New to me SVT40 - Why is Bolt and Carrier Orange?

I

ISaidShotgun!

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Northern Alberta
Red Rifle Folks:

I've seen a few SVT40's in the gun shops and the bolt and carrier were are plum coloured. The one that followed me home from the local gun shop today is more orange or copper coloured. Is this out of the ordinary? Or when the thing was refurbished Ivan was into the vodka and didn't do the blueing correctly? Idle curiosity, I am not a collector nor do I think I have a rare treasure.
 
Post some pics and I'm sure someone will clear it up for you. The one I had, the bolt was brownish/plum. Thought it looked cool. It doesn't look that plum against my ugly pink carpet in my spare room, but it was closer to plum by the naked eye.

svt10001_1.jpg


SVT40's are beautiful rifles.
 
I've seen them plum, black, silver or the coppery/orange colour. I don't know if they were refurbished at different time, maybe different factories, maybe they were trying new storage methods, but all 4 colours are semi regular.

If your local store was all plum, it's likely they were all from the same batch/crate from the same place.
 
For along time Canadian collectors believed that a 'plum' bolt was a sure sign of a refurb - we now know that even in WWII many SVT's had 'plum/black/copper/gold' bolts and during the first two years of production many were silver. Most Finn Captures have 'silver' bolts, but if you check the bolt over, they are generally in 'silver' as the finish has simply wore off.

A few years back people were soaking their bolts in vinegar and then using steel wool to put their bolts back to silver - but we now know that the blued finish is correct.

Regards.
 
I have seen online war-time photos of SVTs where the bolt does not seem to be silver. So there is an opinion that the plum bolt doesn't necessarily mean it's a refurb.
 
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