Picked this one up from P&S this month. I had Jean on the lookout for me for one with a nice bore and a WW2 dated scope. The VAST majority of the recent PU imports have un-dated scopes. PU scopes were made post-war and I wanted to ensure absolutely that I did not get an SVT scope and that it had wartime provenance. I'm very happy with this one Jean found in his second shipment.
Rifle is matching apart from a struck and re-numbered floorplate. (Yes, I know that most of the parts were replacements from rebuild). Mix of Tula and Izhevsk parts, but the receiver and bolt (the important bits) are both Tula.
Unlike many of these, mine does not appear to have an older scope number ground off the barrel. It's only been marked once with the number of the scope it is presently wearing. Likely when it was new in 1943, it had just not been marked. It IS an original sniper rifle though as it has the distinctive Tula CH stamping (translates to SN = snypirskaya) and the receiver is too finely finished to have been a 1943 infantry rifle. The stock inletting is also period with no freshly removed wood, so it's a real sniper stock, but is Izhevsk wood.
Bore is perfect. And I do mean perfect. No evidence of any wear at all. The tip of the firing pin had surface rust all over it, so when it was test fired at rebuild, the primer was likely pierced. It cleaned up well with steel wool.
The canvas scope cover is one I had from years ago and is a real soviet one with a copper-washed steel buckle that I scrubbed the verdigris off (it was thick like playdoh!)
Very happy with this one and the scope seems to already be adjusted rather close from the boresighting I did earlier today. Optics are amazingly clear too, much better than any other real PU scopes I had owned in the past. Whenever it was overhauled, they did a good job. It IS overhauled though as the turrets were both re-indexed and new lock screw positions were used.
Now for those who claim these are not legit sniper refurbs or that the mounts are repro - not so. Mine has clearly been scrubbed at one point (refurb?), but they did not completely remove the original Izhevsk manufacturing stamp when they refinished it. It's still there. Obviously, the rifle would have been issued with a Tula mount, but at refurb an Izhevsk part was substituted. Here's the marking:
I have never seen a WW2 era izhevsk stamp on a repro mount.
Hope y'all like the pics.
