Welding Mauser 98 scope hole plug screws

[Bucaneer]

Hi there,

I recently bought a Mauser 98 system based hunting rifle with front ring screw holes terribly out of alignment..

Seems like the most common fix for this is to screw in plug screws with loctite and dress them down.

However, I wanted to ask if it would be possible to TIG weld just the surface in order to blend the plug screws in or if that would endanger/ruin the heat treatment of the receiver..

 

[PRD1]

Any welding...

on the receiver ring of a Mauser (or any other rifle action) is a bad idea, since the receiver ring is a critical area, and the heattreatment is almost certain to be affected by the heating, and in an unknown and uncontrolled way. At best, the effect would be to cause stress risers (a likely failure point) in the receiver where the welding was done.
Don't do it.

PRD1 - mhb - Mike

 

[Kp321]

The best way is to plug the holes and redrill. Welding on alloy steel can leave hard spots which cannot be drilled or tapped without annealing the receiver. It would then have to be re-heat treated. If the plugs are properly installed, tightly and with red LocTite, they will work fine.