Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

Firearms distributor Davidson’s has the PTR-91 carbines (16″ bbl) on sale for $979 and Cheaper Than Dirt still has $0.97 aluminum mags and $1.97 steel mags. Even if your dealer charges you $50 to do a transfer you still come out way ahead. And theres still a huge amount of surplus G3 parts, stocks, slings, etc, etc, out there.

And, despite what armchair experts may tell you, you can reload your brass.

For price comparison:
A standard M1A from Springfield will set you back, dealer, $1300 and each additional mag is $41.00 (Source: Jerrys Sport Center catalog)
A standard AR10 from Armalitewill set you back, dealer, $1200 and each additional mag is $35.00 (Source: Jerrys Sport Center catalog)
I dont have the dealer pricing handy, but DSA lists their standard FAL at $1700 MSRP (so figure about $1300 dealer) and spare mags at around $20.

(Even if you say “But, I can get mags from XYZ Inc. for less than that! Only $12 per mag!” youre still getting one mag for the price of twelve.)

Point being that while I like the FAL platform a lot better than the G3 platform, for the money you cant beat the PTR and a footlocker of dollar magazines.