Steyr M95M Rifle in a peculiar stock

[Dorffster]

Thanks for your comments, but I don't think you folks are correct in a couple of your statements. In terms of there being other similar examples on the forum, please point me to them as I made this posting because to the best of my searching ability, there are NOT other similar M95M models in the forums.

To state that this is not an original military rifle is a bold assertion, and I do not think it is correct. Who would "sporterize" a military rifle to get the Mannlicher stock appearance but also force match the stock? That seems highly unlikely to me. Additionally, all the metal looks "correct" and similar in terms of age and patina.

While I am pretty confident this rifle shoots the 8mm Mauser round, there's no way I'm going to try it out--I'm just interested in its history, which I suspect is more along the lines of this:

This firearm was converted from a 8x56R cut-down M1895 rifle to a Yugo M95M 8mm Mauser, but then somewhere during that process or perhaps later (at an arsenal) was thrown into a very different stock arrangement, perhaps because of what was available at the time.

It's this latter stock arrangement that has me puzzled, but it does not seem to me at all to be something done by a private individual. Thanks for your input just the same!

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[Eaglelord17]

Thanks for your comments, but I don't think you folks are correct in a couple of your statements. In terms of there being other similar examples on the forum, please point me to them as I made this posting because to the best of my searching ability, there are NOT other similar M95M models in the forums.

To state that this is not an original military rifle is a bold assertion, and I do not think it is correct. Who would "sporterize" a military rifle to get the Mannlicher stock appearance but also force match the stock? That seems highly unlikely to me. Additionally, all the metal looks "correct" and similar in terms of age and patina.

While I am pretty confident this rifle shoots the 8mm Mauser round, there's no way I'm going to try it out--I'm just interested in its history, which I suspect is more along the lines of this:

This firearm was converted from a 8x56R cut-down M1895 rifle to a Yugo M95M 8mm Mauser, but then somewhere during that process or perhaps later (at an arsenal) was thrown into a very different stock arrangement, perhaps because of what was available at the time.

It's this latter stock arrangement that has me puzzled, but it does not seem to me at all to be something done by a private individual. Thanks for your input just the same!

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You aren't understanding me. The barrel was cut shorter than it was surplused as. You can tell just by looking at the stepped part in the barrel, that should be longer from the step to the front sight. A M95m should have a 23.4" barrel length and a 43.2" overall length.

What I suspect happened was someone took one of these rifle as it was surplussed, cut the barrel shorter, remounted the front sight on the barrel, cut the stock to fit the new front site cap/band (possibly modifying the band as well), and cut the handguard or found a new one. I suspect the stock is the original one, just cut shorter to accommodate the shortened barrel.

This was not done by any military, you have a sporterized rifle, just one that wasn't done as terribly as many were. Considering the Yugoslavs didn't do that and they were the ones using them it means it was done by private hands. There was many talented gunsmiths out there in the 40s-80s who could easily have whipped something like this up. I hope you didn't pay too much for it.