Bang for the buck....
 

I'm not a big gun guy but a co worker of mine had bought a couple of WWII era rifles and took me shooting.

He paid less than $100 each for a Mauser K98 and a Mosin Nagant.
A week before we went shooting we went to a gun show in our area and bought Ammo something like $120 for 1400 Round for the Mosin nagant
and a similar amount for 1200 rounds of 8 mm Mauser.

Those guns were a blast at the range. They made a HUGE boom and were fairly accurate. We were questioned several times by other on the range about what the heck these guns were and got to sample a few other guns that were way out of my price range.

That brings me to my question.....I really enjoyed shooting rifles and enjoyed the challenge of testing my accuracy making adjustments and testing again. I don't have the time to devote to hunting down ammo, dickering over price then to go shooting.......What is your advice to best bang for the buck....

Price of weapon vs. price and availability of ammo vs. room to grow enthusiasm for the sport?

Your post is probably the cleanest description I've read of what a "fun gun" is supposed to be all about. Military surplus big-bore rifles are one of the best ways to get your feet wet with firearms too. They don't cost a lot and shoot cheap ammo. You don't need to haggle either to get the best price. Although gunshows do often get you the best deal, you'll still be paying less than $0.15 per round at a gun store for the same stuff. Not enough of a difference to worry about. You also need to go here:

Gunboards

Even if you don't decide to pursue a milsurp rifle, there are forums for every firearm type here and deeply informed people to answer your questions. BTW, my old cheapski fun gun was a surplus Chinese SKS. Ammo could be had for ~$80.00/1000 a few years back and that lasted me for months. I'd absolutely lean towards an ex-military rifle as my first purchase given what you said about your intentions.

Good luck!

soundmotor

I second the SKS. Not only are they cheap with some of the cheapest ammo around, they're semi-auto. ^_______^

I'll check that out....Are they legal in CA?

They're completely unrestricted in Canada, so I'd say that they are legal in CA with 99.9999999999% confidence.

as long as they are not magazine fed, they are legal in california to the best of my knowledge... just go to a show, practically never see anyone ever selling anythign illegal there... pretty strict enforcement

Thanks for the advice... I got ahold of my friend and we're gonna go down to the local gun shop this weekend...Check a few out...ask some questions.

Yeah and luckily the SKS uses an attached mag by default, so you shouldn't have to order a special version for CA.

The SKS is 100% ILLEGAL in Cali. They were coercively purchased several years ago, and posession of such a weapon will land you in shit up to your eyebrows, as they were retroactively defined as an "Assault Weapon" in 2001. Some of the Russian and Yugo models may be Curio And Relic exempted, but I don't think so; call your sherrif or Top Cop first.

OK, I stand corrected. Any fixed-magazine SKS is legal, but any SKS which was either designed or modified to accept a detatchable magazine, of whatever size, is not.