Svt 40 action question

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Kev70

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Hey guys so I finally broke down and got my first Milsurp. My town doesn't have a gun store so I drove to a neighbouring town that does. I had emailed to see what they had and they replied they only had a couple Mosin's so I decided to swing by and pick one up. When I got there I noticed they also had a Svt 40 and a Swiss k31. So I know these both are getting tough to find so I decided to get both ( and no Mosin lol ) however when I was looking at the Svt something looked odd about it and I couldn't figure out what. It's forced matched ( stock and barrel match ) with electro pencil which I'm fine with for the price. I looked it over for almost an hour all the time asking the guy behind the counter about it. Everything seemed kosher but something was bugging me and I couldn't figure out what. So I bought them both and headed home. Today I decided to start cleaning the svt as it's caked in Cosmo and found a video on how to strip it down. I watched it a couple times cause I'm looking at my rifle saying to myself it's the same rifle but something looks off, then I notice, all the actions I've seen for the svt are a silver metallic but mine is like a brownish tarnished bronze color. It's electro penciled so I'm assuming it's legit but I don't know. I don't want to strip it down and go through the work of removing the Cosmo if the action is some after market job made last year. Has anyone seen actions like this before? Are they common? Legit? Any help would be appreciated cause if it's not good I'll bring it back, I already sent them an email about another issue so I have to go back anyway. Thanks in advance.
Ps I'll try and post a pic of it tomorrow.
 
My SVT40 bolt carrier is more of a "bronze colour" which sounds like what you have there, its perfectly normal, iv seen several different colour variations on many different SVT's some silver, some bronze, some plum, I have no background info on why the different colours, im guessing its just different refurbish factory parts.
 
the newer imports have the bolt carrier refinished ,no big deal, some people say they were originally in the white ,personally I don’t agree. if you don’t like the colour and want it in the white, soak it in vinegar and give it a good soapy water wash after to stop the acid action.
 
The colour = normal. There's debate about whether the "plum" bolts are the result of refurbishing after the war, or if they were originally issued that way (it's surprisingly hard to tell from old WWII black and white photos)... There's evidence that both plum and "in the white" existed in original issued rifles.

Pretty much every rifle that gets imported has the plum bolt. The only reason there are a lot of bolts "in the white" in North America is because some of the American importers back in the day thought they would sell better all shiny'ed up, and a lot of guys remove the plum colouring after the fact.

The process to get it in the white is quite simple. Soak it in vinegar for an hour or so and then rub it down. Repeat until all the colouring is gone. Polish with jewelers polish.

Personally, I think nothing says "Bubba" like a shiny SVT bolt. I'm in the "they came plum from the factory" camp because it makes way more sense for a military gun. In any case, they were all "blued" as a part of the refurb process after the war. A shiny bolt is a 100% guarantee that it was messed with after the fact.
 
grelmar said:
The colour = normal. There's debate about whether the "plum" bolts are the result of refurbishing after the war, or if they were originally issued that way (it's surprisingly hard to tell from old WWII black and white photos)... There's evidence that both plum and "in the white" existed in original issued rifles.

Pretty much every rifle that gets imported has the plum bolt. The only reason there are a lot of bolts "in the white" in North America is because some of the American importers back in the day thought they would sell better all shiny'ed up, and a lot of guys remove the plum colouring after the fact.

The process to get it in the white is quite simple. Soak it in vinegar for an hour or so and then rub it down. Repeat until all the colouring is gone. Polish with jewelers polish.

Personally, I think nothing says "Bubba" like a shiny SVT bolt. I'm in the "they came plum from the factory" camp because it makes way more sense for a military gun. In any case, they were all "blued" as a part of the refurb process after the war. A shiny bolt is a 100% guarantee that it was messed with after the fact.
Click to expand...

I disagree on the silver bolt theory. Weimajack had some beautiful refurbs with silver bolts, and also the early ones were in the white. It all depends on the factory that did the work. Nothing is black or white with these rifles!
 
