Czech VZ24 Brazilian contract 7mm Mauser

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lionking

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Got these two at a gun show back 2008. Story is they were limited contact rifles sold to Brazil back in the 30's, approx 15,000 or so made.

Condition is good, bores are a bit frosty but good overall. With factory ammo I haven't got good accuracy at all so far, still working on that.

But I am entertaining thoughts of cleaning up the wood, and my question is if I do want would you recommend I use to do it as far a wool and oil and procedure? Or should I leave them alone?, for any historical value they may have although they are not exactly worth any amount of excessive price on the market despite the fact that there wasn't that many made.
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I am a collector so you know what I'm going to say. Leave them alone. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't shoot them. If they were in near new condition I would say "Don't shoot them," but they aren't, so have some fun.

Like your cats!
 
There is a good video on milsurp world on your gun. If I were not so computer stupid I would post a link.. Your rifles are known as the Brazilian Revolutionaries rifle and there were indeed 15,000 made, all of which were delivered to Brazil, which, in 1935, was in the middle of a civil war. Many Mauser collectors consider your rifles to be among the best military Mausers ever made. They are quite rare in this country and they are probably worth a lot more than you think they are. Having said that, if they were mine, I would still shoot them.
 
I'd take the prettier of the two and give it a good coat of preservative grease.

The other, just get it cleaned up as good as physically possible. Maybe try one of those bore lapping kits depending how frosty the bore is. Maybe recrown it if it's still not shooting quite right.
 
I think they look great as is. :)

But soap and water for cleanup, finish with a little Feed n Wax or clear BLO if you wanna shine em up a bit.
Sounds like a plan, the flash brings out the nature of the wood tint, but in normal light the wood looks dark and a bit grungy. Your suggestion eliminates sanding, keeps any historical nature but will make it them a bit prettier, I like it. Think I 'll experiment on the darker less nicer one first.

I assume light amount of HOT water so not to swell the wood and maybe dish wash soap?
 
Sounds like a plan, the flash brings out the nature of the wood tint, but in normal light the wood looks dark and a bit grungy. Your suggestion eliminates sanding, keeps any historical nature but will make it them a bit prettier, I like it. Think I 'll experiment on the darker less nicer one first.

I assume light amount of HOT water so not to swell the wood and maybe dish wash soap?
Thats how I would start out, just sponge it on and dry quickly. If there is any remaining grease or oil buildup afterwards, I would try Simple Green.

GunnyUSMC has a few good old posts on cleaning dirty military stocks which im sure you could find with the search tool.:thumbup:
 
And the Purest Scream “ Just wipe it off with a dry paper towel “.
I’m a Purest at heart when it comes to collecting surplus weapons, but I’m also a Realest. I see where many of the Purest will clean the metal of a gun, but won’t touch the stock for fear of damaging the weapon.
But there are the Hard core Purest that believe you should do nothing to a gun but keep it as you found it.
But 9 out of 10 of these Purest were never in the military and have no clue as to what was done to keep these weapon while in service. Yes, there are military manuals that tell you what they did, but to the soldiers, the manual was a guideline, not the Bible.
Many will tell you that if you clean the stock, you will remove the original finish. Let me tell you, the last time your rifle’s stock had an original finish was when it left the factory. Weapons are used, and many times in not so nice of conditions. They get rained on, they get muddy and sometimes covered in blood, sweat and tears.
The normal upkeep was to clean, dry and re-oil the stock. In many cases standard issued cleaning gear was not available and soldiers had to make do with what was available. I remember reading where a German soldier talked about using axle grease to wipe down the stock of his rifle, on the Russian front, to keep the melting snow from soaking into it.
My neighbor Jim was a Marine. He told me that in Vietnam he carried an M14. After long patrols their rifles were filthy. They would use gasoline to clean the stocks and the re-oil them.
Well, enough of all that. I’ll get to question about cleaning your stock. My answer is yes you should clean it. But remember that you don’t want to remove the patina and history. Now there’s a big misunderstanding of what patina is on a stock. It is not the buildup of dirt and oil on the stock, that is called crud. Patina is the aging of the surface of the wood. As long as you don’t remove the the top layer of wood, you will not remove the patina.
Some will call me crazy, but I’ve been doing stock work and restoration for over 30 years. The key to clean a stock is to do what would have been done if the rifle was still in service. This can be as little as a light cleaning to as muck as a heavy cleaning.
For a little cleaning, you can do an oil scrub. This is very simple. Apply a thick coat of BLO to the stock and let it sit for 30 minutes. Then use 0000 steel wool to lightly scrub the stock. You are not trying to scrub the wood, but the crud that is on the surface. The scrub is just to loosen the dirt. A nylon brush can also be used. After the scrub, wipe the stock dry. Let the stock sit for 3 to 4 days and then apply a wax top coat.
Now you can go all out and do a heavy cleaning. This will remove the dirt from the surface and some of the oil from the stock. Don’t worry, the oil that you remove wasn’t put there by the factory that built the gun.
For a heavy cleaning you will have to use a cleaner. You may has to clean the stock a couple of times. Yes, this will require you to use water that will most likely cause the wood grain of the surface of the stock to rise. You will need to Bone the stock to compress the surface, making it smooth without removing the patina. Then you will need to apply a coat of BLO. Nothing heavy, just a light coat rubbed into the stock. This will bring back the color of the stock. Wait 3 to 4 days and then apply a coat of wax.
Here’s the reason for waiting to apply the wax. If you apply it before the oil in the surface of the wood has dried enough, your wax top coat will turn cloudy so, don’t be in a rush to finish.
Now after a heavy cleaning, your stock will not be as dark, but that is because it is no longer covered in dirt. But remember that over the years several coats of oil were applied to the stock and a lot of it is deeply soaked into the wood. As time goes by, you will notice the stock getting darker. This is some of that deep soaked in oil coming to the surface. This will start to happen within the first week or so.
What you will end up with is a rifle that looks like it was just issued from the Armory while it was still in service.
Now I have never been one that will just tell you how to do something, I will also show you.
Here’s a link to a post I did on cleaning on a vz24 rifle.
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/quick-cleanup-vz24-stock.868982/#post-11522402

