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Mauser Vs. Mosin/Berthier Relevation

Linachaw

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Milsurp Collector
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I was polishing the bolts on some of my milsurps to make them look "in the white" again, and got some interesting results. I had 3 mausers bolts that I polished using my dremel with polishing wheels and mother's polishing compound; a Spanish M43, a Kar 98, and a Gewehr 98. Over the course of 2 months, I polished all the pieces, including where the cocking piece and camming surface on the bolt body interact, put the bolts back together WITHOUT ANY LUBRICATION, put them back into their perspective rifles, and they ran smoothly. I did the same with the Finnish M39 bolt and Turkish Forestry Carbine bolt. For those that are unaware, the Mosin and Berthier bolts are quite similar. The Mosin was designed after the Berthier and probably took some design aspects from it. Unlike the mausers, when I put these unlubed bolts back into their perspective rifles, when I dry fired them and then proceeded to try and cock the rifles by lifting the bolt, it was impossible doing it normally with my hands. I could get the bolt handle to lift by either beating it against a hard surface or by pulling back the cocking piece, which was easy on the mosin and hard on the berthier. There is not a spec of cosmoline on any of my rifles, and cosmoline is only a factor when extracting fired cases from a gunked up chamber. I was stunned at first, and thought I had severely messed something up with the polishing. I removed, disassembled and reassembled the two trouble bolts and had the same problem. I them took them out, disassembled, doused in lube, reassembled, and then put them back in the rifles. Massive change in results this time. Everything worked like it should. I decided that since the mosin and bertheir needed it, why not put it on the mausers too, so I did. The only reason I didn't lube the bolts like I normally do is because I expect to be firing the rifles with corrosive ammo soon, which means the lube would be washed off in the clean up process and be wasted. Keep in mind that these 5 bolts were bone dry due to being wiped down with paper towels excessively and sitting in a tote for 2 months. However, the bottom line and most intriguing part is that a mauser will work without any lube at all, while the mosin & berthier needed lube, otherwise they are garbage rods. At least that is what I experienced, with my individual rifles, in this one simple scenario.

Anyone else have any experiences like this?
 
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