1911/14 Erfurt Kar98a

[Warrior1354]

This 98a carbine was a stroke of pure luck early this month, and from a good friend as well. I received a phone call late in June from a buddy of mine. He bought a small collection of military rifles from a 87 year old gentleman in Kentucky. He was selling his collection to move down to Florida. He was able to buy a few neat Lee Enfields, Mosins, a cool 03 Springfield with a serial number hit, a early 1886 French Lebel, and one neat 98a carbine. We started talking about the carbine, and I asked. Anything special about that one? He was like yeah it's all matching besides the magazine follower, and floorplate. The stock is nice with tiger strips, but has some dings on it. The worse ding is around the pistol grip area. No signs of depot mark's on the butt plate, and sadly no unit markings. Now, it does have a a nice original blued 98a muzzle cover on the carbine. Also has a 1934 dated K98k sling on this carbine, but it is not in the best shape. And finally it is a Erfurt made 98a carbine, but the receiver is weird.

Huh, weird receiver as in how lol? Show me please, and he sent me a picture. An Erfurt 1911/14 marked receiver! That's right a freaking duel date on a 98a carbine! When I saw that marking. We made an agreement for me to pick it up, and buy this carbine! So this carbine was my 4th of July present to myself! Fun little trip to go down and get it. Enjoyed the travel company with another collector friend of mine. He was able to bring back some killer items for himself too.

After taking this carbine apart. My buddy was right it is matching besides the magazine follower, and floorplate. The capture screws in the trigger guard were not correct for it, and thanks to Dave (aka Mowzerluvr). I had some Imperial era made screws that were Erfurt proof as well. They both fit perfect, and match the color of the wear on the rifle. The original matching firing pin is clipped though, but can be easily repaired.

Other then that I'm quite happy, and this piece fits well with my 1914 set. I do remember Paul mentioning another duel date Erfurt 98a 1914/15. I wonder if he has recorded other examples over the years.


Receiver: 1911/14 Erfurt 8083a
Barrel: 8083a K.R.39
Front barrel band: 83
Lower barrel band: 83
Front Sight: 83
Stacking hook: 83
Stacking hook nut: 83
Stock: 8083
Handguard: 8083
Trigger Sear: 83
Rear sight base: 83
Rear sight ladder: 83
Rear sight ladder slider: 83
Trigger guard: 8083
Trigger guard screws: both 83
Floorplate: 63
Follower: 63
Bolt release: 83
Bolt handle: 8083a
Bolt gas shield: 83
Bolt safety: 83
Bolt striker: 83
Bolt firing pin: 83
Bolt extractor: 83
Butt plate: 8083

 

[Warrior1354]

Bolt and Rear sight:

 

[Warrior1354]

Front sight, Trigger guard group, and muzzle cover

 

[Warrior1354]

Barrel bands, stacking hook, and butt plate:

 

[joryfreeburg]

Nice looking 98a rifle Jordan

 

[Warrior1354]

And finally that lovely stock set:

 

[Warrior1354]

Nice looking 98a rifle Jordan

Thank you Jory. This type of carbine 98a variation was on my want list, but being so scarce. Not something I tried hunting for to me honest.

 

[cj556]

Very neat gun Jordan. Curious to hear any thoughts from Paul about this one. Fits in well w/ your 1914 collection for sure.

 

[Warrior1354]

Very neat gun Jordan. Curious to hear any thoughts from Paul about this one. Fits in well w/ your 1914 collection for sure.

Thank you Marc! Now I just need to find a 1914 Spandau Gew98, and my set is complete. Paul did suggest I should add a 1914 Danzig Gew98 to go with the 1907/14 Danzig though. If I locate one maybe I'll add it if the price is right.

 

[Tom H]

Wow nice looking stock. Cool gun

 

[OzzMan]

Jordan buddy. I’m on the forum lol. You don’t have to refer to me as “travel company” lmao.

Either way. You got an absolute score on that rifle. Me getting this other items still felt pretty lack luster I won’t lie. It’s a little rough around the edges but is a sweet carbine nonetheless.

 

[Fal Grunt]

Jordan buddy. I’m on the forum lol. You don’t have to refer to me as “travel company” lmao.

Either way. You got an absolute score on that rifle. Me getting this other items still felt pretty lack luster I won’t lie. It’s a little rough around the edges but is a sweet carbine nonetheless.

He was trying to protect your anonymity incase you, understandably, didn't want to be associated with him.



Fantastic rifle! Thanks for taking the time to do a detailed photo shoot.

 

[OzzMan]

He was trying to protect your anonymity incase you, understandably, didn't want to be associated with him.



Fantastic rifle! Thanks for taking the time to do a detailed photo shoot.

He’s stuck with me . Heck! I drove!

 

[Warrior1354]

Jordan buddy. I’m on the forum lol. You don’t have to refer to me as “travel company” lmao.

