Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Gunsmithing Krag Gunsmith Needed

My good old Krag’s groups are starting to open up a bit and it may be time to re-barrel. I have considered reboring to 35 Krag however I want to keep the caliber. I have found a supplier of barrels I am wondering what gunsmith’s you would recommend?
What I am looking someone to install the barrel and a scout type rail. Not for a long eye relief scope but for a red dot. I know it breaks up the classic look but I need it for my eyes and she’s my hunting rifle.

Nothing tricky about barreling a Krag. Any competent 'smith should be able to do it for you. GD

Ditto. Buy a Criterion barrel from the CMP and anyone with a suitable wrench and barrel vise can screw it in. Mine came with the extractor cut and index mark. Bringing it up to the witness mark on the receiver was a cinch, and everything was hunky dory- even the supposedly short chamber was actually spot on requiring no reaming. Headspace was perfect. Probably the easiest re-barrel known to man. The Krag is notorious for having very closely held tolerances in the bolt, receiver threads, and barrels (but not so much the internal barrel dimensions). Those old boys at the Armory in those days knew what they were doing.

Both the carbine (22") and rifle (30") CMP barrels come with the front sight dovetail cut. Just have your smith un-solder the original sight ramp and re-solder it onto the new barrel.

I understand your wanting to sight it the way you indicated, and it is certainly your rifle to do with as you please, but for the record I have to protest! There's just something aesthetically demoralizing about a 120 year old classic with a modern scope arrangement. Before you go that route, try a Redfield No-Drill receiver sight (it mounts in place of the magazine cutoff and doesn't alter the rifle one bit) and if you still can't function with it, sell it and buy a scope. It'll cost less than a decent scope and mount + gunsmith charges for installation- and you can re-sell the sight in a heartbeat if you don't like it. I can shoot ok with an aperture sight, even with my 63 year old myopic vision with a healthy dose of astigmatism and plain old crappy old man's eyeballs.

Pacific made no-drill Krag sights too. They both turn up on eBay with fair regularity.

While we're on the subject, I made a decent score at a public auction two weeks ago of some Krag stuff:



A complete Krag action (minus extractor) with single stage Bold trigger and headless cocking piece, another bare receiver that someone removed the magazine probably in preparation for a single shot build, a mint Redfield No-Drill receiver sight and other miscellaneous bits--- all for $30! It would seem I was the only Krag guy in the room.

I wasn't planning yet another Krag classic sporter build, but now...

As gnoahhh said. Redfield made two versions of Krag sights. The one in his picture is a 102K. It is a basic sight that is fully adjustable but without micrometer clicks. Redfield also made a 70K with micrometer windage and elevation click adjustments. By the way, 30-bucks for all those parts was a steel!