This is before and after pics of another vz24 46BA92F9-40CE-43CC-85AC-ABAE42520FC6.jpeg

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@linking
Your rifle are correctly known as vz24 JC. These rifle were originally ordered by China but never paid for. They were then re-barreled to 7mm and sold to Brazilian revolutionaries. They were intercepted or captured by the Brazilian government. Later on, along with others models, we’re re-marked with a PM prefix number on the right side of the receiver by the Brazilian Government.
I got mine as a stripped barreled action, that came from the leftover, what was called junk, of a Collector from the New Orleans area that had passed away. I still need to find a correct bolt body and stock.
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thanks gunny, I have to go get a spanner tool to get the swivel ring off in the front, hopefully not damaging the upper hand guard when I pry it off.
 
Is this different from the patina referred to on metals?
Metal does take on a patina. Basically the surface of the metal will oxidize. On a blued surface, such as many guns have, you will get a brown patina, which is just basically rust. In fact bluing is just a chemical rusting of the metal surface, but under controlled conditions. When oil is applied to a gun that is then put into long term storage in open weapon racks or stacks, dust will collect on them. This dust will stick to the oil. As the dust collets on the metal surface, it will attract moisture. This will start the metal to oxidize, causing it to take on a brown color. If there’s to much moisture the oxidation will be more stronger and you will get active rust that will start to eat into the metal.
You will find older used guns with this brownish color to the metal due to pretty much the same thing. Kind of like when someone comes across an old gun in grandpa’s closet that no one knew about. The gun was wiped down and put away and forgotten about. It may have had a nice blued finish back in the day, but moisture and time have done their job.
Most often this brown patina is all the way to the metal and if you try to remove it, you will end up with bare metal. If you have a gun that has the brownish patina, it is best to coat the metal with a good gun oil and let it soak for a few days. Then wipe it down with a rag. You will get some rust on the rag. Coat the metal with oil again and let it soak. Then wipe it down again. Keep doing this until you no longer have rust coming off the metal.
You can speed this up by lightly scrubbing with 0000 steel wool, but you take a chance of removing to much of the patina.
Not all metal will oxidize at the same rate, depending on the metal compound, like on this Stevens Favorite. Notice the color difference in the action and the barrel.
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I hope this helps. I’m just going off the top of my head and not going through research material.
 
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thanks gunny, I have to go get a spanner tool to get the swivel ring off in the front, hopefully not damaging the upper hand guard when I pry it off.
The threads of the front swivel/band can be a pain without a spanner tool. Apply wax to the stock forward of the band. This will help to avoid scratching the stock. The handguard has a metal spring band at the rear. Take care when removing it.
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Good stuff on this thread. I had one of those rifles pictured and indeed it was a great shooter . I kept is cleaned and oiled for 20 years , shot it every few years, less and less. It fetched $900 in LGS in 2017
 
Good stuff on this thread. I had one of those rifles pictured and indeed it was a great shooter . I kept is cleaned and oiled for 20 years , shot it every few years, less and less. It fetched $900 in LGS in 2017
You did good. A lot of these rifles saw some very hard use and were in good to poor condition when imported. A lot of people didn’t like them because of all of the extra numbers stamped on them, and like many imported guns, they were sold with little to no info on their history. When they were imported there were plenty of nice Mausers being imported and the vz24 JC rifles were priced low, kind of like Turkish Mausers.
 
Mine was beautiful , gorgeous blue vibrant color. Slick as can be , the bore pristine but the stock was kinda dark but great shape. Mine was from the early 90s import. I used to have a C&R license then and cherry picked many special imports in late 80s to 2000 . I surrendered my license in the early 2000s under Klinton , at that time the BATFE inspections became threatening affairs and in Ca. were unprofessional IMHO.
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Well I finally took apart the one that is the less best looking of the two. There is some minor pitting on the barrel and receiver not too bad EXCEPT on one side of the barrel there is one area where there is some deep pitting, hard for me to judge how deep it is but say 1 mm or 1/16 deep probably. My local gun guy say it and says he would still shoot it. So I have been taking fine grade copper wool and 0000 fine steel wool to the metal and am gonna clean up the stock and put it back together.

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