New to me Mauser bolt is hard to open/cock

[corbinace]

My dad is about to die and gave me an '06 on what I think is a '98 Mauser action. I have other small ring Mausers that cock on closing, and have no problem cycling from the shoulder while mostly remaining on the target. Is it supposed to be so difficult to cock that it precludes this method of operation?

[Scharfschuetze]

Shouldn't be. If it's a Model 98, there is a cocking cam located to the rear of the bolt. Make sure that it is clean and well lubricated with a good quality grease. That should lighten the cock on opening friction to some extent. Also clean the bolt lug recesses in the receiver's ring and lubricate as above.

A second guess is that if the receiver's ring was not hardened properly, the bolt lugs may have set back against their abutments in the ring. On firing, the bolt lugs then have to be forced out of the set back before the primary extraction cam and cocking cam can come to bear. This problem is seen from time to time on late WWI or WW2 actions made in Germany or one of their client states.

Sadly, if the bolt lugs are set back, there is no real economical fix for it.

Post a photo of the action so that we can confirm its heredity.

[beyersgrt]

M98 to my knowledge is cock on open.
M96 and 95 such as my wife uses are cock on close.
Do you reload?

[leadman]

The 98 does cock the firing spring when opening the bolt, along with camming the cartridge case out of the chamber. This has been a point of much discussion as some favor cocking on opening, other like cocking on closing.
The extractor does need some lube as it stays stationary while the bolt is opened adding to the effort needed to open the bolt. Setback locking lugs are also possible, along with pressure to high in the cartridge, dirty, pitted, rusty chamber.
My first thought would be to disassembly, clean and lube the bolt and chamber and see what happens.

[Multigunner]

If a Mauser ring has noticeable set back it can be rectified.
A friend who built custom rifles showed me how he did this and the necessary tools may be available from Brownells, though I'm not certain of that.

The barrel is removed and a stub reamed for an arbor is threaded into the ring. A diamond grit coated disc is affixed to the arbo and when turned it cuts away any high points leaving the surface perfectly perpendicular to the bore axis.
He did this on new actions as well, he called it "blue printing".
So long as the carburized layer isn't cut through it doesn't affect the strength of the receiver ring. Only two or three thousands at most should be ground away. With military Mausers the depth of the carburized layer is usually a lot thicker than you'd expect, but it also varies quite a bit.

[Multigunner]

A Mosin Nagant belonging to a friend was extremely hard to open even if not fired.
I found the angle of the camming surfaces of bolt and cocking piece were no where near the same.
The roughly machined and extra hard edge of the cocking piece surface was digging into the bolt's cam surface like a saw blade.
I knocked down the edges with a whetrock then I applied some medium grit valve grinding compound to the surfaces and worked the bolt only six times before detail stripping and cleaning and the bolt was then slick as a ribbon to operate.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

Shouldn't be. If it's a Model 98, there is a cocking cam located to the rear of the bolt. Make sure that it is clean and well lubricated with a good quality grease. That should lighten the cock on opening friction to some extent. Also clean the bolt lug recesses in the receiver's ring and lubricate as above.

A second guess is that if the receiver's ring was not hardened properly, the bolt lugs may have set back against their abutments in the ring. On firing, the bolt lugs then have to be forced out of the set back before the primary extraction cam and cocking cam can come to bear. This problem is seen from time to time on late WWI or WW2 actions made in Germany or one of their client states.

Sadly, if the bolt lugs are set back, there is no real economical fix for it.

Post a photo of the action so that we can confirm its heredity.

You've got the two most likely explanations by far. The answers proposed by Multigunner will often be good ones. In particular there is no danger in smoothing and polishing the cocking cam in the rear of the bolt. You might find that the situation has arisen because the cocking-piece is scraping it with an edge rather than an inclined surface of hardened steel. That is good, for it means the case-hardening needn't be thin.

