Quote:
Originally Posted by SteveF
They have these pouches in Edmonton as well but like most people here I already have more than I can use. There was a surplus dealer in Calgary that had thousands of them for $2 a piece. They also had thousands of unissued P'51 straps and pouches. When I went to Calgary last year the warehouse was closed and I wonder where all of the webbing went. Perhaps PA got the P'37 pouches from there...?
|
I'm not sure 100%, but I think you are partially correct on the source for these. The son of the princess auto prez was getting into the hobby, and trying his hand at some of the surplus game. He brought up a few pallets or so of what he thought were regular bren pouches from the US. As soon as I saw them, I put 2 and 2 together and told him that he had found rears. There were thousands of the fronts in Calgary, to which nobody could ever find a source for rear pouches. So when we were in Calgary for the Easter gun show, he bought quite a number of the front pouches and the shoulder straps from the warehouse in Calgary.
I have not heard of his milsurp business going anywhere in the last couple years, so it may be that princess auto assumed his wares and have been selling them as regular inventory. I would expect to see the shoulder straps eventually as well.
Shame that warehouse in Calgary has closed. I only found out about in in the last few years and always managed to find a truck load of treasure every time I was through there. Especially hardware. They had all the old time screws and nuts in steel finish and charged by the pound for them. More than a few of them have been finding their way onto my carrier project.