Look what I have been fingering for the last few days. It will be coming up to auction in a few months.
Sam; Where else has that finger been? Wait! Maybe I really don't want to know.Look what I have been fingering for the last few days. It will be coming up to auction in a few months.
Guess here is what I was saying:Not sure what you are getting at here. The issue is that a buyer of a C+R MG pays a significant premium for an original factory MG and the C+R transfer status. If the gun turns out to have been registered after the end of the '68 Amnesty and is not legally a C+R, the buyer is out a lot of money for an overpriced reman. Registrations have been notoriously inaccurate over many many years for many different reasons and especially for C+R MGs so add in the fake C+R MGs and the NFRTR is further compromised. Now ATF vets every transfer application against the original registration. and, yes, ATF is constantly having to deal with MGs that were illegally and incorrectly registered, but in their effort to "clean up" the registry they are very forgiving. They are in a tough spot since an owner that has a compromised MG can make an issue out of it if he is hassled by ATF, further proving that the NFRTR is too badly polluted and can't be used in any registration prosecutions by the US attorneys.
No registrations except early F1s and 5s had a line describing the nature of the deactivation. If the original form 5 had that info it should have continued on in subsequent F5 transfers, but many registered DEWATs were just transferred by F4s so the paper trails was interrupted. Further, once the gun is reactivated, the information does not carry onto the next transfer. The only way to prove that an MG was registered prior to or during the '68 Amnesty is with an FOIA request with a copy of the original registration showing date and form of registration.
When all MGs are "C+R" that doesn't change the value and premium for original factory MGs. As the years go by all it does is progressively dilute the C+R designation as more and more remanufactured MGs became "eligible" for that transfer status. In my opinion ATF will add a provision for eligibility for C+R that requires them to be original factory MGs thus retaining the value of the C+R designation. Otherwise it has no meaning any more if remans are C+R eligible. In any case original MGs will always have a higher value than a reman example of the same gun. FWIW