Honing the locking surfaces in the bolt, as he describes, can also be good. You have to make sure you haven't increased the headspace too much, but as Multigunner says, a very small amount of metal removal may do the trick. The question arises how it got that way. If it was from firing extreme overloads, no problem, you needn't do that again. But if the case-hardening is too thin, it might happen again. The diamond disc method is fine for bolt locking-lug surfaces which are perpendicular to the bolt axis, but when they are helical you would need a dummy made of softer metal (since the grit sticks in soft metal and cuts hard), or even a spare bolt which you anneal. But if you do the latter, you should take one or two large bites out of it with a grinding wheel, in case someone yet unborn takes it for a safely usable part.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

Another possibility (You should be so lucky!) is that someone has substituted the wrong extractor or its collar. It is worth trying the bolt with these parts removed.

[corbinace]

Thank you for all of the replies.

After taking what I thought were some decent pictures, it seems I do not have the skillset to post them at this moment.

To clarify, this is not extracting a cartridge, but rather lifting the lever to cock the firing pin after dry firing. The lever is increasingly more difficult to raise until it reaches the top. I had pretty liberally lubed the area of the extractor where it wraps around the bolt, as well as the bolt shroud and safety area. LPS was the lube used, not grease.

I will watch some videos on how to disassemble the bolt and see if it is dirty inside. It is an older rifle built for my Grandpa in the early fifties. I am surprised at how clean the rest of the insides are given the minimal amount of blue left on the rest of the rifle. Who knows maybe they cleaned it so much that they wore the bluing away. My Grandpa and Dad were both guides in Wyoming in the fifties and it got packed a lot.

It may be my anatomy that is to blame too. After a bad rotator injury a couple years ago, lifting above my right shoulder level is challenging. This is rather like lifting, where as my cock on close rifles take advantage of my greater downward strength.

Funny how our memories get altered as we age. According to my dad this *** rifle could defy all manner of physics in trajectory and ballistics. He does love this rifle, in spite of it's looks. I am torn between rebluing and refinishing the wood and just leaving it as is in his honor. Leaning heavily towards as is.















IMG_0071.JPG

[Ballistics in Scotland]

To clarify, this is not extracting a cartridge, but rather lifting the lever to cock the firing pin after dry firing. The lever is increasingly more difficult to raise until it reaches the top.

Do you mean all the way to the top, i.e. to the position which permits longitudinal movement of the bolt? And is it the same way without a case in the chamber, or when unchambering an unfired round or sized case? It ought to break the adhesion of case to chamber and allow a little free rotation at the top of the bolt rotation.

If it doesn't, possibilities include someone having drastically altered the camming surface in the rear of the bolt (I don't think it could wear that much) or a swollen chamber. The test for the latter is to fire the rifle without the extractor, and see how the effort to poke the case out with a cleaning rod compares with rifles you know are all right.

You say you aren't sure it is a 98 Mauser? If it is an earlier model someone may have messed up the job of adapting it to cock on opening, which I believe entails modifying the bolt camming notch. (I know it does on the Dayton-Traister kit for the P14 and M1917 Enfields.) This might be rectifiable by building up the extension of the cocking-piece with weld (which needs case-hardening unless a special hard-facing welding rod is used) or by silver soldering a piece of high speed steel in place.

[waksupi]

Keep in mind, the Mausers were designed to work properly when slapped around pretty firmly. Work the bolt vigorously, and see if you notice the problem as much.

[nicholst55]

A stronger striker spring can also make it more difficult to open the bolt. From your description, I'm inclined to discount that possibility, though.

[corbinace]

So, after disassembling, cleaning and lubing the bolt assembly, it works with much less resistance.

There was a fair amount of dried lube inside and this may have been a bit of the problem.

I was trying as Waksupi said, to operate the bolt with gusto, while still maintaining target acquisition. Think IPSC with a bolt gun. I think this rifle with its cock on opening and longer bolt travel will take a bit of practice to get there. I guess I was just spoiled by the short small ring actions.

