Mosin-Nagant Intro and Shooting Demo - VIDEO

[Amsdorf]

The Mosin-Nagant 91/30 is a great rifle to have in the safe, or several, or a lot...they are still the least expensive WWII main battle rifle you can get, a few weeks ago AIM Surplus had them on sale again for $109, with all the goodies.

Got mine out of the safe and warmed it up out at the gun club and did this introduction and overview with a shooting demonstration.

Let's hear it from the Mosin owners out there.

What do you have?
What do you enjoy the most about it?
The least about it?

Here's the video:

 

[JimTh]

I actually have 3 mosins...2 carbines and one 91/30. They really are fun guns to shoot but more than that they are a piece of history. The cost was great, 3 of them for less than 400 dollars. I have 2 ars that cost in total over 2000 dollars. The mosin is probably the hi point of the long gun world but I encourage everyone, before you knock it, to understand that the mosin was very instrumental in defeating the nazis in WW2. If you want a piece of history that began turning up in the late 19th century and can't afford a thousand bucks for a "cheap" garand, get a mosin.

 

[Dekul34]

They're built like everything Russian, quantity > quality and function >>>>>> form. They're ugly, generally poorly fitted and finished, but they work all the time, if you get one with a decent bore they are acceptably accurate, with power close to a .30-06 (even better, if you find a good Finnish model they can be quite accurate and will likely be better put together and cared for).

The ammo for them is still available in bulk surplus, and cheap, which is another great selling point for a fun range gun. If anything goes wrong with it, you can fix it with a hammer and/or parts of it's own construction. The bolt carrier can be taken down by hand and can be used to take the whole rest of the gun apart for instance.Only failure I ever had with one was a stuck case, dirty chamber most likely, I put about 300 rds through it that day without cleaning till afterwards. I whacked the bolt handle loose with a hammer and went on my way.

The only other milsurp battle rifle that can be had at a similar price is probably the Steyr Manlicher carbines, for 109.95, a beautiful straight pull bolt rifle which are often in excellent/unissued condition, but in a caliber that is not available anywhere, 8x56R, and requiring its own en-bloc clip to function as anything but single shot, which are even rarer than the ammo.
*edit* I see that Privi Partisan and Hornady both make new rounds for this rifle now, i couldn't find any commercial when I looked a few months back. It's a little over a dollar a round but then, so is .223 now


For a little more than the mosin you can get a yugo mauser and some of those are in excellent condition and great shooters too, though 8mm is getting harder to find, you can definitely tell a big increase in design and manufacturing quality over the mosin-nagant, but with more small parts and more prone to failure which was a downfall of the Germans in the harsh winter conditions in Russia, Mausers would often get their bolt stuck in the icy weather while the Mosins could be more easily manhandled to free up that bolt.

 

[atbdrummer]

I have two and love them both! Both are hex recievers and from the Izhevsk factory. One was made in 1925, the other in 1932. I would love to get a sniper eventually.

 

[tricolordad]

I have just one. For now lol

It's an Izzy 1943 M91/30. All the serial numbers match on the rifle. But the takedown tools and bayonet are different numbers. Got it for $100, including all the accessories. I bought an AIM sports scout scope kit for $68 but have yet to mount the scope and test it out.

Favorite thing about it is the sound it makes, or maybe the smell of the gunpowder, or maybe the huge fireball you can get at dusk...it's been my favorite gun since I bought it two years ago.

My least favorite thing is the barrel length, but only during deer season. I missed more than a few opportunities to bring down a pair of does i was stalking this year because it's pretty much impossible to swing that long gun around while standing on a steep riverbank (somewhere near 70 degree angle) and get off a good shot. Good deer stand rifle though!

 

[Dekul34]

I have just one. For now lol

It's an Izzy 1943 M91/30. All the serial numbers match on the rifle. But the takedown tools and bayonet are different numbers. Got it for $100, including all the accessories. I bought an AIM sports scout scope kit for $68 but have yet to mount the scope and test it out.

Favorite thing about it is the sound it makes, or maybe the smell of the gunpowder, or maybe the huge fireball you can get at dusk...it's been my favorite gun since I bought it two years ago.

My least favorite thing is the barrel length, but only during deer season. I missed more than a few opportunities to bring down a pair of does i was stalking this year because it's pretty much impossible to swing that long gun around while standing on a steep riverbank (somewhere near 70 degree angle) and get off a good shot. Good deer stand rifle though!

Get yourself a M38 or M44, the carbines are a lot handier for woods carry/hunting, plus the fireball they make is even bigger than the one you get outta the 91/30. The recoil is worse too considering they're a couple pounds lighter (especially the M38) but hey, that's part of the fun.