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slamfire51
11-14-2010, 11:42 AM
I want to lessen the spring pressure to ease the stiff cocking of the bolt.
Has anyone cut coils off the spring to accomplish this, and still retain enough
tension for the firing pin to pop the primer?

The bolt is very difficult in the last 3/4 arc of opening the bolt on an empty chamber.

TEN-32
11-14-2010, 12:42 PM
I think Vit is the resident Mosin expert around here. He can probably answer your question. Is it lubed? I have 2 M44s and have had one other previously. I think the stiff bolt is inherent in this rifle.

slamfire51
11-14-2010, 12:46 PM
I think Vit is the resident Mosin expert around here. He can probably answer your question. Is it lubed? I have 2 M44s and have had one other previously. I think the stiff bolt is inherent in this rifle.


Thanks. I wasn't sure the expert is. Yes, they are all stiff. This is one rifle that needs to be "cock on closing".

I have a sniper bolt on mine, and even with the extra leverage, it's still a bitch to open the bolt even on an empty chamber.

slamfire51
11-14-2010, 01:06 PM
This is what I've done so far.
The bolt lugs contact these two points upon opening and closing. (see pic)
There were rough tooling marks on the receiver so I used a diamond hone and polished
these two places and reblued.
It helped the "grittyness" but helped very little opening the bolt.

The stiff spring has to be the cause of stiff bolt operation on these rifles.

http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c80/Canis-latrans/222.jpg

mriddick
11-14-2010, 01:20 PM
I've heard of people removing a few coils to lighten the cocking action, also polishing the camming surfaces of the cocking piece helps.

slamfire51
11-14-2010, 01:25 PM
I've heard of people removing a few coils to lighten the cocking action, also polishing the camming surfaces of the cocking piece helps.

I'm wondering just how many coils I can get away with.

deth502
11-14-2010, 03:29 PM
id check with wolf and see if they had a useable spring for that purpose in a lighter weight. more reliable than cutting coils (which actuall makes a spring stiffer, btw. it results in a lighter feel because the free length is shorter, so there is less preload on it.)

slamfire51
11-15-2010, 01:55 PM
Well, since springs are plentiful, I went ahead and clipped off 4 coils.
I reassembled the bolt and bolt opening is 10 times easier, and the trigger pull improved tremendously.

I took the gun out in the back yard and fired 10 rds. each of Czech, Yugo, Russian, and
Hungarian. Zero failures. All primers were hit hard.

I am happy!!!

deth502
11-15-2010, 04:00 PM
yeah, i guess i didnt take into account the fact that the new spring would cost nearly half as much as the entire rifle, lol!!

gald you got it worked out :thumbsup:

aliceinchains
11-15-2010, 04:05 PM
slamfire51 did you cut one at a time and try it. Or just cut off 4 in one shot?

slamfire51
11-15-2010, 04:06 PM
yeah, i guess i didnt take into account the fact that the new spring would cost nearly half as much as the entire rifle, lol!!

gald you got it worked out :thumbsup:


I didn't ck on the price of the spring. Must be pretty expensive.

I just took a chance and started with 1 coil and worked my way to 4.

I'm glad it worked.

deth502
11-15-2010, 04:23 PM
i didnt either, but for an $80 rifle, theres not much leeway there, lol.

00RedZX-6R
11-15-2010, 04:23 PM
I just slap the shit out of the bolt to open and close it. Never thought about trying to fix it.

slamfire51
11-15-2010, 04:29 PM
I'm trying to figure out why other military rifles aren't as hard to cock. Mausers aren't nearly that hard to open.

Must be in the design.

aliceinchains
11-15-2010, 05:05 PM
Sticky bolt. I pulled this off of Yahoo. Not a bad read.


While its possible there's an issue with head-spacing, the most likely cause, especially if you're shooting surplus ammunition and didn't clean the chamber good when you got the gun, is stiff bolt syndrome. Basically there are two main causes. First is a bur in the chamber. The second is the more common. Its a case of the cartridges becoming "glued" into the barrel. Basically what's happening is that the guns were coated with cosmoline inside and out by the Russians to preserve the metal. The ammunition is coated in a lacquer. When you shoot the gun, it gets hot and the cosmoline and lacquer melt together forming a glue which causes the bolt to be stiff.

To open the bolt, I'd suggest you try smacking the bolt with the palm of your hand. Hard. Several times if necessary. You may even need to really pull on it to open since the Mosin-Nagant has a short bolt which doesn't offer much leverage. Fortunately like all Russian military rifles, the Mosin-Nagant's are tough so you don't need to worry too much about being "gentle" with it.

Once you get the cartridge out, clean the gun thoroughly. Especially the chamber. I don't know if you need to use power-tools like the guy in the Surplus Rifle article suggested, but definitely use a wire brush, bore solvent, plenty of patches (shotgun patches should be big enough to fill the chamber) etc... to make sure you get the chamber clean. That should remove any cosmoline in the chamber and bore and make it better. Given the previously mentioned short bolt handle, nothing you do will make the bolt as smooth and easy to open as a fine commercial hunting rifle. Or even a Springfield, Enfield, Mauser... But it should make it better than it is now.

slamfire51
11-15-2010, 05:19 PM
Sticky bolt. I pulled this off of Yahoo. Not a bad read.