While I know there are those of you who are shaking your head in dismay as to why I want to be able operate the rifle in this manner. All I can say in my defense is that I just want to cultivate the ability to do so. Just as it is exciting to shoot a sub MOA group in a few minutes, for me a pie plate at 50 or a hundred offhand in very few seconds thrills me. Follow that with a stripper clip of five more on the clock. I am surprised more did not die in the early wars, with the rate of accurate fire these arms are capable of producing. Enough rambling for now.

Thanks for all of the insight on this new to me action.

[Scharfschuetze]

Glad a good cleaning helped with the effort to open the bolt.


Follow that with a stripper clip of five more on the clock. I am surprised more did not die in the early wars, with the rate of accurate fire these arms are capable of producing. Enough rambling for now.

Sustained and accurate fire is quite high with these rifles in the hands of a marksman. I often took my 1903A3 out to the Trainfire Ranges when we had a team qualification (SOF unit-not a big army unit) and fired 40 out of 40 with it under the time limits. Ranges on the Trainfire course of fire are from 25 meters to 350 meters and time limits, while generous for an M16/M4, get a little tight with a bolt rifle and stripper clips.

Early in WWI, during the Schlieffen Plan maneuver, the German infantry often thought that they were under machine gun fire when engaged by the well trained marksmen and Lee Enfields of the British Army.

[gnoahhh]

It sounds like you're getting to the bottom of it.

As for refinishing it: I wouldn't touch it. Your Gramps and Dad worked hard to give it the look it has now. Refinishing it would take away from those memories. Were it mine, I would strive to preserve it in its present state, and use it in their honor now and again.

[castalott]

One crazy thought... If it has been rebarrelled, the receiver 'may' have been sprung....making the bolt not fit correctly... I am afraid it is unsafe if this is it....

[Ballistics in Scotland]

Early in WWI, during the Schlieffen Plan maneuver, the German infantry often thought that they were under machine gun fire when engaged by the well trained marksmen and Lee Enfields of the British Army.

There is a former German soldier in the BBC's "The Great War" series of 1964 who still believed that. I can still remember my grandfather's friends with tears in their eyes they would have shown for their own. Some of them had picked up prisoners who said they were student volunteers and had received no military training whatever, and they thought the German emperor had used them to do murder. It isn't like shortage of manpower was Germany's problem.

It isn't true though, as often stated, that the British didn't have machine-guns, and the Germans did. The allocation was about equal, as indeed were the types of the guns. After the war the Loewe company sent Vickers, Sons and Maxim a very large check for royalties on those they made under licence.

There were pretty sound arguments for the British Lee action being a bit old-fashioned on its adoption in 1888. But its rear locking and short bolt throw, both rotational and linear, made it better for rapid fire in muddy conditions.

[gnoahhh]

I for one wouldn't have wanted to wallow in the mud at Passchendaele, gone over the top on July 1, 1916, or had breakfast with Haig's staff, but if I had I would've wanted a SMLE clutched in my fists over any other bolt gun of the time. (Or a Lewis gun, and a couple buddies lugging spare ammo drums, with a sackful of Mill's bombs for good measure.)

[M-Tecs]

If it's been scoped make sure the base screws are not too long and contacting the bolt.

[Scharfschuetze]

It isn't true though, as often stated, that the British didn't have machine-guns, and the Germans did. The allocation was about equal, as indeed were the types of the guns. After the war the Loewe company sent Vickers, Sons and Maxim a very large check for royalties on those they made under licence.

Heavy machine guns (Vickers and Maxims) were not present in large number at the beginning of WWI. In fact, an infantry battalion usually had only two to four on the TOE (Table of authorized equipment) and they were usually task organized to support the company most in need as the need arose. As the war went on and stagnated into trench warfare after the too early swing to the south of the German right across the front of Paris, they became widely issued as tactics and need evolved in the moribund trenches.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

Heavy machine guns (Vickers and Maxims) were not present in large number at the beginning of WWI. In fact, an infantry battalion usually had only two to four on the TOE (Table of authorized equipment) and they were usually task organized to support the company most in need as the need arose. As the war went on and stagnated into trench warfare after the too early swing to the south of the German right across the front of Paris, they became widely issued as tactics and need evolved in the moribund trenches.

