Steyr-Mannlicher M95M - bolt question

H Wally

H Wally

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Have a new to me Steyr M95M and have noticed that the bolt head will not stay forward when removed and rides the receiver when put in and out of battery. When removed from the action it snaps shut and has to be held forward when put in the action.
I've seen disassembly videos as well as photo series that discuss and show the bolt holding itself in the unlocked position. It concerns me because it doesn't feel like it's right... the function is fine but it just doesn't make sense that it would ride the bolt rail like that.

Thoughts? Is this a sign of something (wear on a part, a specific flaw, a variation in design)?
 
I believe your problem is with the NUT behind the bolt-shank.

Not, Wally, I'm not insulting you; I have had the same problem with my 1903 Bulgarian-crest 8x56R!

When I got the rifle, manymanymany years ago, the bolt would not stay closed at all; shut the Bolt and it would jump back to UNLOCKED position. I suppose you could have fired it IF you held the Bolt forward (and the Locking Lugs thus rotated into their recesses), but there was no ammunition available anyway. But I wanted the thing to WORK, even if there was no ammo. I borrowed a copy of Smith's BOOK OF RIFLES, tore mine apart and realised that a part was missing: the little Nut which screws into the ear end of the rotating Bolt Shank. The firing-pin passes through this Nut and extends rearward to the threaded portion which the Cocking-piece screws onto. So sent away and described the part and, in due course, one arrived in the mail all the way from a place called Montreal where, I was told, folks spoke a different language. There were, of course, no instructions.

So I assembled the NUT carefully into position and found that if it was screwed on ALL THE WAY, the bolt would go together perfectly but the channels milled into the rotating Bolt-shank did not line up with the corresponding channels on the Nut. But I slapped the rifle back together and it worked, more or less. At least I could load the thing and the action worked. One of these days, gotta fit a thin little washer in there so that everything will jam up solid and IN POSITION..... which is the way it is supposed to be.

I THINK your problem could be that "you are off your Nut"......... and I MEAN that the little S.O.B. has worked itself loose. It is SUPPOSED TO hold everything in perfect alignment so that the Bolt will go together right and not give you any of the grief which it seems to be handing out. When good and solid, it holds in position and keeps the rotating Bolt-shank solidly in alignment so that you don't have to mimic King Kong's stronger brother when you are putting the thing back together. When the little "step" which the Nut provides is there and working, the Bolt should work easily. Also, it should be easy to insert. But let the Nut work loose and you have the trouble you describe.

If it were mine, I think I would rip it down, give it a good internal cleaning and, when it is going back together, dump a bit of BLUE Loc-tite onto the nice, dry threads and screw it back into position, let it sit a couple of minutes and finish assembly. It should work.

So your problem is very simple: like anybody else who owns one of these, you are "off your Nut"!

Hope this helps.
 
No, it does that. I've got a excellent condition M95/31 that does the same thing. It's a PITA to recock too.
 
smellie said:
I believe your problem is with the NUT behind the bolt-shank.

Not, Wally, I'm not insulting you; I have had the same problem with my 1903 Bulgarian-crest 8x56R!

When I got the rifle, manymanymany years ago, the bolt would not stay closed at all; shut the Bolt and it would jump back to UNLOCKED position. I suppose you could have fired it IF you held the Bolt forward (and the Locking Lugs thus rotated into their recesses), but there was no ammunition available anyway. But I wanted the thing to WORK, even if there was no ammo. I borrowed a copy of Smith's BOOK OF RIFLES, tore mine apart and realised that a part was missing: the little Nut which screws into the ear end of the rotating Bolt Shank. The firing-pin passes through this Nut and extends rearward to the threaded portion which the Cocking-piece screws onto. So sent away and described the part and, in due course, one arrived in the mail all the way from a place called Montreal where, I was told, folks spoke a different language. There were, of course, no instructions.

So I assembled the NUT carefully into position and found that if it was screwed on ALL THE WAY, the bolt would go together perfectly but the channels milled into the rotating Bolt-shank did not line up with the corresponding channels on the Nut. But I slapped the rifle back together and it worked, more or less. At least I could load the thing and the action worked. One of these days, gotta fit a thin little washer in there so that everything will jam up solid and IN POSITION..... which is the way it is supposed to be.

