baby because 45/90 WCF means I don’t give a fuck what level plates that corpse is wearing.

    1. AWESOME! See… THAT right there is how it NEEDS to be
      Thank the High Power your brother/sister (whomever) raised them right.
      FAR too many kids have no appreciation for the boomsticks of days gone by
      And 45-90? NICE!!!!

    2. My neighbor is seriously into classic/antique cars. He’s currently looking into buying a ’40 something Packard that woulda sold for $60-$70k five years ago. He thinks he can get it for around $20k.
      May the price of ye ol’ firearms take a similar reduction in price…in Jesus name we pray. Amen.

    3. 45-70 for me, the only “government” I care to have in my life lol. Don’t have to penetrate just deliver that nice little “love tap.”

      1. 45-70. “It may not penetrate your plates, but it’ll make the front one ring off the back one”

        Said someone a bit more clever than I am

  2. I’d love a good quality P-38. And yes I’d shoot it too. Trying to sell off some of my collection now that I’m retired so I can add a few older items like that.

    1. I can believe it. Alex Jones gets carried away sometimes but he has dropped a ton of Intel over the years.
      The Feds lost their shit when he opened his show a decade ago with “deep in the heart of FEMA region 6 behind enemy lines is Alex Jones”.

      Jesse Ventura did a show on his Conspiracy Theory show on FEMA camps. It was shown once, never released on dvd and was deleted from people’s DVRs.

      Point is those camps AREN’T for Pedro the illegal or natural disasters but for YOUR Patriot ass.

  4. Thanks for the meme, promptly forwarded it to a chinese woman I know. Should tweak her buttons a little bit.

  5. I’m just gonna say it: if you get a chance to inherit a gun under the table with no paperwork – TAKE IT.

    And for the love of God DON’T REGISTER IT.

    1. First, Second and Third thought as reading right here, what gun, gramps musta been robbed, he didnt hear so well and couldnt remember where he put anything.

  6. Pingback: BCE: Romanian Find And Some History – Western Rifle Shooters Association

  7. I have that exact same Romanian trainer. I bought it about three decades ago when a local shop got a bunch of them in. They were selling for $49.95 if I recall correctly. On most of them the stocks were beat to shit, but if you sorted through them you could find a few good ones. I kind of pissed off the guy behind the counter because I kept having him bring out different ones until I found one that I liked. They have a pair of slots milled onto the receiver that look like you could mount a scope, but they don’t work. They are too shallow for the bases to grip. A buddy of mine needed an open sight .22 to teach his kids to shoot, so I offered to give it to him, but he insisted on paying for it. I charged him what it cost me and tossed in a brick of cheap Remington ammo that I had on hand. A few years later when his kids got older I bought it back. Supposedly extra magazines are hard to find, but I got a couple aftermarket jobs that are nicer than the originals…..

  8. Found a nice Brno 462 LUX .22 at a gun show some years ago. Came with three mags (CZ mags also fit). Three-position safety. Flip up sight leaves for distance. schobel stock. Most accurate .22 I own. Old World quality. It will be passed down to family just like all the other stuff. Over the years my wife would say, “What do you need another rifle for?” My answer, “Because when the boys are grown and/or have kids of their own they likely can’t afford or get their hands on rifles like this!”

  9. Big Country , A few years back a lot of WW2 memorabilia hit the market due to the older vets dying off , prices still didn’t drop much but if you were careful you could get real German Badges Etc. A lot of reproductions these days are made in Eastern Europe using original dies from the WW2 era and are almost indistinguishable from the originals . A lot of Shops up here in NJ (yes we have such a thing) have an ever growing used market with a lot of vintage stuff , but you have to be there to find it (presentation Party leaders PPK bought before it hit the counter , Young guy brought it in and traded it for a Glock! lucky me I had a unused purchase permit and snapped it up . ) A lot of the younger people have no interest in this stuff so I can guess how much of Helmets, badges , daggers etc gets trashed or tossed in the garbage when an estate is cleaned out . back in the 1950’s -1960’s this stuff was everywhere in old school Army Navy stores, a US shelter half today will cost about 80 to 100 dollars and that’s the newer 1990’s limited issue production, vintage stuff way more, Its hard to think My fathers “old paint drop cloths” which I carefully peeled the latex paint drips off were some thing disposable in that time period . Those old “Paint Drop cloths” were SS oak leaf Zeltbahns .

