M38 worth accurizing?

Well someone had to try it. I bought a nicely re-finished (cheap) Russian Izzy type M38 with the full intent to see how it would respond to a full house accurizing job. Before the task I checked the headspace and it was just fine then proceeded to shoot it with many different types of mil spec. mil. surplus. Overall it shot groups ranging from 5" to 8" off the hard rest. I found it shot the copper wash stuff the best so I kept a bunch for later use.

I broke down the gun and routed out the barrel channel on the milling machine keeping it as neat as possible. I got it pretty nice around 0.010" over then started on the receiver end I oversized all areas to be bedded including the trigger guard area and proceeded to bed both the receiver and trigger group. While this was setting I lapped in the bolt, polished the chamber and feed area. Then went about playing with the trigger pull. I added a surface ground shim under the sear then match angled the sear to the disconnect also using the surface grinder. Didn't come out half bad considering its a Russian trigger.

Once the bedding was set, I drilled out the rear screw hole and bedded in a steel bushing, a steel .375" rest pin on the receiver flat, cut a 0.005" steel shim in the foreward lug hole and trimmed all bedding foreward of the reciever. I checked all potential contact areas in the barrel channel and there were none, so I oiled the internal areas where I hogged out wood to prevent moisture effecting the barrel influances. I re-assembled the gun and took it back to the range to see how it all went.

It worked smooth as Finnish re-builds with a decent trigger, but, the best group I could get was 2.5" off the hard rest the average running around 4". I can't say it was worth the effort, YET. Once I can get my hands on a Sako barrel. I should be able to have a little more fun with it and have one very strange looking gun when I'm done-SDH

sdh:

I hate to say it, but the weak link here is not the M38, the barrel, nor your work on it. It's the crappy commie milsurp ammo.

Before inesting more time in the gun, invest in a reloading setup and make some quality brass cased lead core copper jacketed bullets using consistent projectiles and powder charges.

I'll bet that puts you close to MOA all by itself ;) Just make sure you choose a bullet size that's about .01" over bore diameter and you should be laughing ;)

Thanks Claven, I'll have to give it a try. The ammo I've been using shoots very well in my sniper rigs, but, thats a hole different animal. I'm so used to just picking up what I need at the shops I work at that I just never got into shell stuffing. With my new found passion into mil surp stuff, I guess I have to start stuffing shells after all. Many thanks-SDH

What you are describing is very common with these rifles. A range trick we have learned is to lap the bore. A tight fitting bore brush surrounded with molten lead(hard lead) and jewlers rouge will remove the rough spots and burnish the rifles bore. You didnt mention the distance you fired the rifle. 50 yards, not too good. 100 yards, not too bad for a rifle made for Minute-of-Man. How well the rifle's muzzle is crowned is also a huge factor? Is the rifle counter-bored? Have you slugged the bore? The ammo is .309/.310, your bore is most likely .311 or larger. The ammo is "land riding" by design, not bore riding. It's seldom -50 degs F in the USA. The bore will shrink at these tempatures. A factor most shooters never grasp, but the Russian engineers did.
As you know when you clean your rifle, the patch looks as if you are cleaning your BBQ grill. This is due mainly to the gas blow-by of the small diameter bullet.
Good luck on your M38. I would love to have my " sniper rifle" done the way you describe.

I hear you load and clear Rapidrob, that was one of the first things I did, sorry I didn't mention it. I do this as a matter of coarse for all the weapons I shoot. Been at it for years, I guess it has become a habit, like most collectors/shooters. We all have a case of being just a wee bit compulsive. Thanks-SDH

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Originally Posted by Rapidrob

Have you slugged the bore? The ammo is .309/.310, your bore is most likely .311 or larger. The ammo is "land riding" by design, not bore riding. It's seldom -50 degs F in the USA. The bore will shrink at these tempatures. A factor most shooters never grasp, but the Russian engineers did.

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Just for interest, I slugged the bore of my M44 after reading the above note. The groove diameter is .314" and the land diameter is .302". Do these seem like normal dimensions?

Go for that Socko barrel.

My Mosin Nagant M44 carbine gets about 1 1/2 inch groups at 100 yards.

How am I able to do it, I use either Winchester or S&B ammo 180 grain

The 150 grain in wolf gold is all over the place so it seems these rifles like the heavy bullets

You can also reload the brass and use Sierra 174 HPBT for more accuracy

My rifle has the Mojo sights and the Huber concepts trigger and I am really surprised at the accuracy that I get from a $69.00 dollar rifle, when you first get them they have to be cleaned really well.

... I have derived a couple of pragmatic methods for getting most milsurps to shoot better that a lot of people think they can:

1) CLEAN FIRE CLEAN FIRE CLEAN... some of those rifles haven't been properly cleaned for nearly a century, and have the history of ammunition expressed in sedimentary layers in the grooves. In fact, my serial no. 9xx Brazil Mauser didn't have visible grooves any more, and was sold as a "shot-out" wall hanger.

2) Check the muzzle crown. Unless your milsurp is genuinely mint, chances are the crown is not as good as it could be. Years of cleaning with a gritty Enfield pull-through or those terrible aluminium-link chains that the Mauser fans find so trendy (aluminium oxide is a really good abrasive!)may well have worn a part of the crown lopsided (I have read that the Swedes issued cleaning rods with sleeves to preserve the crown). Bores that are very shiny may in fact have been cleaned to death. Have the crown touched up before doing anything complicated like bedding. It is probably the MOST cost-effective action you can take on an old military rifle.

3) Get the right bullets. Forget SAAMI-- Sorry Yanks, but the rest of the world never heard of SAAMI, which was set up in 1926, long after a lot of our milsurps were made. The LEAST cost-effective action you can take for a non-American milsurp is to buy a set of SAAMI headspace gauges and, for instance measure your beautiful Swedish Mauser with them.

In general, military rifles were made so that the Tommy, Landser, Poilu or grunt in the local language could drop his ammo in the mud, pick it up and wipe in on his dirty battledress, load it and fire. We are NOT talking benchrest here. The fired cartridge cases from my M1896 Swedish Mauser will jam hard 1/2" out of the chamber of my Schultz & Larsen match rifle. Both are excellent rifles, but for different purposes.

Military chambers tend to have long throats. So long bullets with a good cylindrical section often perform MUCH better than modern boattails. The good old 174 gn flatbase bullet as used in British 303 ammo is also good in 7,62 Argentine Mauser or Russian Mosins (NOT Finnish Mosins, which often have tighter bores). Flatbase bullet that are open at the bottom can actually obturate better to fit the bore.

I have acquired a couple of rifles that were sold as unusable because they couldn't hit the target at 50 meters with "off the shelf" boattail-loaded ammo, thanks to the above effects. And they all now shoot properly.

Summarizing: your milsurp ought to achieve 2-3" groups at 100 yards if you attend to the 3 items above- clean, crown, suitable (often flatbase) bullet. Only then is it worth while to go through all the work of bedding the action. But those 3 items must be attended to first.

Patrick