A hard to feed Mosin

[Jack Stanley]

I've been trying to learn about my 91/59 and determine if I want to get a mold for it or if what I have will work . I slugged the throat and it measures .3155" with a touch of out of roundness or it's just one groove deeper than the other .

I have a bullet big enough , the problem is the chamber/brass doesn't want to use bullets bigger than .315" and the LEE reloading dies I have didn't want to seat these to the overall length I wanted untill I used the smaller bullets . Fortunately my LEE sizing die is a little fat and it makes the bullets right at .315" , got lucky there .

I did have to sort out some cases that didn't want to lock up into the chamber freely . I didn't really detect any difference with a caliper but perhaps a tubing mike would show they have a thicker neck than the rest .

I got a few good groups using a LBT two hundred fifteen grain bullet and thirty-one grains of Accurate Arms 2495 . I think I can detect a bit of leading starting at the muzzle so I will back it up just a bit . With three to four inch groups at a hundred and fifteen yards it's not going to be a long range gun but , a stubby carbine like that will be handy at woods and swamp ranges I bet .

Jack

[JIMinPHX]

The throat was .3155"? or the groove diameter just forward of the throat was .3155"?

The chamber area around the neck of the brass needs to have a little clearance when you load the round so that the brass can have room to expand & let go of the boolit when the pressure starts to build. A tight fitting case neck in a chamber is a dangerous thing. Too much clearance can also be a bad thing.

You can compare neck thickness of two different cases by just using a pair of calipers. It's not as accurate as using a tube mic, but if you use the same tool on both case necks, then the numbers that you get are OK for comparison to see if they are the same or not.

[dubber123]

I opened up the neck in my brothers .30-30 seating die by drilling and tapping a case, threading in a bolt and spinning it in the die with some 320 lapping compound on the case neck. It didn't take long, and the seat die would then accept the .312" boolits we wanted to use.

I don't know if I would be brave enough to try the same trick in a rifle chamber, but......

[Multigunner]

I've found several well used Military rifles with a thick build up of age hardened fouling in the chamber neck. I use brass or copper tubing to make scrappers to remove this deposit.
In each case before scrapping there were pressure signs on the primer, and no excess pressure signs after removing that deposit.

[Jack Stanley]

Jim , you translated what I meant rather well . As it turns out the three fifteen diameter bullets are about as big as I can use with these cases . I just wish the Ruskies hadn't shot this one so much :roll:It is just the neatest little zip gun there is .

Dubber it appears if I'm gonna do that it'll have to be both gun and dies ..... not for me .... I'll just use it like it is [smilie=1:it ain't really terrible . We've all seen worse results .

Jack

[Dschuttig]

Keep in mind that a lot of surplus ammo was coated in paint and then laquer, and will tend to build up in the chamber. Especially when you consider how many years these things were used for.......

[Jack Stanley]

I've used a lot of Kroil and brushes on the chamber , I think I got it clean ..... at least it never sticks when using Czech silvertip ammo .

Jack