And there are people who say the 7.5 Swiss cartridges and rifles might be as good or better when it comes to accuracy.
Why are Swedish M96/M38 rifles more accurate than G98/K98s in the same condition?
- Thread starter Bratwurst
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And there are people who say the 7.5 Swiss cartridges and rifles might be as good or better when it comes to accuracy.
highlander
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
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Has to do with the calibre itself, and the specific ammo it's designed to use.
They are VERY accurate rifles, especially for military rifles that are not known as tack drivers in the first place.
They are VERY accurate rifles, especially for military rifles that are not known as tack drivers in the first place.
Maybe the soviets had some memory of the bloody nose Finland gave them in 1939 Winter war. There is an undeclared, unofficial, reciprocal defense agreement that would see Sweden, Norway, and possibly Denmark coming to Finland's aid - because they know they would be next. The "volunteer" Swedish units that fought for Finland were Swedish Army trained and equipped. Sweden was officially neutral - they only sent troops and weapons. Norway also secretly sent artillery, ammo, and supplies.
I think Sweden and Finland together were a fair chunk to bite off, even for the USSR. Norway being a NATO member after WW2 didn't hurt either.
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tactical lever
CGN frequent flyer
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- Fox Creek, Alberta
Agreed! Not sure what you mean by modern cartridge as I'd say any brass cartridge. Some ridiculously small groups circulating on CastBoolits shot with guns that most "knowledgeable" nuts would agree have no business shooting like that. I suspect you have a few yourself. A cartridge is only a pressure vessel.
Whether the Swedish guns are better, I'm not sure. It is widely known that the Swedes were meticulously anal, had armorers who were very picky and had extremely high quality steel with very low inclusions, said to greatly extend the service life of the barrels. Have heard from a couple, few sources that the Swedes are very hard to wear out.
With the German guns, while they had excellent guns, too; I believe that it is possible that in war time when they were pressing kids into battle, and the soldiers were methed out, that production of guns could have been rushed.
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They bought or were lend leased 77k rifles and the Swede volunteers left ??? behind. For a nation with the population the size of Finland, that's a significant number.
As for the other nations, obviously very limited use.
i hand load for my m96 swede. at 100M it shoots 1.25-1.50 inch groups and its a pleasure to shoot. 29inch barrel might have something to do with it. also the 6.5x55 is an excellent cartridge and the trigger is great, it weighs about 9lbs so super stable when shooting. put all these things together and you have a recipe for good accuracy.
i use 4831sc and 143 grain hornady ELD-X or 156 grain PPU softpoint round nose. loves both those bullets powder charge is the same. groups stay the same.
i use 4831sc and 143 grain hornady ELD-X or 156 grain PPU softpoint round nose. loves both those bullets powder charge is the same. groups stay the same.
The external diameter of the barrels are similar, but the bore of the Swede is a lot smaller, that means there’s a lot of extra meat in the Swede barrel.
It’s not a heavy barrel on the Swede but all that extra steel probably helps a fair amount when it comes to stiffness.
It’s not a heavy barrel on the Swede but all that extra steel probably helps a fair amount when it comes to stiffness.
There is actually about a 30 year history of ISSF competition between the K98 and M96, both chambered in 6.5x55.
The Swedes used 96's, Danes used K98's.
Shultz & Larsen a small Dane gunmaker (they were pretty big pre war, but the Germans cleaned out all their tooling, and they basically started from scratch post war) firm made the barrels and attached them to reparation surplus K98's they received. They also made the adjustable sights and later an adjustable trigger. At first the Swedes were limited to using "as issued" '96's, but they were not competitive against the Danes. So with the help of CG and several private firms they did some upgrading, first the CG63, which still wasn't competitive with the Danes rifles, and later with the CG80, which they did just about everything to improve it, shortened the lock time, heavy bedding jobs, newer sights, trigger improvements, not much of the old '96 left in these.
Still losing, the Swedes turned to S&L to make them barrels, but even with the same barrels, the 98's were beating the 96's. It boils down to the actions and the designs, the 98's are just bigger, heavier, stiffer, have a stiffer barrel attachment, faster lock time, all that contributes to better accuracy.
The Swedes used 96's, Danes used K98's.
