Considering an SVT-40... advice?

[lwaldron]

Hey, folks--

I just laid down something in excess of $700 for a CMP M-1 (plus shipping and a case of Lake City 30-06), so I didn't expect myself to be back in the market for a rifle so soon.
But, I have a chance at an SVT-40, and it's something I've wanted for a while, and something that doesn't pop up every day.
I'm waiting on pictures, right now, so I don't yet know that much about it. I'm told it's a 1942 Tula with an AVT stock. Comes with the obligatory one magazine. The bore is said to be good to very good.
Is $570 (the asking price) too high? The seller has a couple of extra mags, and is likely to ask $80 bucks a pop.
I'd prefer to have a figure I could offer him for the whole lot.
Any ideas would be appreciated.

THX

 

[lwaldron]

*** bump ***

 

[buttrap]

does not sound that bad, the mags are a bit hard to come by so 80 bucks is not that bad each. In general most went tru all of WW-2 and really got beat up so nice originals are a bit of a find. I cant recall if all or just some came came with the scope mounts but it seems to me that it may be all. Very popular as a sniper rifle too as it was much more acurate then the self loaders of its day. Just be sure the wood is not trashed out as you dont see piles of new wood sets at gun shows.

 

[telewinz]

I have one and with the cheap ammo available it's a natural. Felt recoil is minimal and function is excellent. Accuracy is about 2" at 100 meters. Most have a built in scope rail and B-Square has a cheaply made scope mount. Magazine is like the FN49, Hakim and SKS, it can be removed but it was designed to be fed in place via stripper clips. Most have been redone in russia, the hard part is finding a mint bore. I paid $350 for mine 3 years ago but I have heard prices are going up due to the cheap ammo and incresed popularity of the rifle. It's a slender rifle (designed weight restrictions) so I would not throw it off a roof but other than that it's a great shooter. The German's loved them during WW2. With the extra mags and IF the rifle is in excellent shape, that sounds like a pretty fair price.

 

[cabinetman]

OK Price

$570 for that rifle is probably an ok price but nothing to right home about, especially since it has the AVT stock on it. It would be worth more if the stock matched the rifle but that notwithstanding, it sounds ok.

I feel that having "extra" mags is really not important with these rifles as you strip the ammo in from the top, anyway. You dont' swap mags on these rifles like you would an AR15, FAL, or CETME. I don't believe that Russian soldiers were given more than one mag at issue but I someone more experienced than me will be able to clarify that. However, $80 is a good price for them.

As for the rifle itself, it has a gas adjuster located up near the muzzle. It's important to know that it is not infinately adjustable. Each of the "flats" on that valve correspond to a specific hole in the valve body. You have to make sure it's properly centered so that the gas can travel through the full opening. If you have it adjusted 'in-between" a setting, you'll be effectively shutting off the gas entirely, making it a single-shot rifle.

The first thing I'd do after I got it would be to disassemble that valve and clean it out using some good bore cleaner. When you put it together ready to shoot, start at the smallest setting and work up. The manual says that this is the way the soldier would start his day and open the valve one setting at a time as the rifle became dirtier. At the end of the day, the soldier would remove it and clean it then start at the small hole the next day.

So, save your money on the extra mags as you won't really need them. Instead, order up a spare firing pin, extractor claw, and has valve from Numrich and have them as spares should you have a failure in the future. Also, keep your eyes peeled for a bayonet. They regularly fetch almost as much as the rifle, they're that rare.

Good luck. I love my SVT which was a Finn capture model, rearsenaled by SA and marked as such.

Rome