I am in the process of acquiring my SOT, and have been told by many that the Machine Gun Dealers Bible is a must have. Recently I have been looking around for the MGDB and coming up empty. Why are these books so hard to find? It looks like the last version was from 2002, but they seem to be almost impossible to find.
Any ideas of where to find a copy, or two if possible? Any information would be greatly appreciated.
Thank You,
The last printing, 4th edition, was in indeed in 2002 and it’s now long out of print.
It is an excellent book but it looks like you are gonna have a hard time tracking one down. Long Mountain Outfitters was the main supplier of course. If you are lucky at some point Dan Shea with do a 5th edition.
I just checked all my “hard to find book” sources and came up empty.
I suggest you find an 0331(machine gunner) and ask for his copy. Some companies have the machine gun bibles floating around. I knows know ours does.
I think you might be thinking about another reference. Dan Shea has reportedly been working on a new version for years. The ATF’s NFA handbook is a good reference, too.
Remember that if you do go for your SOT, you need to be in business. Don’t get it with the intent of acquiring a few weapons and then getting out. NFA branch has frowned on the practice.
Also consider, after having been an SOT since around 1979-80 or so, it really isn’t that great a thing any longer. I don’t know if I would do it now to be honest. It is easier for me to say I suppose, but with the advent of the internet, the marketplace has changed dramatically with a small group of dealers almost single handedly driving prices up well beyond “normal” increases in value. This accelerated price increases has precluded many guys from participating in the hobby and primarily left it to wealthier folks and investors.
While I agree that the internet did open a larger group to the NFA community, I wholeheartedly disagree that dealers have driven prices up. The single most important factor in driving the price increase is the 1986 ban that has limited the availability of new machine guns. Pricing for other non-banned NFA items has remained stable.
I beg to differ and you can wholeheartedly disagree, but you need to reread the portion of the quote above. “Beyond normal increases” and “accelerated” are operative terms.
While the McClure/Volkmer act is of course a major contributing factor, I have watched this thing for many years now, and there are a few “well known” dealers that use the internet to bid against each other on a regular basis. While vying for the same weapons they dramatically increase the prices a weapon should bring just to win the bid and get the weapon in inventory. It is that simple. These dealers are on the NFA websites incessantly advertising to purchase weapons, they do the paperwork, protect you from supposed problems and risk (whatever that is), provide shipping containers, and most importantly, overnight payment!!!
M16’s have not gone up by 50% in the past few years because of the 1986 ban. They have gone up at an accelerated rate relative to other weapons because the US is involved in wars and folks want them. The dealers I mention know this and are willing to pay more than an individual to get that weapon and then put it back on the market at a higher price. The individual who may have been interested in now forced to pay the dealers higher realized price he paid PLUS the additional markup of the dealer. It is that simple.