byf 42 snipers out there?

[Bruce95]

Hello. I have done a lot of research and I can't seem to find any byf 42 snipers. I'm guessing if there is, it would be a low turret.

I've read that byf made low turrets from 1939-1943 (ends at K block) but never have I seen a byf 1942 dated sniper. I have seen 1939 to1941 and 1943 to 1945 snipers but it appears that byf took a year off in 1942. Please help me understand. I know there is a lot of misinformation going around but I figured this forum can help me.

Thanks!

 

[Philip]

I don’t know, I’m sure many collectors here have been building data lists on various configurations for many years and can offer their observations. As far as I can say LT configurations earlier than the summer of 1943 or exceeding rare to encounter in collections or references. I can also say that I would estimate that about 90% of all byf LT that I have seen since I’ve been keeping up with that particular configuration, right at 35 years now, have been in the i through l 1943 blocks. I believe l was a transition block from low to high. I’ve seen a few h blocks and one or maybe 2 g blocks. I’ve read of a reported d block which would have been made around May or June 1943.

 

[Absolut]

You are asking good questions. For the scope base covering the receiver code most people are generally not aware on the actual year code of their rifle. The observation that most which turn up are 43 dating though I can only confirm. Odd is that the official German reports list quite high production numbers. An excerpt taken from another thread:

Production chart for November 1941 already lists 600 K98k rifles with scope (of 1850 planned), May 1942 lists 150 scoped K98k rifles for the Luftwaffe, October 1942 lists 3732 scoped K98k rifles for the Heer (of 4000 planned), November 1942 lists 3423 (again of 4000 planned) for the Heer, December 1942 even 5771 (versus again 4000 planned) for the Heer, etc. To speak on 1943 and Heer, March were 4150 planned and 6050 actually made, April 4150 planned an 5030 actually made, May 4150 planned and 3474 made, June 4000 planned and 5288 made, August 4150 planned and 4797 made, September 4650 planned and 3605 made.

For clarification, these numbers refer to the ABNAHME, meaning APPROVAL, of such guns. Please also count in that this is supposed to be overall production, so all manufacturers, meaning that theoretically this could include all scope mount variants from this period, therefore also Short Side Rail or Suhler Claw Mount. Since it is Army (+ Luftwaffe and Marine), I'd assume this does not include SS sniper rifles.

Attached sample from November 1942, for better illustration.

 

[Muncher 1953]

Is it not possible that many such rifles were lost in the East?

 

[Philip]

The ZF-41 systems were made in very large quantities compared to the various ZF39 systems. I believe at some point in later 1943 or 1944 that the ZF41 configurations ceased being reported along with ZF39 rifles (I may well be wrong but to does not really matter) so I have long believed that the high numbers of pre 43 or even pre 44 optic equipped rifles included ZF41 rifles, which may have actually been close to 75% (or higher) of all optic equipped German rifles built during the war , not factoring in whatever the actual number of ZF4 systems were fielded.

I agree about possible confusion with some and or mis reporting correct dates due to receiver date being covered by front base however correctly dating a turret set up is pretty easy for a collector with a decent knowledge of the 98k. A working knowledge of serial number formats, bands and the fact that many or most barrels have two digit dates is a big clue as are the 1942 WaA change….actually many things will establish a date but I agree that some of these being reported are not necessarily being examined by those who know what they are looking at.

 

[Absolut]

Is it not possible that many such rifles were lost in the East?

I'd agree the majority of those went to the Eastern front, as well as I cannot recall having seen any Russian Captures that still had turret mount holes in those (did anyone else ever encounter any Russian Capture K98k rifles with holes? I think I once saw ex SSR with welded/plugged receiver, and I think also former PU (?) base, but I cannot recall seeing a RC with welded holes for turret mount or Steyr Claw Mount). Also why would this not apply to 1943 rifles where we are to see so many?

 

[Philip]

I'd agree the majority of those went to the Eastern front, as well as I cannot recall having seen any Russian Captures that still had turret mount holes in those (did anyone else ever encounter any Russian Capture K98k rifles with holes? I think I once saw ex SSR with welded/plugged receiver, and I think also former PU (?) base, but I cannot recall seeing a RC with welded holes for turret mount or Steyr Claw Mount). Also why would this not apply to 1943 rifles where we are to see so many?

Very good point as to why we don’t find 1943 (and I say 44) Soviet captures with traces of mounts. I personally don’t think 1943 dated snipers (and earlier of course) are that common in any configuration and are certainly a fraction compared to 44-45 dated rifles. My feeling based on my study of German sniper rifles is that simply not that many were produced prior to 1943 (except ZF41 type) and that the German army got serious about a sniper production and training program during the course of 1942 and actually got it implemented during 1943 and had it hitting on all cylinders by 1944. This is a simplified answer but I believe pretty accurate. The SS in proportion probably emphasized snipers and scoped rifles earlier than the Army did. All of this is NOT saying that the OKW via the HWA did not produce some ZF39 configurations from 1940-1942 as they certainly did but I’m not seeing that number in the tens of thousands but maybe closer to several thousand or 10,000 it’s really hard to say and this is why a good study of actual scope numbers by maker and tied to matching rifles (which are dated of course) is the only real way to get a good estimate. All of this is IMHO of course.

