Old Mauser makover- lot of pictures

[Nestor]

Made in 1966 for Frankonia in Germany. 30-06, Mauser action, double set triggers built on the military receiver. Bore looks great, so I decided to spent some time over it and smooth it out here and there. Wood has some scars, bluing is missing in some areas, pitting is visible near the front sight and one of the locking screws for the action screws is gone. Ohh...well, the German girls are rarely without any defects on the outside Bit of love can fix that for sure though. I'll post more pictures as I go - as usual. Cheers!

 

[Nestor]

I need to remove the old finish first. I'm always trying to start with the least invasive way. Very mild finish stripper. Bio degradable, so good for nearly nothing, but it worked couple of times, so I'll give it a try first and see how to go from there. Paper towels are getting soaked in the stripper, wrapped around with the plastic film (so it won't dry and keep on working) and then I'm wrapping everything in the painting tape - just to make sure that the stripper stays in contact with the finish.

That pitting is the first issue to be addressed. Starting with the 400 grit, to 800, to 1000 and to 2000.

Looking much better now

 

[Nestor]

To my surprise the finish remover actually worked. Well, kind of. I had to do two coats, but because it's very mild I really like it. Makes no damage to the wood and fixes some dings in the process as it contains some small amount of water. Bit of sanding and the wood is ready for the new finish. I won't be using any stains. Will try to keep it natural by using oils and similar products. Stock is nice, but the grain isn't spectacular. Serialized to the action. Good stuff.

 

[Nestor]

It took couple of hours to dry for the mineral spirits after I use it to removed the wood dust stuck in the grain after sanding. Because the wood was finished with 800 grit I had to do something to improve the oil absorption...so I heated up the oil mix that was sitting in a jar in the boiling water. Once warm I flooded the wood with the mix of purified linseed oil/pure 100% tung oil and mineral spirits. The oil was hand rubbed into the wood. Quite quickly I've noticed spots getting dry so I kept adding more oil. Between 30 and 40 minutes later my hands started getting tired, but the oil was completely absorbed. There was no need to wipe it off. No sticky film on the outside. It all went in. I'm going to give it a week or so and apply another coat of the oil mix.

 

[Nestor]

As the wood was put aside I focused my attention on another issue. All my bolt rifles can be fed using the stripper clips. This one is no exception. Problem is that during the production the geometry of the receiver was slightly changed (I guess to accommodate much longer 30-06 round) and the standard Mauser stripper clip would not go into the guide without a huge effort on my end, but even then it wasn't working 100% of times. I examined the brand new stripper clips and how they were making contact with the receiver and decided to grab the file. Very carefully I opened up the stripper clip guide by filing off the back area of the guide. Just a few stokes of the file and check. Around 40 minutes later the problem was gone. Now it works like a dream. After all I polished the metal with 1000 and 2000 grit sand paper and it works even smoother now. It's going to get re-blued soon.

Problem

Solution

 

[Nestor]

Every project that I take on helps me to learn and develop some new skills. Of all the bolt actions out there the Mauser system has reputation of being the most advanced. Yet I know little about it. As you may know Mauser once loaded do not require removal of the stripper clip. All you need to do is push the bolt forward into battery and the stripper clip is going to get ejected. Well…will it? Only if the rear wall of the guide is straight and the forward part of the guide is angled. Plus the stripper clip needs some wiggle room in the guide. I tested the function and the stripper clip was blocking the bolt making it impossible to close without removing the stripper clip manually. After watching my Mauser 96 I had to re-profile the guide on this rifle again to allow the stripper clip to be ejected automatically. So, enlarging it alone wasn’t the proper way of doing it. Lesson learned!

 

[Nestor]

Wood stock - the way it looks now (nearly 24 hrs since I applied the oil). It dried so quickly that I may cut down the time in between the coats to 48 hours.

 

[Nestor]

Today after applying the second coat of warm oil I took on refinishing the receiver. This part of the rifle isn't the easiest to work with. Lot of uneven surfaces, crannies and such. After I degreased the receiver I've noticed a lot of surface rust (especially under the wood line) invisible before. So, with a help of WD40 and steel wool I started working on removing the rust. Took me a while. Finally it was time to start working on refinishing. That was probably the most time consuming part of the process. Anyway, in a couple of days I'm going to take on the barrel, bolt and all the small parts in no particular order. Slowly, but surely this project is moving forward. I ordered the recoil pad from Brownells along with the white spacer, so fitting it to the stock will be the last part of this restoration.

Take a look at the barrel and receiver. Difference in quality of machining is obvious. Receiver is likely war or post war product while the barrel was made in the 1960s.

