cheap 14$ bore scope and my 1927 mosin

[mac1911]

this rifle has a well worn bore and only shoots cast with over sized bullets.... .315" as dropped from my mold. then ran through a .314" sizer. I was actually expecting even more leading but really not bad for 300 rounds pushing WW lead to about 1800fps. I bet if I ddialed these back to 1600 with 2400 the leading might reduce some. so far 3moa ish is all this old dog will do.
With FMJ even the hornady .312" bullets I could not get better than 6 moa... fun stuff


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jB3YV5mazTc

[Oklahoma Rebel]

that really makes me want to cry, if you look below you'll notice I am a fellow mosin nagant owner, great, tough, rifles!

[jsn]

What cheap $14 borescope are you using?

[LAGS]

These are shot out of my Finnish with a .315 barrel 20 inches long.
The groups improved as I got closer to 28 gr of Reloaded 7.
No leadding, because the bullets were cast out of Lino GC'ed and Powder coated

[LAGS]

I found some more pictures of Targets shot out of a .315 bore
This is why I call the rifle my AKMN because it has a pistol grip stock.
The mold is a Lee 155GC that I honed out to .316
I beleive these bullets were cast out of Lino and powdercoated too

[runfiverun]

I think you need to clean that barrel.
I'd probably unscrew it and soak it in the garbage can for 2 weeks then go check on it.

you might be able to help it out a bunch with a paper patched boolit or 20.
that would get a bunch of that gunk out and let you know if there is still some rifling left.

[mac1911]

What cheap $14 borescope are you using?

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01KC7S9Q2/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

It's a *** but I figured as much I added it to a late night amazon Christmas frenzy...

[mac1911]

I think you need to clean that barrel.
I'd probably unscrew it and soak it in the garbage can for 2 weeks then go check on it.

you might be able to help it out a bunch with a paper patched boolit or 20.
that would get a bunch of that gunk out and let you know if there is still some rifling left.
The bore was completely cleaned prior to shooting cast. It's very pitted after removing decades of fouling. It actually looked worse clean. When you passed a jag and patch down this bore it feels like a course file.
I may give the bore a swipe and post a after shot. There is not much rifling left it's a 1927 and it's not counter bored. It is what it is.
I was actually surprised there was not more leading... I have no intentions of paper patching or doing much more of anything else.
Maybe just go shooting plain base .315" as dropped from the mold and bring it down to gallery load velocity?

[LAGS]

I had a 1891 MN that had a very rough bore like you described.
I made a Bore Lap out of an old bronze bore brush and JB weld.
Then I used it on a cleaning rod after cleaning the bore really good.
I used JB Bore Bright as lapping compound.
It smoothed out some of the Gritty Rough spots in the bore.
The cast Lap followed the rifling that was left and minimized the wearing of the bore further.
It really improved the accuracy , and reduced leading

[kawasakifreak77]

I have a WWII era Mosin that has been nick named "the sewer pipe" for good reason. The last foot of barrel looks like a gravel road..

Somehow it shoots heavy ball pretty dang good! Consistant 2" groups, about 5" high & I never moved the sights!

Considering it pretty much cost me nothing & shoots some if my cheapest ammo well I am very happy.

[LAGS]

The Sewer Pipe Bore in the last 5" of the bore was the reason the Finn got cut down to 20"
Made it shoot much better, and I figured it had little value with a bad bore, so what did I have to loose.
The stock looked like Dr Zivalgo had dragged it behind his horse from Linnengrad to Moscow and back too.

[runfiverun]

if you can get something to grab the rifling it might shoot pretty well.
the paper I mentioned will generally smooth down a bunch of the roughness.
it's pretty effective and doesn't take a ton of them.
a higher carnuba containing lube might help here too.
it will generally fill in some of the rough spots and ease things along as time goes by.

[30calflash]

mac1911, that doesn't look like a sewer pipe to me, more like the entry to a salt mine!

Just goes to show that a less than favorable rifle bore can shoot fairly well.

[mac1911]

mac1911, that doesn't look like a sewer pipe to me, more like the entry to a salt mine!

Just goes to show that a less than favorable rifle bore can shoot fairly well.


