Raimey,both scoped "Leue" rifles sport the same unique non-detachable scope mounts. imho the scopes were mounted by the same shop on both, so Springer`s merely bought in the rifles, already mounted, proofed and finished, for resale. Pre-WW1 Austria did not recognize foreign proof, so every imported gun had to be reproofed. To me, the Austrian proof seems to be the Vienna NPv one instead of the Weipert NPw. BTW, last Saturday I passed through Vejprty, the former Weipert. It is a small, former industrial town in terrible state directly behind the German-Czech border. Only a small creek, the Pöhlbach, seperates it from German Bärenstein. In 1939 Weipert had about 11000 mostly German inhabitants. Due to the "ethnic cleanup" of 1945, when more than 10000 of it's citizens were thrown out of Czechoslovakia, wide parts and most factories are in ruins or torn down. Vejprty's population is now 3000, among them about 400 Germans who returned after 1995.
|