 

[Absolut]

I was not limiting my question on RC rifles to 43 and 44, actually to any year. How many ex sniper rifle RC did you ever see?

Re the numbers, I don't think they would dare to "invent" 4000 sniper rifles within one month being set up and report this. IMHO they should actually had been made. Maybe it would make more sense to analyze the approximate production numbers of the various scope types being used and see if those could possibly match the named production numbers. In a second step, linking matching scopes to certain years, could even act as rough separators for each year (yes, I do know these do not necessarily match each year).

 

[Philip]

I was not limiting my question on RC rifles to 43 and 44, actually to any year. How many ex sniper rifle RC did you ever see?

Re the numbers, I don't think they would dare to "invent" 4000 sniper rifles within one month being set up and report this. IMHO they should actually had been made. Maybe it would make more sense to analyze the approximate production numbers of the various scope types being used and see if those could possibly match the named production numbers. In a second step, linking matching scopes to certain years, could even act as rough separators for each year (yes, I do know these do not necessarily match each year).

Yes I was not intentionally suggesting just soviet capture 43 and 44 reworks as I have seen few if any ex turret or other configurations (a few ZF41) of ZF-39 ex snipers in all the posts or in the hundreds of 98k captures I looked at in racks back nearly 30 years ago. You point on looking at scope serial numbers by makers and trying to correlate these with production dates on matched mount rifles is exactly what I also have suggested and I of course agree. I have pretty much done this with Ajack scopes because I’ve long had a dog in that fight. That said I have a big hole in my data collection on those from about 42,000 to about 45,000 plus as we discussed a bit in a recent earlier thread. The gap is simply due to the severe lack of matching mount examples of sniper rifles that exist (LT and SSR in this case) earlier than 1943 and really earlier than mid 1943. When one looks for specific things they (me at least) are often surprised by what they see and don’t see! In my case 35 years of searching out examples just to study of matched upper mount (real ones) LT examples earlier than about the i block of 1943 are very few apparently as few if any reference books show them nor or any on this board that I’ve been able to find.

 

[Absolut]

Just now replying to a very detail of your answer, IMHO the gap from 42-45.000 with Ajack is also hard to verify for some of those being used on SSR mount by the Wehrmacht.

 

[bruce98k]

From a strictly Mauser Oberndorf standpoint, there were limited releases of early low turret snipers in 1940. We know by April 2, 1940 875 low turret snipers were delivered to the Army Ordnance Office Ulm. Another 1,340 rifles with scopes were shipped by by the 21st of May 1940. It is likely that shipments continued to at least Sept. 1940 when at total 50 low turrets were delivered to the Army. At some point production stopped in late 1940 and Mauser did not resume low turret production until late in 1943. I believe the scope equipped rifles that show up in the Wehrmacht order logs in 1941 and 1942 are primarily Zf41 rifles built by Mauser Berlin and BLM. Certainly the 1942 totals could have also been orders of Sauer SSR type rifles, albeit in much smaller quantities. Any SS sniper activity would not be documented in Army order entry logs. Also in late 1943 the production of Zf41 equipped rifles was transferred to Mauser Oberndorf from Mauser Berlin since the Berlin factory was ending production of the K98k rifle. By late 1943 the only supplier of Zf41 equipped rifles was Mauser Oberndorf.

The gap in production from 1941 to late 1943 has always puzzled me and I still don't have a reason for it, perhaps it was the quick end of hostilities in the West that was a contributing factor.
As we know, the German armaments manufacturers were caught short handed with the situation in the east beginning later in 1941 and the extended war with Russian was certainly part of the reason that primary sniper production resumed in 1943 on a much larger scale (this does not include the Zf41).

The big unanswered question is why did it take so long to resume turret equipped sniper production. For nearly 2.5 years only the Sauer SSR existed as a primary sniper platform. I do not include any SS SSR and objective mount systems.

Mike and I have had discussions on the SSR versus turret system and we believe JPS was reluctant to accept the Mauser design.

Anyway good discussion here!

 

[Wolfsburg]

This is interesting to me too because it's easy to have romantic visions of the German sniper and sniper battles with the enemy, especially on the Eastern Front, when in reality it sounds like Germany didn't have any sniper rifles in quantity until late 1943, well over halfway through the war.

 

[Philip]

I believe that what we might call comprehensive use school trained snipers equipped with 4X systems (and a few 6X) did not start coming into serious planning as part of German Heer doctrine until some time in later 1942 and essentially took 6-9 months to really get rolling…..:summer or early fall 1943. That’s not to say that there were not a few thousand quality 4 and 6X scoped rifles in the hands of specialists troops army and LW (and W-SS) from later 1940-42, with very many others informally used captured soviet system rifles but a doctrine driven formal weapon development program and training along with training officers how to deploy such capabilities, IMHO came about in 1943 and pretty much corresponded to Germany’s shift to the defensive primarily although this may have been purely coincidental.