I have a retired gun Smith near by who has a older nice bore scope. It has a straight rod with just a eye piece like a spotting scope. I had him bore scope my 513t made in 1942 as one day I was cleaning it and felt a "snag" about 8" from the chamber.
Before he proceeded he said... does it shoot well, because if it does it might not after you see what it's like in there."
Man he was right the bore on that gun is ugly.
Countless rounds have been put down this rifle.
I wish his set up had a camera attachment.
The snag 8" from the chamber was a a spot of lead fouling once cleaned out you could see a small section of the bore was pitted as if something sat there for a while rotting that one spot. The rest of the bore look rough also.
With most decent ammo this rifle still does well by me. One a few 100 yard Bragg in rights matches and a couple 200 yard matches with groups like this being typical when I'm shooting well. Prone 100 yards.

So yes you never know how a bore will do until you try. I have a K98 with rough dark bore that will now hold 3moa with cast or reduced FMJ loads. My only guess is the higher velocity forces the projectile right past/over the remaining lands?
http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t196/jrm7800/Mobile%20Uploads/Photo-0138_zpsexkw4f8i.jpg (http://s160.photobucket.com/user/jrm7800/media/Mobile%20Uploads/Photo-0138_zpsexkw4f8i.jpg.html)

[30calflash]

Nice report on your rough bore shooting experiences. 3MOA is nothing to sneeze at in the real world.

I had a Rem 03 that put most standard load FMJ's thru the paper sideways at 25 yards. I didn't spend any time with it, wish I'd tried some reduced loads in it.

Had it rebarreled with an NIW Rem A3 barrel and changed everything else to make it happen. The 'individual' who installed the barrel finish chambered it about .015 too deep so now it gets it's own lot of special brass.

I've a Remington A3 that was to get that NIW barrel but it still shot so well that I couldn't see the sense in changing it at the time. About 2.5 MOA IIRC.

[swheeler]

I think I would try fire lapping the barrel with something like this. https://www.midwayusa.com/product/646612/wheeler-engineering-bore-lapping-kit

[mac1911]

I have considered them they might help a little by smoothing the edge of pitting a,little but I don't see a lot of help for worn out bores lapping them.... so far my ugly dark bore projects have recovered well by simply getting the last few decades of fouling out. Load up some rounds and see what happens most have done ok if not I slug them and cast accordingly.

[flint45]

I have a 1917 ENFIELD that has a rough bore when Ibought it at a gun show the bore actually looked pretty good when I checked it at the show but when i got home and started cleaning it was full of fowling when I got done afew days later it looked like asewer pipe with rifling it had stong rifiling all the way through the bore so I went to shoot it first two groups were great man Iwas happy but that was short lived every group after that got bigger and bigger from 1/14'' to 10 '' in about 6 groups bore was to rough even to fire lap just to eaten up by corrosive primers and no proper cleaning.

[mac1911]

I have considered applying lapping compound to some of my cast loads but first I will run a few more loads through it. Heres the bore with just 2 pulls of the bores
snake.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9SXyoxe8O-U&feature=youtu.be

so not completely worn out yet

[seppos]

As it is visible the rifling improves when aproaching the mouth, so that is a good sign. That should also indicate that the barrel might tighten along the way.

S

[mac1911]

I will reloading up some more soon. See what she can do.

[mac1911]

So as you can see sometimes all a ugly bore needs is a fat pill to make things better.
The vertical spread is all me as I have a hard time with the rear notch on the mosin. I will at some point get a peep sight for it.
I think with a little load tweeking I might find a nice solid sub 2moa load.? I need to cut down my custom front sight post again to bring up the point of impact. This group was fired at 50 yards aiming at the 6o'clock of the black bull. Rear sight on 400m
200gn 314299 , gas check, white label lube, 17 grains of 2400.
http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t196/jrm7800/20170105_123812_zps28w4qfwo.jpg (http://s160.photobucket.com/user/jrm7800/media/20170105_123812_zps28w4qfwo.jpg.html)

[Maven]

mac, Drop the powder charge to 16gr. and/or try 12.0 - 12.5gr. Unique with -299.

[mac1911]

I can't seem to get 2400 with any regulatory.
For now that's benched for the 1903a3
I would like to try some other powders. Unique is on my shelf. I would like to try some other powders that will fill the case more.
IMR 4198 maybe Reloader 7?
Also wondering is clays would do well. I have a good amount of that.

[Maven]

mac, I have RL-7, but haven't yet tried it. However, I have used IMR 4198 in my M-39 Finn. Nagant and a M-28/30 with -299. Start with 22gr. and increase to 24gr., which -> 1,750 fps with that CB. As for CLAYS, I have that, but only use it with PB CB's in the M-39 and my .30-06: 6 - 8gr. with a plain base CB is all you need, but be careful you don't double charge a case!