BobinNH and Dave_Skinner,
Thanks for the kind words. I did write it, but of course based on the expertise of others, many of whom I quoted in the write-up.
CRounds
I would say that the discussion has concluded that military Mausers are less desirable ONLY in that converting one to commercial standards is MORE EXPENSIVE than starting with a commercial action that has already had changes made such as scope-ready bolt handle, single stage trigger, etc. Commercial actions, in many cases, have their own compromises, such as less good gas handling, etc. that I discussed in my post, although those compromises are no more than many other actions have. Certainly, your FN Mauser is a very high quality action, but as vapodog points out, converting it to a sporter could be an expensive proposition unless you are able and willing to do quite a bit of the work yourself.
I once had a friend whose father was in the US army in WW2 (D-Day Normandy through the end). He brought home a military FN rifle (military stock, bayonet lug, straight bolt, etc) that had no military markings on the receiver, bolt and trigger guard. It just had commercial FN markings. The barrel did have a Nazi proof mark, but that was it.
He could only speculate that this rifle was made using a previous (to invasion) action and it was mated to military parts. It was in beautiful shape. I've long wondered what happened to it.
