mosin nagant 91/30: puzzled by EXTREME force needed to lock action

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silverlance

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Took my 91/30 to the range today. My first bolt action purchase (i have another 91/30 and a yugo mauser in 10-day).

what i liked:
balanced really really well, bench and offhand.
accurate! hit a bowling pin at 50, 80 yards. that's good enough for me for iron sights shooting czech silvertip.
acceptable recoil - punches a bit, but not horribly - just straight back.
beautiful (i happen to think so - others think it's ugly). btw, it's a rearsenaled 1943.
powerful round
cheap cheap ammo.

the bad:
action was VERY hard to close. in dry-fire it's easy, but when you're trying chamber a round it's VERY difficult. I left nail marks on the wood from me trying desperately to push the lever closed. opening, however, was easy - some peopel complain about a sticky bolt, but i made sure mine was totally clean of cosmo before using it.
- can anyone explain this, or shed insight?


so, only one bad point.
 
First thing I would do is get the headspace checked. That is NOT a good thing. Were any of the cases split or damaged?
Next, take a look at your bolt. Are there any imperfections in it? Check the entire thing; bolt face, extractor claw etc. Pull the bolt and see if its difficult to get a round into position on the boltface.
Also, make sure you aren't jamming a new cartridge into an old case that might be stuck in the chamber. It could be possible that the rim of an old cartridge got ripped off leaving a sleeve of sorts in the chamber.
 
Ditto; get the headspace checked ASAP. Also the chamber inspection, in case there's something in there that shouldn't be.

IIWY, I WOULD NOT fire it again until this is done, the problem identified and remedied. That bolt should close easily on a factory-new round of the correct cartridge. Forcing it closed and firing it when it doesn't is asking for tragedy.
 
*gulp*

what a bummer.
headspacing, you think?

well, i'm very glad nothing blew up in my face yesterday; that would have really ruined my day.

darnest thing - the round slid into the chamber real easily, but pushing the bolt lever down to "lock" was really hard. imho, it's not that the chamber is too narrow - it's that it takes a lot of force to get the rim of the cartridge to push up the extractor and seat properly into the bolt face.

well, i don't think i'll be taking myself to a gunsmith, although i might if i can find one that won't charge an arm and a leg just to check headspace. the gun was $90, and it simply wouldn't justify more than $20 of work, much as i like it.

but you guys are on to something, i think - headspacing sounds like a very likely candidate. the only other reason tha ti can think of is that when i first cleaned the cosmo off, i didn't remove the extractor (i had been advised not to). perhaps the extractor is crudded up in its channel, thus making bolt locking difficult?

i wonder if i should pull the extractor and find out.
 
okay i figured it out

the good news:
it's not the chamber. this is confirmed by successful firing of 20 rounds (not a good way of testing mind you) and, moreover, that the gun chambers and locks very easily when i manually fit the cartridge into the bolt face.

the bad news:
the cartridges have a hard time pushing into the bolt face. the extractor is wedged VERY tightly, and so a lot of force is required to "hard-fit" the rim through the extractor. manually, of course, i can fit the edge UNDER the rim to begin with, and then just push down on the other side to fit.

so, it seems that i need to remove the extractor. any suggestions? i plan on using a steel hammer, steel punch, and a block of wood (hopefully, ill find one).
 
I agree that you perhaps need to have the headspace checked. Though, It may not be just that. I found a lot of useful articles on the Mosins including this one at surplusrifle.com. A lot of good reading there that might be helpful to you.
 
It seems to me I read somewhere that pushing the round into the chamber and closing the bolt is NOT the way to single-load a Mosin Nagant. Again, this is from memory, but I think you're supposed to snap the round into the magazine, then let the bolt do its thing to strip the round from the mag and chamber it, then the rim ends up under the extractor like it's supposed to.

Can anyone confirm this? I'll try posting this on a millsurp forum I belong to.
 
yes

i remember something to that effect, too. it may be that it's just real tricky getting the rim to get under the extractor. but chambering from magazine isn't exactly easy, either. the problem is that my rounds dont' seem to go from magazine to UNDER THE EXTRACTOR... they enter the chamber balanced on the extractor, above the bolt face, and that's why it's requiring me to put so much force into it to lock the bolt. as i wrote earlier, when i manually seat the round into the bolt face under the extractor, the bolt chambers and locks very nicely.

it's getting the round to fit under the bolt fromt he magazine that's difficult.
 
