G.I. bring-back Mauser

[JT-AR-MG42]

Pics of the bolt may be in order.
The shroud and the cocking piece usually show at least one waffenampt. The root of the bolt handle will have one as
well as a firing proof.

In the FWIW category.
Some years back (before time had a real value to me!) I took out 7 or 8 matching 98k's (Oberndorf, Borsigwalde, Steyr, Gustloff, and BLM) with dates from 1936 thru 1945
and a pile of 198 gr. 8mm ammo that I had reloaded to German 'G.I.' velocity.

I deliberately mismatched all the bolts from the rifles and started firing three rounds in each of the mis-matched guns.
My goal was to find a rifle/bolt combination the would not accept the fired brass from another combination.
After an hour, I realized two things.
First, I could not find a combo that would not accept the fired brass from any of the other combos.
Second, there were way too many combinations.

I do agree with boom boom that gauges are cheap insurance.

Regarding the 'bringback with a mis-matched bolt' thing.
Obviously, we did not have the surrendering Germans do it.
Luck of your duty station and location as to whether your war prize came from one of those piles of guns or guns with their original bolts left in place.

American troops did pull bolts on different piles of surrendered 98s at times.
This was done for several reasons.
Safety, prior to American troops being allowed to 'pick one' as a war souvenir.
It also kept semi and full automatic guns from being put into or left in those piles by accident.

JT

 

[boom boom]

Thank you boom boom for all of the information. I have yet to find a waffenamt Mark on the bolt. I did completely disassemble the bolt, and even the firing pin is the correctly numbered part matching the rest of the bolt parts numbers. I appreciate all of the time you took in your very detailed and informative reply. I appreciate all of this information.

Thanks for the kind words. Mausers can tend to be a bit addictive and it is a well thought out design perfected through several models. IMHO, the German and Czech versions are probably the best of the lot (absent late war production in WWI and WWII).

If the digits stamped on bolt parts matches the receiver serial number with no waffenamt on the bolt itself, then it may be an armorer's replacement bolt. That is a good thing because it was properly headspaced and tolerance stacking won't be a problem, only wear and tear on the bolt. As the war went on, more and more finishing touches such as waffenamts and even stamping parts numbers went by the wayside on some and as you noticed, the machining marks and finish suffered. Somewhere on the nets, there are postings and articles that deal with wartime rehab of rifles that became non-functional for a variety of reasons that I have read during some of my restorations and promptly forgotten most of it. There is a whole sub-genre of arsenal replacement practices and stampings that created a fair amount of mixmasters just as it did for small arms of the American, Russian, and British armies. That is part of the reason that all matching pristine examples bring such high prices is due to the relative rarity and collectible desires. Me, I care more about function as I don't really want a firearm that I cannot shoot.

Fortunately, you have matching bolt parts that help ensure proper safety, firing pin, and cocking piece function in combination with the receiver's sear. Handfitting is required otherwise, especially safeties, and it can be a pain-Russian capture k98's often have mismatched parts and as a result often display rougher function because the Russians used these mainly as war reserve.