The WW2 German K98 rifles (Originals) had various Plum parts right from the factory. It all depended on the Process.
 
I have a 1940 which happens to be either a Winter War or Continuation War capture by the Finns. I have had it since 1976.

The Breech-block Carrier is in the white. For me, at least, this settles it.

I have seen a few Toks over the past 50 years of messing with these things, but, to me, the Plum Carriers seem only to have turned up in the last 10 or 15 years at most.
 
There is no debate and there is no theory. Sorry, but there are just ppl that don't want to check sticky threads and ppl that don't beleive in photographic facts. Simply put - first years of production white bolt carriers, then plum. After the war during refurb most but not all of the whities where treated and turned all shades of plum. That's it. No conspiracy, no unsolved mistery. It's being brought up every two months and every two months I see new theories and questions while all of this is very well known and documented.
 
I dunno. I think I agree with gaff, grelmar and Coyote Ugly on this one. If the change in colour is a result of the refurbishment process are we sure who refurbished the bolts? The Russians or the Germans who are known to have reissued captured SVT40s.

And if it is part of the refurbishment process then why? Were some bolts too soft or brittle? Was the change in colour from tempering the bolts or to make them less shiny? Are bolts left in the white less durable than those that are plum or bronze?

I'm thinking Coyote Ugly is closer to the mark with nickel content and process.

Coyote Ugly said:
The Plum color has to do with the Nickel Content and the Heat Treating.
Click to expand...
 
All the Finn captures I have seen were in the white and from memory the matching stamped (no electro pencil numbers) imports in the 1980's were in the white also.
 
It doesn't matter if they were in the white originally or not. Most are now plum, to tamper with that is to tamper with the history of the firearm. Just like those guys who go replacing parts on there rifles to make it 'more correct' it actually isn't (M1 Garands, K98s, and M17s come to mind as quick examples), as no matter what you tampered with it and it loses its authenticity. The SVT-40s that are coming over now are arsenal refurbished as part of the arms the Soviets intended to use in the event of WWIII. They are not in 'original' (as in what they left the factory as in the first place) condition and the only ones that pretty much are now is the Finnish ones (which are extremely rare thanks to such things as the globco Mohawk).

Enjoy the rifle, they are a blast and I find quite accurate overall.
 
The plum colour is actually bluing. the high nickel content in the metal has a chemical reaction in the bluing process that results in the colour change. I have seen Finn capture rifles with remnants of plum colour on them . weather all the rifles were blued or only some I don't know. what ever they were using in the1940s to clean the rifles would have been very corrosive to neutralize the corrosive primers . this would have deteriorated the plum coloured bluing first because of the nickel content.
in the end what difference does it make.
 
Finn capture, purchased in early 80s, original finish and in the white bolt carrier.

tok2_zps89ae3d56.jpg
 
Thanks for the responses, I had done a topic search but didn't get any hits so that's why I posted. I know it's force matched so not overly concerned about " authenticity " I was just more concerned as to if it was correct to the rifle for the time period, it's going to be a shooter so not overly concerned about collectibility, I had just never seen a plum action which it seems is fairly common, I guess if I had know it was considered " plum color " I could have found a thread about it. I'm just happy it's fairly common, now I can go about cleaning all the Cosmo off it.......yeah ! Lol
 
There are several distinct colours that I've seen: dark plum, light plum, bronze, and cherry red. It's a fair certainty that '43's had the red coloured bolt and carrier originally. Chumak addresses this issue in his new book and actually quotes the specific soviet text allowing for "bluing" of the bolts starting in '42. The bolt locking insert in the action is also usually similarly coloured and must have the same metalurgy as the other parts. While the colour can be easily removed, I've found it to be pretty resistent to wear with guns I've fired hundreds of rounds through not having noticeable loss of the bluing.

milsurpo
 
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