I had the same problem with my m38 :banghead: .... I got the headspace checked and it was fine. The problem went away after 100+ rounds. If you look at your ammo check out the rims. I had some (yellow tip, dont know country of orgin) that had different width rims!!! Some was normal, some was to thick. I went and bought a couple boxes of wolf ammo and the rims were uniform. As for the loading proceedure, yeah you have to let the bolt strip it from the magazine and use some force... Not like slam it but dont go slow either, that will probably solve half of it...
 
ty tangodown

I really doubt it's the headspace for the reasons above, and that CAI (century arms int) has a real good reputation for checking their guns before they sell them.

this one in particular is also a rearsenaled 91/30.

it's unlikely headspace - more likely extractor gummy or wedged too low. i figure that after 100 rounds the extractor will be knocked looser.

still, i'll be getting a sandblanket for the next 80 rounds. now i just need to figure out how to make a sand blanket =)
 
It is some rounds, or all from a particular lot/package/bundle?

I ran into a couple of difficult-to-seat rounds for my M-44. Mine was 88 vintage Alabanian. When I looked at the sticky ammo, I noticed that the base of the ammo was flat, with a thick rim. The easy to seat stuff had a thinner rim, with a slight 'bevel' to the base.
 
Some of the Albanian has oversized rims and will be tough to chamber. If you're using that or other sub-grade surplus you may ironically have GOOD headspace. The early Albanian is so bad it functions as a no-go gauge!
 
I think you guys are confusing Mauser and Mosin. In a Mauser action the round does indeed need to slide under the extractor. That monster-claw cannot snap over the rim.

In a Mosin action it is the reverse. The round is pushed into the chamber and the extractor snaps over the rim.

Try removing the extractor and have the headspace checked without it. If it checks OK, you may need to relieve the extractor a bit.

Oh, and don't use a steel punch to drive it out. You will peen the tip and possibly break it. Use a brass one.

PS - I just saw Cosmoline's post about Albanian ammo. That is true, the rims can be out of spec. Try some quality ammo first (as far as case spec, Wolf should fit the bill) and see if you still have this problem.
 
Mauser extractors CAN lock on chambered rounds, it's just not healthy. Do it if you must, but do it too much and you risk breaking the extractor claw.
 
Excess headspace--the dangerous kind--would result in too
easy chambering and swollen cartridges. Hard chambering is the
sign of minimal headspace or a very dirty chamber. But if there
is a question on the headspace of a rifle, it is often best to let
a qualified gunsmith check it. Err on the side of caution.

I threw away two stripper clips in disgust before I realized
the lot of ammo I was using had over-sized rims. Try a different
lot of ammo and see if the problem remains. If the rims are
too big, they would bind on the boltface.
 
I have seen this problem before on my brothers M38. The extractor needed to have it's face made concave. It was flat and would not hop over the rim of the cartridge. Also the inside of the receiver needed to have some metal removed where the extractor cammed against it. Once this was done it was nice and smooth.
 
another solution may be to swap the bolt out.

Could be ammo, could be the extractor claw. Either way, get a box of Wolf and try it with that.
 
You need to load the rounds...

in the magazine then chamber a round by closing the bolt. The extractor on a Mosin Nagant has a difficult time snapping over the rim of the case, especially if the grove for the extractor in the face of the chamber is a little tight. Mosin Nagants feed from the magazine just like a Mauser does. As the Mauser extractor is about 5 times as long as a Mosin extractor, it does not bend as easy to snap over the cartridge rim..........chris3
 
Headspace- $12 fix

Had a similar experience with an M38. Bolt would NOT close on some rounds, unless rotated slightly. Wierd but true.

There is some variation of rim width.

Mine wouldn't close on a NO-GO gauge, as it was a GO headspace problem.

It's a moderate pain to check- must remove extractor from bolt head.

For a low cost fix, I tried a new bolt head from Tennesee Gun Parts, on the theory all MN bolts are interchangeable... it worked!

The new bolt head passed NO-GO test, and would close on any and all rounds... off to the range, it shot fine.

New bolt head- think it was $6-8. With extractor (I was fussing I messed it up a little removing it) $12, I think.

I am a cheapo. And I borrowed the NO-GO from a bud.
 
brilliance!

thanks to all!

this is what i've done to remedy my MN's reluctance to properly seat rounds from the mag into the bolt face:

1. bought another MN 91/30 (in even better condition! unbelievably nice, $89 from big 5 sporting goods)
2. bought a box of wolf 7.62 x 54r
3. 3/8th filled a 50lb rice bag with sand, tied it off

i'm going to (when i get all the parts), first try my MN#1 with the wolf, sand blanketed (ps: a sand blanket is a bag of sand that you place over something that might go kaboom. then you pull the trigger using a string from behind something nice and solid).

then try the wolf with MN#2.

then try czech silvertip with MN#2.

if the silvertip works, pull bolt assembly out of MN#2, insert into MN#1 (the problematic one). try wolf and silvertip in MN#1 (using MN#2 bolt assembly).

if it's the bolt's fault, i'm going to follow some guy's directions and order an entire new bolt head. i don't know how you guys do it, but im pretty sure that there is no way in heck i'm going to be able to get that extractor out. i know a real good method to get it out, but it involves a lead ingot and i don't have one or know how to get one. =(
 
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