Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Shot My 1937 Oberndorf Mauser 98

In 8mm (7,9mm) Mauser.



I bought this rifle some thirty years ago, and have never shot it. It appeared to have never been shot since coming out of the Oberndorf factory in 1937, thus my hesitancy, but I decided to shoot it some.



The history of this rifle is interesting. It was actually made when Germany was severely restricted in the manufacture of arms for their military, i.e., under the terms of the Versailles Treaty. But they found a loophole allowing them to produce as many military arms at they liked, and that was to mark them as commercial rifles, i.e., leaving off all military markings. They were allowed to manufacture commercial arms, so they just made "commercial" arms that were identical in characteristics to military arms.

My specimen is, feature-wise, about halfway between what was a standard German military Mauser 98 in WWI and what would eventually become standard in WWII. Notice the carbine length, but the straight bolt handle, for example. Also, the rear sling swivel is under the butt stock, like in WWI, but during WWII they changed that to the side of the butt stock. There is also no provision for a front sight protector, which only became standard during WWII. Another feature is the WWI style butt plate, whereas most WWII specimens (other than the very earliest) featured a steel butt cup, to better protect the wood during rough handling.





I shot some military surplus 8mm from Greece, manufactured in 1940. In thirty rounds fired, I had one primer fail. Not bad for 80 year old ammo.

Here's a group from fifty yards. I think that's about 2.5 inches. As you can see, it was high and to the left.



I used a brass hammer to drift the front sight to the left. Little by little, I got it to where it was impacting directly over the red dot. Then I put the target out to 100 yards, where it was still centering perfectly, but was about four inches high (with the rear sight set at 100 yards - or is it meters?). Groups at 100 yards were about 4.5 inches.

I'm sure it's mechanically capable of much better, but the ammo was old (likely each round pushed bullets out at significantly different velocities), and my eyes aren't what they used to be. Still, better than typical AK-47 accuracy.

I bet with new quality ammo, and a scope, this rifle could make small groups at 100 yards. I'll get to work drilling and tapping for a scope mount next week - NOT.