Either way. You got an absolute score on that rifle. Me getting this other items still felt pretty lack luster I won’t lie. It’s a little rough around the edges but is a sweet carbine nonetheless.

Hey you can be my travel company anytime with pick up cool rifles lol! Just so everyone is aware. Connor saved me from buying a long Lee Enfield with a bad muzzle. Thank goodness he brought a 303 British round so we could test muzzle wear.

 

[Warrior1354]

He’s stuck with me . Heck! I drove!

That's because your Toyota gets better gas mileage than my gas guzzling 5.7 Hemi pickup truck.

 

[chrisftk]

That's a cool find Jordan. I don't recall seeing many other dual dated 98a-- particularly non-consecutive years.

The c/C c/D and c/V acceptance on the RR would be more characteristic of 1911/12 production I've seen, as would the c/S bolt. The c/B wrist acceptance/final assembly makes more sense for 1914. That's a bit of a strange combo, but these things turn up.

My thought would be leftover parts or loose partially assembled rifles that were rounded up and assembled amongst 1914 production.. The more interesting thing here is that I have a low (#270) no-suffix '14 Erfurt, so these, if there was a small run of rifles assembled from leftovers, were something done midstream, perhaps as a bolstering to production when war began. It would be interesting if others emerge within the same range.

Either way, neat rifle. Thanks for taking the time to post it up.

 

[OzzMan]

Hey you can be my travel company anytime with pick up cool rifles lol! Just so everyone is aware. Connor saved me from buying a long Lee Enfield with a bad muzzle. Thank goodness he brought a 303 British round so we could test muzzle wear.

It’s handy to have a bag of various milsurp calibers with you when you go to a show. An 8mm mauser, 8mm Lebel, .30-06, etc etc. it can save you a lot of money.

That's because your Toyota gets better gas mileage than my gas guzzling 5.7 Hemi pickup truck.

It rides better too

 

[OnlyMil]

Very nice rifle Jordan, thanks for sharing. 105 years since the end of the war and still new things popping up all the time with these Imperial rifles.

 

[Cyrano4747]

Very nice rifle Jordan, thanks for sharing. 105 years since the end of the war and still new things popping up all the time with these Imperial rifles.

Imperial stuff in general is really enticing from a research standpoint just because of how hard finding good documentation can be. Nazi stuff is easy (well, relatively speaking - it's all challenging) in part because the surviving records were dispersed and a good chunk of them ended up in American archives (good luck getting your hands on the records taken by the Soviets, though). A bunch of those have been returned in the last ~30 years, but a ton are still held at NARA and even more are accessible via microfilm copies that were made in the intervening time. Also a lot of the damaged, lost, or otherwise inaccessible Nazi records had companion records that were kept in other locations. Carbon copies of correspondence that existed in two locations, for example, so if one of the corresponding offices was burned down there's a good chance we still have the second's records.

Imperial records got really badly mulched by the war, however, and a lot of those backups just didn't exist. The Prussian Geheimes Staatsarchiv in particular got hit pretty bad by the early bombing, although the evacuated a bunch of the surviving documents to nearby salt mines to protect them in 1942, then the Soviets took them and mostly returned them in the 50s, but not entirely. I believe the old Army documents were almost entirely destroyed though, because of a jurisdictional battle between the Heer and the rest of the government that saw the old military files relocated to Potsdam, where they were almost entirely destroyed during the Battle of Berlin. Don't take that as gospel, I'm going off of flawed memory, but that's the broad strokes.

edit: also a lot of Imperial documents got scooped up in the chaos of the war. I already mentioned good sized chunks going to the USSR, but a bunch ended up in the US also, especially the Foreign Ministry files. I think we returned the originals in I want to say the 80s, maybe earlier, but either way we kept microfilm copies. Which is nice if you're an American because that's all held by NARA and College Park MD is a lot easier to get to than Berlin. No where near as fun, though.

 

[hale1940]

That's a cool find Jordan. I don't recall seeing many other dual dated 98a-- particularly non-consecutive years.

The c/C c/D and c/V acceptance on the RR would be more characteristic of 1911/12 production I've seen, as would the c/S bolt. The c/B wrist acceptance/final assembly makes more sense for 1914. That's a bit of a strange combo, but these things turn up.

My thought would be leftover parts or loose partially assembled rifles that were rounded up and assembled amongst 1914 production.. The more interesting thing here is that I have a low (#270) no-suffix '14 Erfurt, so these, if there was a small run of rifles assembled from leftovers, were something done midstream, perhaps as a bolstering to production when war began. It would be interesting if others emerge within the same range.

Either way, neat rifle. Thanks for taking the time to post it up.

Is there any hunches as to why this receiver would have intially gone unused?

Great rifle Jordan! You know we all love oddities like this