Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Tuning up the beater rifle

So I bought a cheapo Gew98/Turk 1938 conversion (I think) chambered for 8mm-06 Improved. It has a non matching military step barrel, roughly 25 inches long. Drilled and tapped with 2 piece Weaver mounts, new bolt handle welded on, Buehler safety(seems to work), military trigger, unbedded Ram Line synthetic stock, and original bottom metal. Doesn't look like anyone has extended the magazine, but I think there's room for a 3.4"er as some 3.25"er seems to fit with a little room to spare. The crown is in nice shape, the bore is nice, but that's about it. Action is rough/sticky, metal not pitted but lots of some dings and scratches. Haven't verified it yet, but previous owner said it weighs 8.2 pounds unscoped.
I bought the gun thinking it could be a beater/bad weather/loaner/truck gun type deer/elk gun.

With that in mind, what would you do here? Check headspace and chamber cast is a given. Check lug contact? Cut the barrel down a little to save weight? Turn the barrel down further? I think it may have been turned down a little, as there is no rear sight notch. Cerakote? Bore coat? Replace stock or leave it, then paint it? Bedding it seems obvious, but not gonna bother if I could find a stock that weighs less and doesn't cost twice what this gun did. If replace the stock, with what? Smooth up the action? Speed lock kit or firing pin? Replace the trigger with a Timney or Boyd? Or stay with an open design in keeping with the theme of bad weather/crappy condition/beater gun? Bottom metal work?


Wouldn't take long before all of this added up to $1,000++ worth of work on a $200 gun (that needs $100 dies), so let's keep repairs and upgrades to a minimal dollar amount. I actually like the chambering, so no I don't want to just junk it and put the money towards something else. Just want to enhance reliability and usefulness of the gun.

And while we're at it, how about some scope and bullet suggestions? 200 Speer, 180 Ballistic Tip, 195 Hornady, 220 Sierra, 200 Partition or Accubond, 175 Sierra?

I can get pics up later tonight if you just have to see the old beater.

If you paid $200 for it and haven't bought the $100 dies yet, I suggest selling it, or trading it, and put the $$ toward an inexpensive commercial rifle in the Marlin X or Stevens 200 neighborhood. I'm a fan of the Marlin X guns for "behind the seat" truck/beater/loaner rifles, 'cause mine shoot very well and have been a great value in the accuracy to cost ratio.

It is easy to turn a cheap beater into a money pit using the "stone soup" method, "just 1 more change, after 1 more change, after 1 more change, etc. I own the mother of all money pit Mausers, an M38 Swed made in 1942 by Husqvarna. It started as an excellent orginal specs M38 that cost me $150 and now, after about $750 in barrel, stock, etc., has nothing original remaining except the receiver and bolt body.

Jeff

I think you've bought a blue gosling. Especially if you find out it shoots halfway decent. Unless you want to use it as a hobby gun that is always a work of some sort in progress.

Here's what I'd do- Go buy a cheap bullet mold ( read'Lee"),put a cheap 4 power scope on it, and shoot the crap out of it as is with cast bullets or good old Hornady or Sierra bullets. I'd cobble something together to get around the die problem, even if it meant I could only neck size stuff.
A beater gun like that is fun, and it's just as much fun in it's $200 form as it is with $500 more sunk into it.

Fred

Wasting money on beater rifles is something I know a lot about. In fact, the need to waste time and money which will never be recovered is a deep seated personality trait that I've come to accept as being untreatable. I suspect this may be an hereditary trait if some of the tales of trades made by my grandfathers and great-grandfathers are to be believed. My grandfather claimed to have turned a brand new Model 54 Winchester into a broken Colt Woodsmen and a thirty dollar debt to fix it in only three trades. I have no reason to doubt this.
If I had acquired your Turkish Mauser, and there is every reason to think I would have if I had seen it first, I would certainly start out by putting some money into it. There is really no limit when it comes to modifying a beater. One only needs to practice justification techniques to make any further investment worthwhile.
Royce's advice regarding dies is good advice. You could buy a set of 325 WSM dies and use them to neck size and seat bullets. The only drawback to this would be the temptation to buy a 325 WSM to properly utilize the dies. One has to be constantly on guard against this sort of pitfall. My bullet choice would be the 175 Sierra.
There is little point in trying to bed a Ramline. If you want to bed the rifle, you'll want to spend some money on a different stock first. You will certainly want to shorten the barrel and this rifle sounds like it is crying out for a Timney trigger.
All in all, I see a lot of potential here. Enjoy. GD

