Collecting and shooting Milsurps on the cheap

[Eaglelord17]

Well reading another thread, it was pointed out that younger collectors have a hard time getting into collecting at the moment due to cost. The intent of this post is to let people who are interested in getting into collecting (but not limited to), know how to do so for relatively cheap prices as not everyone has 2-4k kicking around to buy a K98k. I will apologize that this list primarily deals with Canada, as that is where I am, and where my experience is so it might not match up with your specific country. A caution this a long read, my intent wasn't to make this long a post, but it just happened that way (more like a article).

To start I am a young collector, and I was fortunate enough to have a well paying job for a while which let me experiment and discover what I liked and didn't like. Unfortunately for me that cost a fair bit of coin to gain this knowledge. I have been collecting for 5 years at this point and it is a blast, but since I am now attending college, I have been forced to be much more careful with my money and how I spend it.

For most new shooters, the two biggest costs are the rifle, and the ammo for the rifle. Many don't realize that just because a gun costs 300$ doesn't mean that you can find ammo for that gun (Carcanos, Lebel-Berthiers etc.). A excellent way to start collecting at the moment is to acquire Soviet surplus firearms, which at the moment are common on the market. For me I started with a SKS quickly followed by a Mosin Nagant 91/30. The greatest advantage these rifles have is the cost and availability of ammo, at the moment in Canada 7.62x54r costs 250$ for 1000 (plus taxes) and about the same for 1200-1440rds of 7.62x39.

Now Soviet firearms are interesting but not everyone wants to collect them, which is 100% understandable everyone has there interests, and they definitely aren't the most 'refined' rifles. The premise of this post however is based on the availability of 7.62x54r and 7.62x39.

One of the things you must know about 7.62x54r and 7.62x39 is that they are both approximately .310-.312 diameter bullets, or actually 7.7 diameter bullets (not a true 7.62 which is a .308 diameter bullet). This means that these bullets are too big for a .30 caliber rifle (30-06, 7.62x51 etc.), but are suitable for many different milsurp rifles.

With these two cases you can make up some very accurate rounds for cheap for the following calibers, .303 British, 7.7x58 Japanese, and 7.65x53 Mauser. There maybe more calibers, but these are just the ones I will touch on.

To make this ammo for cheap you must buy a reloading kit, and the dies and shell holders for the proper caliber, the brass for the caliber, and primers, along with a bullet puller. This will likely run you somewhere in the 300-600$ range. However by doing this you will save yourself a significant amount of money in the long run (this set up will pay itself off in about 555rds, after that it is pure savings) and often make better quality ammo than the factory ammo.

To make this ammo, you must pull the 7.62x54r or the 7.62x39. You prime and size your brass of chosen caliber (.303, 7.7 Jap, 7.65x53 Mauser), and then if using the 7.62x39 do a straight case dump (when I pulled the 7.62x39 it was approximately 24grns for the batch I was dealing with so that is what I set my powder measure to) and seat the 7.62x39 bullet, this makes a decent plinking round with no kick for 100m. If your pulling the 7.62x54r reduce the powder by 15-25% depending on the case (for my .303 I tend to go to about 37grns when the pulled ammo holds 44grns which is about a 17% drop in powder charge). You then just seat the bullet at the proper length. Doing this costs about 38cents a shot for pulled 7.62x54r and about 27cents a shot for pulled 7.62x39. Considering for most these calibers factory ammo costs at least 1.25$ (7.7 Jap tends to cost 2.50$ a shot!) you will save money very quickly.

The other major advantage is the pulled bullets are flat based so they perform exceptionally well in these rifles (approximately 150grns for the pulled 7.62x54r bullets and 120grns for the pulled 7.62x39 bullets). For my P14 in .303 British I can likely shoot about a inch group with the pulled 7.62x54r vs the 3 inches with the factory boat-tail ammo.

Now to get to the rifles. I will recommend the rifles based on price and caliber.

For .303 British, my number one recommendation is a P14. These are very interesting rifles which have neat history and have excellent iron sights (a very effective aperture sight). They also have the advantage of having a regular chamber which leads to longer brass life which keeps shooting costs down. In Canada these rifles can be found in the 300-500$ range, just this year I acquired my personal rifle with a mint bore and original volley sights for 350$. Other rifles in this caliber which would be good to look at are

• a sporterized Ross which has a good chamber (not enlarged) that would be around 200-400$. The main reason I put this on the list is because of the fact it has a 'normal chamber' instead of a Enfield style chamber.
• a No. 4 Mk. 1(*, or Mk. 2) Lee Enfield which currently runs about 350-650$ these have 'Enfield' chambers which is very hard on brass if you full length resize. There are many tricks used to reload for these specific rifles to increase brass life, but overall your brass won't last as long as a P14 or a Ross (provided the Rosses chamber hasn't been enlarged).
• No. 1 Mk. 3* Lee Enfield, approximately 350-550$ see the note above about the Enfield chamber.

There are of course more .303 British rifles out there but I am just focusing on ones that are cheaper to acquire.

For 7.7x58 Japanese there is only one option, the Arisaka Type 99. These rifles have tons of history and several main variations. The largest advantage these rifles have is the bores are all pretty much VG+ as all but the 'last ditch' variants have chromelined bores, which protected them over the years (along with the fact ammo was all but impossible to find until recently). One of these will run you anywhere from 350$-1000$. Biggest issue in Canada is these aren't that available as not nearly as many came into Canada as did the States.

And finally for 7.65x53 my number one recommendation is a Argentine M1909 Mauser. Based on the M98 action, it is very strong. They were also very well made firearms. These can be found in poor shape to EXC+ condition. At the moment one of these rifles will run you about 350-1000$ in Canada, shooter grade likely about 450-500$. Other options for the 7.65x53 is

• 1891 Argentine Mauser, approximately 550-750$
• Peruvian Mausers (basically the same as the Argentine variants, should be about similar prices)
• Belgium Mausers (1889, etc.) these are very uncommon/rare and price wise they are all over the map
• Turkish Mausers pre-1930 (approximately) which haven't been converted to 8mm Mauser. Very rare and likely expensive but you never know what you will run into, sometimes for very cheap.

This about sums it up. These calibers can be made for cheap, and it gives you a variety of options for action types. I wish it to be noted that the three top choices (i.e. number one pick for each caliber) are very strong actions, that do have a fair bit of room for safety (all of those actions the P14, Type 99, and M98 Mauser, can and have been used to make magnum caliber chambered rifles). Do your research before reloading with surplus ammo (or any reloading for that matter), sometimes you don't get the chance to make the same mistake twice. Have fun collecting and shooting, as if you aren't having fun you need a new hobby.

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