I THINK your problem could be that "you are off your Nut"......... and I MEAN that the little S.O.B. has worked itself loose. It is SUPPOSED TO hold everything in perfect alignment so that the Bolt will go together right and not give you any of the grief which it seems to be handing out. When good and solid, it holds in position and keeps the rotating Bolt-shank solidly in alignment so that you don't have to mimic King Kong's stronger brother when you are putting the thing back together. When the little "step" which the Nut provides is there and working, the Bolt should work easily. Also, it should be easy to insert. But let the Nut work loose and you have the trouble you describe.

If it were mine, I think I would rip it down, give it a good internal cleaning and, when it is going back together, dump a bit of BLUE Loc-tite onto the nice, dry threads and screw it back into position, let it sit a couple of minutes and finish assembly. It should work.

So your problem is very simple: like anybody else who owns one of these, you are "off your Nut"!

Hope this helps.
Click to expand...

Haha - Smellie, I am daily amazed by the amount of info in your posts and the amusing ways you write them. Very much approved and I certainly owe you a beer if I end up back in Manitoba :p I noticed the nut likes to back itself out and will certainly use some low strength loctite to stop it from moving on me when reassembling. Only thing is that I have successfully reassembled the bolt with the nut in the right condition, so still unsure. The loctite shall be done though!




Nyles said:
No, it does that. I've got a excellent condition M95/31 that does the same thing. It's a PITA to recock too.
Click to expand...

Hmm - I'm rather amazed that's what they do. Seems like it would cause unnecessary wear.

This vid shows it's possible... just curious why...

At the 2:35 mark
 
FWIW, at one time I had 3 M95M's, all with mis-matched bolts. All three rifles had that problem, but when I swapped the bolts around, I managed to get the bolts on all 3 to work. It was a matter of how each bolt was fitted to that particular rifle. YMMV.
 
Hmm - does anyone know what part of the bolt body and head bear on each other to allow it to hold open? I feel like it's probably just a very small nubbin or flat somewhere that gets worn/polished down over time.
 
If the Bolt-shanks rotate far ENOUGH, they stand on an internal step inside the Bolt-sleeve.

If the "step" is worn badly enough, the rotating Bolt-shank can slip off the step and cause the problem which most of us seem to have.

These were wonderful rifles, but they were "rode hard and put away wet" and there have been no spare parts since about 1919.

The early model of the Ross Rifle was, basically, a 95 Mannlicher with some of the bugs worked out: Ross made the Nut internal.

Not surprising at all that Sir Charles would do this; he and the Ritter knew each other and were friends.

Besides, they were the same social class: a Ritter is a Knight in German (comes from Reiter: a rider). Knights, as any Monty Python fan knows, are silly knees-bent English people whose fathers smell like Elderberries.... but they are the social equal of a Ritter. I don't know how Sir Charles would react to hearing his mother spoken of as "a hamster" but, thankfully, Monty Python hadn't been invented at that time.
 
smellie said:
If the Bolt-shanks rotate far ENOUGH, they stand on an internal step inside the Bolt-sleeve.

If the "step" is worn badly enough, the rotating Bolt-shank can slip off the step and cause the problem which most of us seem to have.

These were wonderful rifles, but they were "rode hard and put away wet" and there have been no spare parts since about 1919.

The early model of the Ross Rifle was, basically, a 95 Mannlicher with some of the bugs worked out: Ross made the Nut internal.

Not surprising at all that Sir Charles would do this; he and the Ritter knew each other and were friends.

Besides, they were the same social class: a Ritter is a Knight in German (comes from Reiter: a rider). Knights, as any Monty Python fan knows, are silly knees-bent English people whose fathers smell like Elderberries.... but they are the social equal of a Ritter. I don't know how Sir Charles would react to hearing his mother spoken of as "a hamster" but, thankfully, Monty Python hadn't been invented at that time.
Click to expand...

You can say that again - I've been looking for a couple parts for mine and it's maddening - handguard wood and proper bands are non-existant! I'm already making the extractor by hand :p
 
Actually, the M95M conversions were done in the 1930's and the parts were re-manufactured to accommodate 8x57JS. If I remember right, on the 8mm version, the bolt head cams into contact with a small rib inside the extractor spring to hold the bolt locked open. It's been a while since I pulled one apart though. Those that won't lock open are suffering from wear on the flat of one bolt lug which causes the bolt head to not rotate fully into the locked position. Sometimes swapping bolts or just bolt heads helps, but it needs to come out of another M95M, not a regular 8x56 gun.

We did I wrote-up on these over at MSC in the MKL which is worth a read. Yep, here's the link:

w w w.milsurps.com/content.php?r=392-Yugoslavian-M95M-Infantry-Rifle-(Puska-M95)
 
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