The Karabiner 98, or K98, rifle was produced by
Mauser and used by the German
Wehrmacht as their standard issue
rifle during
World War II.
The K98 was, like countless other rifles in the world, built on the design of the
Gewehr 98 (G98). Shortly after
World War I, in which the G98 served, the
Wehrmacht decided to modify the G98 into a shorter and less bulky gun.
But the new version, Karabiner 98b had the same length as the
Gewehr 98 and was only minorly changed.
By 1935 the German Army had adopted a shorter version of the K98 - The Karabiner 98 kurtz (short) and was shortened by 140mm to 1107.5mm.
The 98k was then the most common
infantryman rifle in the German
Wehrmacht during the duration of
World War II. 2,769,533 K98k rifles were available at the start of WWII and another 7.540,058 were delivered before the end of the war.
The Kar98k could mount different types Zielfernrohre (Zf) (sniper-scopes) ranging from the Zielfernrohr 40 and Zf 41 with a zoom factor of 1.5 to the Zf 39 and Zf 4 (also called Zf 43) with a 4x zoom. Six percent of the 98k - production were to be fitted with a rail for scopes, but this number was never met with soldiers using them.
Specs:
Caliber: 7.92x57mm GPtr.
Clip: 5 rounds.
Action:
Bolt Action.
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