Yes indeed, that was the situation, but about identical for both sides, and light machine-guns, one of the most important developments of the war in infantry tactics, almost entirely absent. It wasn't that much of a mistake. The first phase of the war involved a long march and more or less hinged upon whose infantry got worn out first, and heavy machine-guns would have had to be separated from their gunners on the very limited transport available.

Captain von Rintelen, the saboteur of the US eastern seaboard in 1915 who later became a personal friend of the British Admiral Hall who lured him into captivity, was first involved in a daring scam in Denmark. After various complications and mishaps, 300 Madsen light machine-guns, already paid for by Russia, were loaded into a fake Russian vessel with a company of German marines in hiding below.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

If it's been scoped make the base screws are not too long and contacting the bolt.

That is certainly a possibility. The bolt is probably too hard to show scraping marks, but the polishing of the screw ends should be noticeable.

I think what castalott means is that the receiver could have been twisted during rebarrelling, by some member of the intellectual classes holding it too far back. That is also a possibility. I think, though, either would produce noticeable dragging in the bolt's longitudinal movement, as well as turning.

[nekshot]

plenty of good advice given and all I can say is with its history its a gem! I would shoot it even with lighter loads if you like but I would make it go bang. Kinda funny the minute a shade tree gunsmith torques a action we want to call it junk yet certain manufactures have had more than a few leave the plant with barrels crooked. To me a mauser is unsafe with too much powder in cartridge or the lugs showing obvious cracks. These babies will shoot forever with cast boolit loads!

[corbinace]

As it turns out, the bolt just needed a good cleaning and lubing. That, along with me learning the idiosyncrasies of the cock on open bolt operation. I have no doubts about the action being OK at this point. Thank you, one and all for your contributions.

My dad and Grandpa have used this rifle to harvest many small, medium and large game, with the last being a Caribou about six years ago. He has been a bit of a tumbleweed, living in Colorado, Utah, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Washington and Alaska. So it has seen a wide array of targets to add to his subsistence. It has been my dads one prize possession, especially since he has never had a pot...or a window to throw it out of. I will try to find an elk with it next year in his memory as this years season will be covered up with his imminent demise.

Sorry about the rambling, maybe I am just trying to process the time and events as they unfold. I thought when the time came, I would be tougher/harder than it appears I am.

Please carry on with the WW thread drift, very interesting.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

Most of the possibilities mentioned, now apparently dispelled, wouldn't have impaired the strength. There is no reason why a 98 Mauser, if it isn't impaired in some way, shouldn't be fine with standard pressures.

An impending bereavement is always tragic, but we all die, and would feel better for knowing where such a cherished part of our lives is going. Usually I resent the obsession of collectors with not refinishing even quite rough old guns. I know what Mr. Browning or the Ritter von Mannlicher would want done. But one like yours is an exception.

Well, you asked for it... Here is von Rintelen's book:

http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks08/0801121h.html

178233

Here is the man himself, at the wedding of Admiral Hall's daughter where his own daughter was a bridesmaid, and eleven British admirals also attended. Now there is a wall I wouldn't mind being a fly on. Rudolf Hess offered him the London ambassadorship, but he ended up an anti-Nazi exile in the Second World War, after having his case to stay debated in the House of Lords due to the small matter of having been a German spy. You have to cultivate enemies carefully to get them to turn out right.

[Shiloh]

Keep the lugs lubed. Still hard to class so don't make it harder.

Shiloh

[Multigunner]

The old story of German troops believing the British had many more machineguns than they actually had is no doubt true but fact is this was first said by the Spanish in Cuba when faced with U S Marines armed with the Lee Straightpull rifles.
A Spanish officer was berated for breaking off an attack on a position held by a squad of Marines claiming they had machineguns and cut his men down in droves, it turned out later that the Marines had no MGs at that particular battle.

Both Lee Enfield and Winchester Lee rifles were designed by James Parish Lee an American citizen.