  10. Those .22LR Romy M69’s are incredibly solid little rifles. Machined for a scope on the receiver, but their version is a couple mm narrower so U.S. stuff doesn’t work. Magazines are fussy, you may need to tweak to get them to feed reliably. Other than that, reasonable accurate, what’s not to like.
    Back in the day when they were just piled on the gun show dealer’s table they were going at $50, or less. Not long thereafter I grabbed one at a KY pawn shop for $75.
    Couple years ago realized I had more ‘n a couple stacked away, gave one to a good friend of my son, he was f’n thrilled.

  11. An elderly gentleman on my block passed away. His neighbor found him when he stopped by to have an evening beer. The neighbor told the cops about the elderly man’s gun collection which the cops promptly confiscated. The elderly man only had one granddaughter all the rest of his family had passed away. She was from a blue state. People inquired about the elderly man’s firearms and she said that she let the police keep them. Something about guns being evil and just going off and killing people. Fortunately for the neighborhood she sold the house and went back north.

  12. I have one of those M-69s as well but not in nearly as nice shape. Cool little gun but, besides the heavy trigger, if you pull the trigger hard enough with the safety engaged it will still fire.

  13. back in Philly, the lady next to my garage granddad died off. they went thru his “stuff” and found 2 duffel bags of goodies. one being a MP-38 machine pistol or burp gun. makes the MP-40 look cheap !
    and about a dozen or so magazines for it. and a few Lugers and Mauser pistols.
    THEY GAVE IT ALL TO THE COPS. I got to see the pictures of it all spread out before the cops took it all away ( yeah, right ! ) and they took a cigar box full of old German medals to a pawn shop and where happy to get 100 bucks for the lot (?)
    if you really want to look at rare weapons, check out the auctions in western PA. there are/was a lot of vets around here with unreal collections of stuff. you right about the old guys passing on and a lot of their ‘stuff” is hitting the market. I don’t even look anymore as I don’t have the money to buy .

    1. Oh and OF COURSE the cops destroyed the “evil guns”.

      BULLSHIT !! 20 years ago when I was a member of a shooting club and half the members were cops and a bunch SWAT.
      It’s just amazing the gun collections they had on a cop’s salary. 😡

      1. yeah. lots of guns went “missing” before they made it to the station house. funny thing as I knew a few cops back in the 1990’s and was offered a 1911 “bring back” for 250 bucks. no paperwork on it
        but “clean” I was told. just another item that went missing on the way to the station.
        here what I was told many years ago by a retired cop. someone dies. they call the cops. the cops get there first and look for anything they can pocket. cash, jewels or weapons. it all called “bennies” of the JOB.

  15. Children, grandchildren, and other assorted relative-folk, do not value the old craft weapons because we have let the blue haired pussies have their way with them. NYC-at one time, a veritable coven of patriotism and skilled craftsmen has turned into illegals, neutered weasels, and grasping Joods. Please stop letting your relatives into the public school system, do NOT send them to institutions of higher souped foolishness. Deaf artists created some of the finest music in the world, medieval churches were constructed by illiterate craftsmen to worship God, and the written word inspired many, starting with Beowulf. We have got to stop “educating” children and start teaching them about life. It has always been my fear that this constant drumbeat of “guns are bad” will eventually put us back to serfs and landless peasants.

  19. I found a CZ 452 – very similar to the Romanian rifle pictured – at a LGS about 10 years ago. Most accurate .22 LR I’ve ever fired. Hooded front sight and the training stock – I think the barrel is 24″ – whatever. A friend had a 452 with the Mannlicher stock – very fucking cool.

  20. ALWAYS wanted to get a Broomhandle. I think you’re right about the gun thing. And the classic car thing. How about golf clubs? And property, too. I think a whole lot of investment homes are going to end up on sale, in the not too distant future.

    In case you’re interested, I saw Apex is selling off a bunch of Brit Enfield parts in their Sales section.

Comments are closed.

Verified by MonsterInsights