In 1995 to 1997 I had a job that was making my bank account go up by my spirits go down.
At lunch I would visit pawn shops and buy guns
By making enough offers on enough guns, I could figure out the rules at each pawn shop.
If I made an offer to an employee, and he checked with the boss, the answer was no.
If I made an offer that was within the employee's purview, then we had a deal.
It turned out that all the employees, for a given pawn shop, have the same latitude.
I remember one place that if it was a 22 rifle, and I could point out something wrong with it, they would take a 50% offer.
They had a 10/22 for $65 with a broken rear sight and a stock with leprosy.
I offered them $32.50 and the young employee with a mullet hair cut took it.
Another pawn shop would only let me dicker them down 15% on anything.
Every night I would take apart the guns I bought.
I would inspect, clean, lubricate, and order parts from Numrich as required.
There was a pawn shop that would sell on consignment. That is where I unloaded guns I fixed that I did not want any more. I was making $2/hour repairing guns, so I did not quit my day job.
I started buying gunsmithing books and gunsmithing tools.
The big leap was buying a big lathe and mill in 2002.
I started out with a big lathe I got at an auction for cheap.
I got tools from Boeing surplus. Now all that type of old junk is on Ebay.