Beater, or knock around rifles need to be bought in almost the condition they will be used. Or you need to keep looking after you sell that one.
My advice is put some sort of sights on it and shoot it. If that doesn't work for you, then look for something else.
BTW, that should be a pretty good action. If the bolt and safety were done right, you might consider using it for a full custom. Otherwise, it sounds like it needs to be sold. E

It's a beater rifle. It's not meant to run a Timney trigger, a McMillian stock, Swarovski glass, fancy bottom metal, etc.

As I see it, the goal with a beater rifle is to spend as little as possible in upgrades. Think of it as "Junk Yard Wars" with a rifle. A beater rifle requires redneck style upgrades (with perhaps a few exceptions). Think of it as a race to the bottom (dollar).

Don't worry about cosmetic dings or nicks in the metal or stock. Knock off any rust spots with a bit of oil and steel wool. Use an inexpensive, but durable paint (if such a beast exists) on whatever you wish to be painted. Use business cards or cork under the barrel for a free-float. Bed it yourself with JB weld as it's about as cheap as an epoxy there is and this is supposed to be an exercise in frugality. If the trigger is not to your liking educate yourself on how best to lighten/smooth it up with a bit of fine lapping compound or a stone. The same for a rough action. Mount a tough, but cheap scope (again, if such a thing exists. If not, just go cheap).

The only exceptions to this is I would have a competent gunsmith cut and re-crown that barrel to 20-22". And perhaps work the trigger if you didn't feel comfortable doing that yourself. Shave a little weight, but more importantly have it be more handy and easier to fit behind the seat of the truck (where it belongs).

I would think that for $300+/-, any of us could buy a Marlin X or Stevens 200 and be ahead of the game over many sporterized Mausers and particularly so if the rifle in question is a Turk without matching numbers and chambered for a wildcat cartridge.

Jeff

Not that interested in a Stevens or Marlin right now Jeff.

Here she be in all her ugliness. Maybe just a rattle can paint job , some bedding, a little scope and call her good?

Used fixed 4 or 6 leupy shoot it and decide from there. 8mm-06 improved is very cool and not found in the Marlin GRF

Ye mite start by given her a name.

Good idea! I had a Mauser 98, that except for the Herter's stock (bad!!!), military sights removed, and bolt handle redone to sporter, was original. After a face lift (turned the steps off the bbl in Gunsmithing School, plugged the screw holes, reblued), a Timney trigger, customized one piece scope mount (someone prior to me had screwed up the bridge removal), Brown Precision stock, glass-bedded, a few times around the block, etc., I called her "Jezebel", cuz if you held her tight and squeezed gentle-like, you could get a good bang and make the meat go limp.... After 15 rounds or so down the barrel, it would shoot 1.5 MOA groups.


I killed tons (literally) of game with that thing before I swapped out the barrel from .30-06 to .280. Them green bores just don't look good, even if they shoot well...

Exobiologist -if it shoots reasonably well as is - say 3-4 inch groups100 - then glass bed that Ram-line, - put a Timney trigger and Tasco World Class or Simmons equivalent (or maybe a Weaver) on it, then pimp whatever else you would like as long as it is cheap.

You could get surprised. I bought a water-damaged rusted up Ruger 77 in '06 many years ago, for $80, primarily for the receiver. Couldn't even see down the bore. Figured it, as best, a "boat gun", even with the planned for barrel replacement- worst case scenario. I was hoping for a 3 or 4 inch group at 100, tho as a "boat-gun" range would probably be 30 or less.