While its possible there's an issue with head-spacing, the most likely cause, especially if you're shooting surplus ammunition and didn't clean the chamber good when you got the gun, is stiff bolt syndrome. Basically there are two main causes. First is a bur in the chamber. The second is the more common. Its a case of the cartridges becoming "glued" into the barrel. Basically what's happening is that the guns were coated with cosmoline inside and out by the Russians to preserve the metal. The ammunition is coated in a lacquer. When you shoot the gun, it gets hot and the cosmoline and lacquer melt together forming a glue which causes the bolt to be stiff.

To open the bolt, I'd suggest you try smacking the bolt with the palm of your hand. Hard. Several times if necessary. You may even need to really pull on it to open since the Mosin-Nagant has a short bolt which doesn't offer much leverage. Fortunately like all Russian military rifles, the Mosin-Nagant's are tough so you don't need to worry too much about being "gentle" with it.

Once you get the cartridge out, clean the gun thoroughly. Especially the chamber. I don't know if you need to use power-tools like the guy in the Surplus Rifle article suggested, but definitely use a wire brush, bore solvent, plenty of patches (shotgun patches should be big enough to fill the chamber) etc... to make sure you get the chamber clean. That should remove any cosmoline in the chamber and bore and make it better. Given the previously mentioned short bolt handle, nothing you do will make the bolt as smooth and easy to open as a fine commercial hunting rifle. Or even a Springfield, Enfield, Mauser... But it should make it better than it is now.

It's not a sticky bolt problem, it's a hard to cock on opening issue, or was until I fixed it. The firing pin spring is so stuff, opening the bolt at the last 3/4 part of the arc, it was a PITA to completely open the bolt.

aliceinchains
11-15-2010, 05:37 PM
Gotcha! I missed the part about hard to open on an empty chamber. Sorry my bad.

slamfire51
11-15-2010, 05:38 PM
Gotcha! I missed the part about hard to open on an empty chamber. Sorry my bad.

No problem.
Thanks for your efforts.

slamfire51
11-15-2010, 05:53 PM
Pic shows primer strike on one of the cases.

http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c80/Canis-latrans/primer.jpg

TEN-32
11-15-2010, 06:17 PM
I guess none of mine have been difficult enough to make we want to cut a spring. I just cycle them "robustly" . LOL. Glad your mod worked out.

slamfire51
11-15-2010, 06:24 PM
I guess none of mine have been difficult enough to make we want to cut a spring. I just cycle them "robustly" . LOL. Glad your mod worked out.

Thanks.

I use one of my Mosins to coyote hunt under 200 yds.
I sometimes need to cycle the bolt fast and easily.

aliceinchains
11-15-2010, 06:25 PM
I guess none of mine have been difficult enough to make we want to cut a spring. I just cycle them "robustly" . LOL. Glad your mod worked out.



I get slap happy to.

vit
11-15-2010, 07:09 PM
I'm no expert, I just a have a bunch of them. ;) Don't even shoot them all either. Had to make trigger pull heavier last night on a 1953 Hungarian M44 - that was a first.
Glad it worked all out for you.

aliceinchains
11-15-2010, 07:13 PM
I'm no expert, I just a have a bunch of them. ;) Don't even shoot them all either. Had to make trigger pull heavier last night on a 1953 Hungarian M44 - that was a first.
Glad it worked all out for you.



How did you go about making a heavier trigger pull there bro.

slamfire51
11-15-2010, 07:15 PM
I'm no expert, I just a have a bunch of them. ;) Don't even shoot them all either. Had to make trigger pull heavier last night on a 1953 Hungarian M44 - that was a first.
Glad it worked all out for you.

Thanks vit.

deth502
11-15-2010, 07:31 PM
I guess none of mine have been difficult enough to make we want to cut a spring. I just cycle them "robustly" . LOL. Glad your mod worked out.

grip it and rip it :thumbsup:

slamfire51
11-15-2010, 07:32 PM
grip it and rip it :thumbsup:

Ok, so I'm a wimp.

vit
11-15-2010, 07:34 PM
How did you go about making a heavier trigger pull there bro.
http://i242.photobucket.com/albums/ff280/uzvslbu/IMG_4947.jpg
The top sear is the Hungarian that had too light of a trigger pull, bottom is an Izhevsk - picture taken. I bent the top one to be closer to what one should look like (bottom), but left just a bit of a "kink" - it's a bit heavier now.

deth502
11-15-2010, 07:35 PM
Ok, so I'm a wimp.

nah, i completely see your point. id love to have mine be glass smooth like the remington 700's, but i just figure its a lost cause for the mosin.

your just much more paitent than i.

aliceinchains
11-15-2010, 07:36 PM
Hey vit how did you ever learn that?

vit
11-15-2010, 07:41 PM
Hey vit how did you ever learn that?

I kind of had a suspicion of what it was as it looked different from what I had seen before, but asking around on Gunboards confirmed it.

aliceinchains
11-15-2010, 07:45 PM
I kind of had a suspicion of what it was as it looked different from what I had seen before, but asking around on Gunboards confirmed it.


That is awesome and something not to forget. Great post vit.