Rust left on the towel after I cleaned the receiver with steel wool and WD40.

Ready to go.

Receiver refinished.

 

[Nestor]

Sometimes to make a progress with the project, one has to take a step back. I was planning to apply the third coat of the hot oil today, but I've noticed that the existing finish is highlighting a lot of imperfections in the wood that I didn't notice before. That's why I love working with oil. It's so easy to correct any problems. Sand, apply more oil, forget. So, I did apply the oil in the end, but before that happened I had to do some sanding first. 320 to start with, 800 to finish. Just some examples as I did fix more spots in fact.

Before (I already started sanding on the first picture):

After:

 

[Nestor]

The biggest, most time consuming part of the project is completed now.

That's the area where the pitting was present

 

[Nestor]

The wood stock is ready for the protective top coat of the poly now.

 

[Nestor]

So, I attempted to take the floor plate out to refinish the trigger guard and the plate itself. I don't think that I ever dealt with anything like that. That thing would not move no matter what. Oiling, heating up, taping...nothing. Not a slightest move. I thought that it rusted in place solid. Nope. They put some paste in between the trigger guard assembly and the plate that glued these parts for good. Never seen anything like that before. I had to take apart the release assembly and even then the damn thing had to be tapped out. Anyway...I'm done for the day. The stock has 5 coats of the poly, but it's still not enough. The grain of the wood isn't fully sealed yet. Perhaps two or three more will help?

 

[Nestor]

I was taken by surprise...when it comes to the amount of rust on the trigger guard. It looked fine with all the oil on it. In fact three areas were pitted, but one was so bad that the rust formed something of a "wild rose" So, I've spent today trying to clean it up. It's all steel, custom made to accommodate longer 30-06 cartridge. Perhaps You'll be able to see where the magazine was extended and welded together (from two standard magazines?). Anyway. I ran out of time today and will need to continue surface preparation some other day. I was hoping to refinish it today, but that's the beauty of those projects...you never know. Trigger assembly is pinned in place and to remove it I would need to cut these damn pins or damage them at least, so I have to work around it instead.

 

[Nestor]

It was time to take another look at the plastic butt plate. It wasn't pretty, but that crack was actually nicely glued, so I decided to give it another chance.

20 minutes later

 

[Nestor]

Refinished. I also polished the triggers as there was a light corrosion starting to set in on both.

 

[MilitaryCollectorMark]

Very nice!

 

[Nestor]

All I am left with is to refinish the bolt now. I ended up doing 11 coats of Poly. In some areas that were more thirsty I did 15. After putting everything back together I checked the function. It loads with the stripper clips. Pushing the bolt forward kicks the empty stripper clip away. Triggers are working, but must be lightened a bit (probably simple affair using the screw that sits in between the triggers). Safety works, everything is smooth and feels like a Swiss safe. Barrel is free floated. I had a bit of issues with the rust reappearing back on the magazine assembly, so I have to watch out for that. That magazine plate visible on the first, few pictures wasn't fully pushed down (it requires gorilla like force) and flew across the room soon after I took one of the pictures. Fixed it right away, but I'm not planning on taking it apart any time soon again Looks like standard locking screws from military Maser 98 worked just fine here (I used one on the rear action screw as one was missing when I've got the rifle).

Pitting?

 

[Nestor]

Before

After

 

[Nestor]

Took apart that firing pin assembly. Not great. Heavy pitting on the firing pin, main spring a bit rusted, shroud covered in surface rust. If you are planning to refinish a metal surface, please, please make sure there is no active, surface rust on it. I can show you a trick in case you have some rust, but don't want to refinish it yet. In fact this trick is used by many high end gunsmiths, so I can't take credit for that

Anyway, here are the parts minus safety that is left out of the picture.

Tiger stripes? No, that's some really ugly pitting.

In fact very deep, so I won't be able to fix it completely, but I can make this action a bit smoother for sure. How?

Let's kill the active rust first.

Polishing time, 400, 800, 1000, 2000.

Effect before oiling (some small pits are still visible, but they aren't active any longer).

The shroud is covered in rust. I need to stop it. Let's just say, that sanding is out of question though (with Mauser it is actually recommended not to sand the action parts as it can affect heat treatment that is very thin).

So, what's the trick? That's the trick. Not any metal polish. Blue Magic cream.

Why? That's why. Bluing wasn't affected at all, but the rust is gone. Don't try that with any metal polish though.

 

[Nestor]

So, after 5 weeks of work this project is done. I have only one sling that will fit into these narrow, German slots...but it's well worn, so I'm going to see if I can revitalize it a bit first Thanks for your time Gents!