David R.Birch wrote:
DoN. Nichols wrote:

The explanation that I got was that it was an "antique", which
is why the captive folding bayonets were allowed to stay. This only
applied to the Russian made SKS -- the others made elsewhere than in
Russia were too new to sneak through. :-)

In ATF regs, guns are "Antique" if made before January 1, 1899. The
Russian SKS is classed as "Curio or Relic" because at the time of that
classification, they were very rare in the US. The Chinese SKS rifles
came in as sporting arms, after being imported with attached bayonets
for a while, the ATF said sporting arms don't have attached bayonets.
The importers first removed the bayonets and sold them separately, then
later sold them with the rifles, but not attached.

Romanian, Albanian and Yugoslav SKS rifles are also C&R and can be
imported and sold with bayonets attached. In fact, because they were
imported as C&R, they MUST be sold with bayonets.


Mine (bought about the same time through a friend who had a FFL
at the time) had (and still has) a *blued* bayonet. It was the only
blued one in that batch (some other co-workers bought at the same time),
and the only blued one which he had ever seen. How common is/was the
blued bayonet on the Russian SKS.

I sold a bunch from several wholesalers from '93 to '96, maybe 1 in 10
had a blued bayonet. These were replacements installed when the rifles
were rebuilt in Russia.

David

Also they tend to change point of impact if you remove the bayonet.


--
Steve W.