Shultz & Larsen a small Dane gunmaker (they were pretty big pre war, but the Germans cleaned out all their tooling, and they basically started from scratch post war) firm made the barrels and attached them to reparation surplus K98's they received. They also made the adjustable sights and later an adjustable trigger. At first the Swedes were limited to using "as issued" '96's, but they were not competitive against the Danes. So with the help of CG and several private firms they did some upgrading, first the CG63, which still wasn't competitive with the Danes rifles, and later with the CG80, which they did just about everything to improve it, shortened the lock time, heavy bedding jobs, newer sights, trigger improvements, not much of the old '96 left in these.
Still losing, the Swedes turned to S&L to make them barrels, but even with the same barrels, the 98's were beating the 96's. It boils down to the actions and the designs, the 98's are just bigger, heavier, stiffer, have a stiffer barrel attachment, faster lock time, all that contributes to better accuracy.
Home guard use not combat. And most of those were returned to Sweden later.
Eaglelord17
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
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That and the quality of 8mm Mauser factory ammo and surplus is all over the board thanks to the fact they are keeping the pressures down due to the Gewehr 88 variants and the variety of different loadings for the round. Some modern batches of 8mm I have shot I have to adjust the rear sight setting on my Portuguese M1904/39 to 400m just to hit on POI at 100m vs the Portuguese surplus I have shot which was dead on POI at 100m with the minimum sight setting. 6.5x55 seems to have much more consistent ammo between manufacturers and batches.
The Swede volunteer force fought in the thick of things and a lot of home guard units saw action as well(doesn't mean they were carrying M96s)
The Finns fielded a lot of different arms during their wars with Russia. Their logistical demands on their supply chain must have been mind boggling.
In 1940, the tiny army of Finland inflicted a major defeat on thousands of invading Red Army soldiers of Joseph Stalin by their superior use of ski troops winterized against temperatures in the Finnish forests of 30 below zero and a rifle—the Swedish M-1896 Mauser.May 17, 2012
The M-1896 Swedish Mauser: How Finland ... - Guns.com
The swedish mauser in finland
« on: 08-04-2013, 22:04:03 »
Alright
What i am about to suggest has been going around the forums before. Not just by me, but by others aswel. We all know the finnish are incoming. Minus the mosin nagant, we know the finnish used 2 other bolt action rifles in combat
100 000 7.35x51mm Modello 38 Carcano's (wich were hated)
And 135 000 Swedish mauser rifles and carbines (wich were well liked)
So what is this swedish mauser? Well its a Model 93 mauser rifle modified by the Swedes, wich was there main rifle from 1894 to well into the 1960's-70s. The last Swedish mausers were retired from the home guard several years ago(to much anger of the home guard)
But sweden was neutral you may say? well yes.
And no
Despite huge public outrage, King Gustav V decided NOT to send troops to support finland in the winter war.
However, the swedish raised a 'volunteer unit'. 8000 Swedes and their rifles fought in finland. Sweden also sended a first batch of 77 500 m96 rifles to finland wich were deemed "surplus" (they were actually intended to become M38 short rifles)
Sweden later sended another batch of rifles, and when the Swedish volunteers were forced to go home, they 'forgot"' there rifles.
In total the Finnish recieved 135 000 Swedish mauser rifles and carbines, 357 heavy Machine guns and 450 light machine guns. Aswel as over 50 million rounds of ammo.
These swedish mausers were used by frontline units. However by 1943 they were slowly being assigned to second and third line troops. It was well liked by troops because of its excellent accuracy and rugged reliability in cold weathre. It was also liked by marksmen but disliked for its long lenght (Simo Hayha being one, he rejected a scoped m/96 because it was 1.45 meters long with bayonet and he was 1.51 meters)
Its a rifle that saw heck-alot more use then lets say, the M1917, so it can fit into FH2. However, it is not a priority weapon.
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I think his distances that he typically fired at were; by our standards pretty short, lots of his kills were with a PPsh as well...forest fighting a lot of it, no?
Fair enough. He used the Suomi...but this sort of lends credence to the theory that a 6.5 x 55 wasn't an ideal fit for his methods. That being said, I'll take a M96 swede over any of the Mosin crowd ( as far as shootability and not reflecting the somewhat inflated values for any M/N marked with an [SA]...) on pretty much any given day. The only M/N's I've owned are 91/30's, 91's and M39's...admitting this right off the bat.
Not sure what the point of this conversation is but is getting gawd-awful long winded. I'm gonna stick with my statement that the vast majority of milsurp Swedish rifles we see do not show rough handling and abuse common in large numbers of German wartime M98 mausers, and that a rifle in better condition would naturally make a difference in accuracy. Speaking of combat, you are a quite the combatant yourself lately. Maybe time to take a deep breath.
