Counterbored M44

My father has been following my exploits with the Russian surplus rifles and decided to get one himself a few weeks ago. He managed to get a M44 cheap, something I havent' seen yet getting into the market a bit late for them.

I had a chance to look at it over the weekend and it is in very good condition with the exception of the muzzle which has been counterbored. It was difficult to tell the actual condition of the bore as he hadn't cleaned it out yet but it didn't look bad. At worst, some minor pitting, at best, it's just dirty.

I have not yet seen a 91/30 that has been counterbored but I know they exist. Is this common practice with the M44's and if so, why, they weren't used as long as the 91/30's.

Not uncommon on any of them, really. I find it "unattractive" to the point that i may only own one (a 91/30), but it should restore accuracy if done properly.

Counterboring is very common in mosin nagant m44's. This was most likely done because the bores weren't cleaned properly and the muzzle end of the rifling could have been in poor shape because of this. So, the solution was to get rid of the bad rifling by counterboring. If this is done correctly, it will actually improve the accuracy of the rifle. My 1945 mosin nagant m44 even has this. It is pretty commonplace. Hope this helped.

the corrosive ammo used back then would chew up the muzzle and make the carbine (or rifle) less accurate. by counter-boring about an inch down the muzzle, it creates a sort of new muzzle if you will and improves accuracy.

my M38 was counterbored and is decently accurate at 50 yards.