I hate seeing military surplus guns being chopped up and sporterized as much as the next guy, but I figured I might as well spend my time enjoying them when I do see them instead of hating on them.
A little over a year ago I picked up a sporterized Gewher 98, still in 8mm, since it's still got the original barrel on it. The bolt was smooth as butter, and it had a hair 2 stage trigger on it because it was a Timney. Most importantly, the bore looked like it was brand new. It also had a Williams side scope mount with the rings that put the scope over top of the receiver, and the scope was a Twilight 2-6x scope.
The shop I got it from only wanted I think $180 for it if I remember correctly, since it is just a sporterized Mauser after all. But I could tell just by checking it out that it was a very well done sporter, done by someone who knew damn well what they were doing. So I snatched it, and since then the only thing I've done to it was free-float the barrel.
I haven't really sat down and did some serious accuracy testing with it until yesterday, but when I did........ Wow. The gun, made in 1916, that I picked up for less than $200, was shooting groups under 1" at 100 yards, and it would have been even better if I was a better shot and had a higher power scope. The ammo I was using was Sellier and Bellot (I don't know if I spelled it right) 196gr. soft point. Needless to say, I was impressed.
'Nuff said. The point I'm making is don't ignore these guns when you see them. At least look them over, check the functionality, and check the bore, and if everything checks out, throw some money out for it. I now have a tack driver that fires an awesome cartridge because I chose not to overlook something that a lot of other people do.