Greetings all...Thanks to a fine CGN member here I have a very nice Tula PU sniper rifle coming..She is one of the recent refurbs that came in...Those of you that have one and have done some shooting with them-how are they??..What's the accuracy like..and if you handload..what works ?...Cheers. .R..
The Mosin 91/30 PU sniper rifle
- Thread starter SA85M1
- Start date
- Location
- Edmonton area, Alberta
There's a thread on the topic call 91/30 sniper accuracy that has what you're looking for. But in a nutshell, I've gotten 1 1/2 MOA out of mine and haven't started tuning a load yet.
I've shot several of these. A few were terrible shooters. In the case of both of those rifles, the real issue for the shotgun style groups was the reluctance of the shooter/owner to break down the rifle to its component parts, without removing the scope base and clean up all of the preservation grease. The bedding needs to be as dry and grease free as possible. I don't like using solvents to clean the grease out of the bedding because they can encourage break down of the wood. I like to use a steamer from Canadian Tire to warm up the grease and wipe it free. Sometimes, I will also use hot soapy water on a cotton cloth to free up the residual oils after steaming. These things will sweat oil for years.
One thing to understand about WWII sniper rifles. They were never intended to shoot the eye out of a squirrel at 100 paces. Two-three inch groups at 100 yards with issue ammo was considered good enough. Snipers supposedly shot several different lots of ammo through their rifles to find the most accurate lot and then stock up as much as was realistically feasible. Obviously, they couldn't carry mass quantities in the field or even in their kits out of the field.
I read an account by one British sniper that exclusively used the heavy aircraft machine gun ammo in his rifle. He liked it because it was regulated and it was produced with much more care and attention to quality and velocities. Whether he was typical or an odd ball I don't know.
Snipers were allowed quite a bit of lee way.
All three of my Mosin snipers will shoot selected handloads into substantially less than 2 inches. This is common. None of them, other than the PE scoped rifle will shoot the surplus on the market in less than 3 inches.
I just picked up a 1943 Tula and couldn't be happier. I have only had it to the range once and only used 1970's surplus but had no issue shooting 2 inch groups at 100m right in the center of the target. I will start to work up a load using 150gr bullets and roughly 45-48gr of Reloader 15.