The bore cleaned up nicely but I had to whack the barrel bulge out and recrown, ending up with a 17 inch bbl, which proceeded to repeatedly cloverleaf 3, then go to 5" for 5 rounds in the original stock. After thinking about it for a year (and killing a ram at @ 330 yards and a moose at 80 yards within 4 days of each other shortly after bobbing the barrel (neither of the second shots used on both animals was really needed), I glass-bedded it and ended up with a 1.5" MOA all-day-long rifle. Looked funny with that standard stock and short bbl, so I bobbed the bbl fore and aft, and thinned the forend some to make it look right- a "carbine" or 10 year headstart on the Frontier, or whatever Ruger is calling their similar rifle. It went from "boat gun" to "wife's rifle" - tho I carry it 10X than she does, and have killed several each moose, sheep, caribou (one at 356 long paces) and bears with it.

I've got it here in Kotz for caribou - tho it's loaned out to a kid with a fugged up Savage that I met in the field end of October. He's killed a dozen or more caribou over the winter with it. I'm about to get it back, as I've finally worked all the repairs/bugs out of his rifle - tonight shooting an inch and a half 3-shot group with it and my own proven 6X Tasco scope, in a gusty cross-wind. I hope his bottom-of-the line-Tasco comes thru, after I mount it later tonight. (One eliminates one variable at a time!)

I have several sporting rifles built on military Mauser actions, both SR and LR, made in Belgium by FN, Germany by DWM, Mexico by ??, and Sweden by CG and Husqvarna. My experience has been that it costs a bit of $$ to make a reasonably decent sporter out of a military rifle, usually more than the cost of a Marlin X gun or Stevens 200, hence the "stone soup" comment.

Good luck with the 8mm-06. I have 1 built on a Swedish SR action and think that it is a useful rifle/cartridge combination, but certainly much more of a "looney" type of rifle than it is an "average casual hunter who buys his ammo at Wal-Mart" type of rifle.

Jeff

For a truck gun, it would seem unwise to put a bunch of time and $ in it, even the $100 dies. I'd trade it for a complete, ready to shoot rifle in a chambering that I could find ammo everywhere. It just doesn't make sense to turn that particular rifle into a money pit.

Unless you want to.

& he would NOT be the first among us to have such an itch.

+1

I inherited a matching K98 bring back that had been semi sporterized in the 50s by a hobbyist. Stock was simply chopped a few inches and spar-varnished. The bolt handle was "homemade." A deer rifle made by a fellow on a budget.

I re-cut, shaped and refinished the original laminated stock; bedded the action and floated the barrel; installed a Timney I had sitting around and re-crowned the barrel. A friend Dura-coated the barrel and action. Mounted an old Leupy Vari-X I had in the cupboard and turned that old "meat gun" into a good-shooting rifle.

It looks like what it is - a hobbyist sporter job. But it's a clean, honest, good-shooting rifle and all it cost me was time, elbow grease and misc odds and ends I had sitting around. It's become a fav

Worked up a handload w/180gr NBTs and managed a nice cloverleaf at 100 yds. Good enough to fill a couple deer tags over the years and a fun project. I say "go for it."

I'd start by cutting the barrel to around 22" recrown, clean the bore throw a reasonable scope on it and go shooting. If its an original 38 8 Mm barrel it should be 9 1/2 Twist and most likely prefer 200 + gr bullets. Make it your 300 yds or less drop em in there tracks rifle and don't get to carried away with long range accuracy. The old military 8 mms I've shot where pretty easy to get real close to 1" 100 yd groups without bedding. Not what I want for long range, but devastating for a 300 yd thumper.

Shod

To me it's not all that ugly. Put a cheaper scope on it, say a Weaver 6x and buy a set of Lee 8mm collet dies. (they will work for the improved chamber too) Then shoot it, you may find a bedding job isn't necessary. Look at this as a rifle rescue project.

You are on the right tract with that last thought.

I suspect it is more about the itch than it is about the scratch.

I'd get the plastic out for the dies. An 8mm-9.3X62 has panache.

Epoxy bed and stiffened the fore end with embedded carbon arrow shafts if needed. Foam textured epoxy over the molded skip-line checkering because that shat has no place, especially on a righteous truck gun. Finish with rattle cans for that proper truck gun look.

Before investing on a aftermarket trigger, military triggers can be home tuned to be really quite nice.