M38 Mosins... Here they come!

Dsiwy said:
Good to hear :p

its a probaly a 43, 1942s and 43s are pretty rough as they were pumping them out fast to fight the advancing Nazi's. the M38s were made from 1939-45
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Ah, so they were made in '45 too. Well, knowing that, I'll have to go forensic on it and find out for sure what that last digit is! Merry Christmas to all!!!
 
Wow these seem to vary lots ,, mine is a 1941 Izzy , M44 stock , mag floor plate renumbered , butt plate does not match :( , its not counter bored but i wish it was cause the crown is really sloppy , good thing i have a sweet little crowning reamer made for sharpening crowns on 30cal milsurps .. I kind of struck out compared to others but at least my bolt works nice and smooth and the bore is decent , it may be a good little shooter with a bit of work .

If anyone has a canted front sight on their M38 its a easy fix. unlike other mosins the front sight is mounted on a ring thats held on by sliver solder , just heat it up with a blowtorch and tap it over with a mallet . i once bought a m38 off the EE for a $100 with a badly canted front sight , fixed it in 10 min and its one of my best shooting mosins ..
 
Yeah, mine isn't counter-bored either but the crown is perfect, not a mark. To be honest, the metal on the whole thing looks as new except for the very tip of the bolt handle. I really can't complain.
 
Some crappy pics of my two & a 91/30 I picked up at lebarons. 1944 tula on a 37 izhevsk receiver in the foreground, 1943 izhevsk in a wartime 44 stock in the middle & a 32 tula in the back.


 
canadianpatriot said:
I previously got a 1944 Tula like above and it has similar wear on the receiver over the Tula star and date stamp. Is that an attempt to remove it or just wear over time? I just haven't noticed it on the izzys I've seen.
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It was lightly stamped from the get go, no idea why. Maybe the roll stamp wore down?
 
1943 dated, Izhevsk M38, purchased in Feb 2007 for $210 plus taxes.
Sure does not look like prices have escalated very much since then. (Almost seven years ago.)

It probably came from Tradex at that time.

David

 
Mine came in from Frontier today! Much sooner then expected! It was supposed to arrive on January 6th. Anyway its an all matching, non-counterbored 1941 Izhevsk produced M38 with a post war M38 stock (full metal escutcheons and grooves by the barrel bands, no bayonet cut out though). The stock is really rough and has 3 repairs; one by the magazine, on by the rear sight and another fixed crack on the butt itself and a half nickel sized chip on one side. The metal looks a little rough as well, a little bit of paint on the receiver and typical rough machining marks but looks like my other Molot refurb 91/30 really. The rear sight base underneath the rear leaf is bare metal. I am assuming that was a part neglected to be reblued or painting during refurbishment. The internals are spotless though. The chamber, bolt and magazine are pristine and the bore is as REALLY shiny with no pitting and negligible frost and the crown has little to no wear at all. Overall I am very pleased!
 
Received my M38 today. It is a 1943 Izhevsk. It was not counter bored and it had the M38 stock with all matching numbers. The metal on it was decent. The machining looked fine too, not rushed. The stock is ok. The finish is peeling something fierce. The wood underneath looks decent. It had the usual repair at the front. The short length is very handy.
 
Received mine yesterday from Frontier.
Mine is also an Izhevsk 1943, matching no.s, and correct m38 stock. The receiver and barrel are in great shape with no pitting, but the trigger guard and magazine shows quite a bit of pitting. The stock is fair to good with some gouges and a lot of dings and scratches. The shellac has peeled in various areas also. No repairs in the stock though. It looks as if the only the metal was cleaned up and re-blued, but the stock left untouched.
 
Got my wives M-38 yesterday from SFRC. 1943 Izhevsk with a early M-38 stock ,great stock with just one small repair at the tip of the forestock.Fairly rough machining on the receiver but all in all a nice little carbine to add to our collection.
 
I'm debating on leaving the stocks dinged/gouged and original or stripping the shellac, steaming out the dings lightly sanding and Tung oiling them. Not sure what to do really.
 
Orvis said:
Received mine yesterday from Frontier.
Mine is also an Izhevsk 1943, matching no.s, and correct m38 stock. The receiver and barrel are in great shape with no pitting, but the trigger guard and magazine shows quite a bit of pitting. The stock is fair to good with some gouges and a lot of dings and scratches. The shellac has peeled in various areas also. No repairs in the stock though. It looks as if the only the metal was cleaned up and re-blued, but the stock left untouched.
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Did you check for pitting under the front wooden hand guard?
 
Tyockell18 said:
I'm debating on leaving the stocks dinged/gouged and original or stripping the shellac, steaming out the dings lightly sanding and Tung oiling them. Not sure what to do really.
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My wife tells me to leave it on mine. I'm not a big fan of the peeling shellac though...
 
Tyockell18 said:
See that's what my situation is as well, the wife says to just leave them original.

One of them has some gnarly dings though and I really wanna try and steam them out a bit.
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Listen to your wife. The Russians may have stripped and added shellac to K98 and other foreign rifle wood stocks but to my knowledge, when the 91-91/30 stocks got to beat up, they either sold them off for surplus in the mid sixties, gave them to the Chinese and North Koreans, maybe the North Vietnamese, etc. The ones they kept for themselves, they usually just restocked them. Yes, if they needed it, they would lightly sand or strip and reapply the shellac but for the most part, the rifles they kept for themselves got A+ treatment. This is quite prevalent in the rifles that are now on the market.

The rifles we were offered back in the sixties and seventies, were mostly used and abused. Poor bores were common, as were beaten and broken stocks. In fact, the stocks on may were considered to be unsafe to fire. International firearms in Montreal, pulled the stocks off and threw them into the garbage by the hundreds. They then refinished the best of the barreled actions into some very nice sporters.

Your rifle may be beat up, it may not look like much to you now but 20 years down the road, some purist will look at it and evaluate it to about half of what you consider it to be worth, after your ministrations.
 
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