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Identify this California Gun Brochure

droptopdroptop Member Posts: 8,367 ✭✭
edited August 2004 in General Discussion
Scanned from a brochure I had. No date was listed. Does anyone have an idea of the date.

The store also had an location in Afton VA.

goldrrushamt.jpg

goldrrushlocation.jpg


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Comments

  • DancesWithSheepDancesWithSheep Member Posts: 12,938 ✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    Early 70's. Retail for the same gun in 1981 was $2000.
  • mark christianmark christian Forums Admins, Member, Moderator Posts: 24,456 ******
    edited November -1
    I have a copy of a near identical ad from Benet Arms, the importer of my SIG AMT, dated from 1973 with the identical $348 retail price.

    Mark T. Christian
  • droptopdroptop Member Posts: 8,367 ✭✭
    edited November -1
    Thanks

    Gold Rush probably used a factory image for the brochure. Based on the responses I'd think their VA office was doing the importing.

    Looks cheap,, but that was more than my house payment and my older friends thought I was nuts for buying such an expensive house !!! No telling what they would have thought if I'd bought a gun for over $300.00.

    This is a link to one side of the FULL (ie: big) image with a few other SIG prices. It is 200K but the text is readable.

    http://www.websoft2000.com/af/goldrrush1full.jpg

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  • DancesWithSheepDancesWithSheep Member Posts: 12,938 ✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    $348 may have seemed like a lot at the time, but it was only $100 more than a new Colt SP1. My SIG AMTs were Mandall's imports, which were vastly superior to the Benet guns (heh-heh-heh).
  • mark christianmark christian Forums Admins, Member, Moderator Posts: 24,456 ******
    edited November -1
    OUCH!

    Mark T. Christian
  • droptopdroptop Member Posts: 8,367 ✭✭
    edited November -1
    Ok,, why is one better than other? How would you know by looking at the gun? The only thing I can see is the bayonet lug.

    Research comments were that sometime in late 70's some guns were "made up" from parts. Some very early models had the bayonet lug, that seems rare. Found this quote,, and it seems Bennet / Gold Rush were same company.
    QUOTE
    I spoke with Bill Edwards (traded as Benet Arms and Gold Rush Guns in the 1960s & 1970s) - Bill was the first and original importer of the SIG AMT, in fact it was his idea to do a .308 cal "civilianized" version of the PE-57 rifle for the US market and he convinced SIG to do the conversion. He confirmed the serial number as one of the first shipment of five rifles to arrive on US shores just prior to the 1968 gun control act (he actually said late 1967)

    Whew,,, found this photo from 1968 edition of the Shot Gun News has the early price and bayonet lug.
    http://www.biggerhammer.net/sigamt/publishedimages.html

    sigearly.jpg


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  • DancesWithSheepDancesWithSheep Member Posts: 12,938 ✭✭✭
    edited November -1
    quote:Originally posted by droptop
    Ok,, why is one better than other?

    There were some minor differences between importers (Benet, Mandall, Osborne's, etc.), usually barrel and flash hider type and inclusion of wood top cover, but they were all pretty much the same quality gun--I was just giving Mark a bad time.
  • mark christianmark christian Forums Admins, Member, Moderator Posts: 24,456 ******
    edited November -1
    Bennet and Gold Rush were one and the same with Gold Rush generally being the retail outlet. There were some AMTs imported with bayonet lugs but most (including my own) did not have the lug or the barrel with the built in grenade launching feature (shown in your ad) of the SIG 510-4 which the AMT was based on. The Bennet rifles also lacked the flash hider (muzzel was threaded however) as well as the upper piece of wood which covered the top of the barrel. Each of these items was ordered by me directly from SIG in Switzerland back in 1979, at a time when the dollar was in the toilet, and cost a small fortune at the rate of exchange during that time period.

    I don't really recall when Mandall began to import the AMT but it was probably in the late 1970's or very early 1980's and they were the only ones importing the PE-57 for many years. When the dollar rebounded in the middle '80s a small one man operation called Osbornes in Michigan began to privately import all sorts of SIG and Hammerli pistols at prices well under what Mandalls, by then the exclusive US importer, was selling them at but by then most of the AMTs being imported were parts "clean up" assembled rifles and most did not seem to measure up to the high standards of the earlier rifles. At the very end of the "good old days" SIGARMS listed the PE-57 in their catalog but I don't know if any of these rifles was ever actually imported by SIGARMS before the 1989 ban hit and the party ended. The easiest way to tell who imported what is to simply read the information stamped on the rifles as the importer will be clearly identified. I am having all sorts of trouble posting photos tonight (for reasons unknown) so I cannot post a photo of my own AMT and PE-57. Well Photobucket seems to be working this morning so here goes:
    SIGrifles.jpg
    If you look closely you can see the bayonet lug as well as the built in grenade lauching feature on the larger PE-57 rifle while the AMT has no lug and a smooth contoured barrel. The cleaning kit roll, which sits below the SIG decal, was purchased directly from SIG in Switzerland at a cost (in 1980) of nearly $40. Today I can purhcase them for around $6 at gun shows!
    Mark T. Christian
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