Mosin POI/POA issue.

TacticalVirus

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To preface this, I'll throw a bit of background out first. I spent 3.5 years as reserve infantry and tended to have very tight groupings with the C7. I practice the principals of marksmanship as much as I can. This combined with the grouping being fairly consistent, albeit off, between myself and another shooter lead me to believe that it the issue isn't entirely my fault.

As for the issue, I set up a target 50m (roughly, had to pace it out) away from the firing line. The target in question was a 16"x15" piece of aluminium with four separate targets sharpie'd on (hasty target as you can tell). At first I wasn't even using this target, I was firing at a separate/smaller target. When it became apparent we were missing terribly, we popped the aluminium target behind the second target just to see where the shots were ending up.

With the bayonet folded out, aiming at the very bottom of the target along the centre line, two shots put two holes in a vertical column with about 5-6" between them, aswell as being three or so inches to the right of centre. Aiming at the bottom left hand corner, two shots produced two holes, one in the very dead centre of the target, the other oddly enough at the exact point of aim. A fifth shot didn't even hit the target. More rounds produced similar results, the shots were generally high and to the right with atleast one flyer per volley.

Now, when I got home and cleaned it I discovered two rather disturbing issues. The first one was that both action screws were loose...and by loose I mean I backed them out by twirling them with my thumb. I snugged those up nice and tight after I was done cleaning, and I'm going out again sometime next week so I'll find out if that was the main culprit. The second issue is that there were brass filings in the chamber. The last time I saw brass filings in a gun of any sort was when a C9 ate a blank round and jammed to the point it took three soldiers, the C9 sling, and the aid of a trench to get the bolt carrier moving again. This time they weren't large brass filings, more the size you'd find at the bottom of a lathe, but it's still a disturbing finding.

So, I guess my question is, has anyone fixed issues like this before? Also I'm using soft-point PPUs, and I haven't slugged the barrel to find the true bore dimensions. For what it's worth, the rounds weren't keyholing, they were just Minute-of-barn.
 
It takes time to get used to the monster trigger pull & short sight radius & the loose action screws don't help. Keep at it, the groups will get tighter.
 
It's been counterbored at some point. I took a bunch of pictures of all the markings it has on it and then left the camera at my friend's place :redface: I was going to post them to learn more about the gun (besides the fact that it's an Izhevsk M44 built in '44)

I'm going try and get the rear barrel band off so I can disassemble the rifle completely and polish up the trigger, but I could not get it off for the life of me last night so I'm hunting down solutions for that aswell.
 
When disassembling the Mosin Nagant, there is no need to completely remove the barrel bands from from the rifle. Clear the carbine, then:
1. remove the bolt
2. remove the two action screws
3. remove the trigger guard-magazine assembly
4. extend the bayonet M44
5. remove the cleaning rod
6. slide the two barrel bands forward toward the muzzle. Try using a non marring tool to open up the bands by the open bottom, allowing them to slide forward without removing all the shellac. The two barrel band springs remain on the stock.
7. remove the hand guard
8. pull the barrel and action from the stock. Might be covered in grease, making removal a little tight.

Be careful not to lose the trigger pin, as some might be loose.

The most important issue in accuracy is the tightness of the two action screws. Tighten them firmly, and I'm sure you"ll receive a better group. These rifles were designed to use military ball ammunition. Soft points sometimes get hung up when feeding.

Remember the the carbine's POI will change when the bayonet is extended or stored.
 
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Aye that's why I had the bayo out, the front sight was still at its original drift setting, and I'm hoping it's just a matter of the action screws being loose causing the issues. As for the barrel bands, the rear one couldn't make it over the spring even using the multitool to hold it down. I'll try spreading the bottom next time now that I know it's possible.

Thanks for the tip about the trigger pin too, I'm sure I probably would have ended up loosing it if I didn't get that warning.
 
If you're having trouble with the rear band - put down a towel, hold the gun up, with the band facing down, and blowdry the spring. It's possibly packed with cosmolene. It'll heat up and ooze out, then you'll be able to use a softwood dowel to pop it loose.

x2 on the trigger pin. I've caught mine 3-4 times as they were skittering around the sink and heading for the drain :O
 
Hmm - I know there's significant belief that M44's were sighted in with the bayo extended, which changes POI. I don't shoot m44's much, so can't comment on that. Also heard that 91/30's were done the same way with their bayos, but mine's pretty accurate without it...

To be honest, I don't think it makes a huge difference, but I also don't shoot M44's a lot, and that's where it's supposedly most apparent.
 
I had mounted a scope on my M44 (no gunsmith mount), and removed the bayonet, and adjusted the scope - it grouped well. I've since reverted the gun back to its iron sight and reinstalled the bayo, but this single experiment ended up in showing me that in my case accuracy didn't suffer.

Lou
 
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