94 Mauser???

[Bob F.]

About 3 yrs ago I bought what I thought was a carbine length '96 Mauser from a friend. I already had 2 geniune '96 and had traded 1 more off to my cousin. This carbine had the Swedish Crest on the receiver ring like my "96's with the date 1907. I finally got around to checking the "2000 Standard Catalog of Firearms" that a collector frien gave me. With the approx 18" bbl it seem to be a Model 94.

I went to Darrell's Scout Page and he has a pic (or 1 of the links) and my gun has a couple discrepiencies (sp?). The stock doesn't go to the muzzle--may have been cut just forward of the 1st stock ring/swivel mount, doesn't have the huge front site but rather one like the '96, and has the Carl Gustafs Crown on the ring. I does have the same rear tangent sight shown in the pic, not the same as the '96. I assume I have a '94 that someone has "cleaned up" the front end on.

 

[Jim K]

There were two different muzzle caps used on the 94 carbine, with and without (earlier) the bayonet lug. In both cases, though, the muzzle barely protrudes from the muzzle cap, which also has the sight guards.

It sounds like someone removed the muzzle cap and cut the stock back to "sporterize" the little gun. Unless they did something to the crown, the operation would not have affected the accuracy, which is usually superb and even more amazing from an 18" barrel carbine.

(One note. Prior to 1968, the minimum barrel length for rifles was 18". Congress changed the minimum (to 16") when it was learned that the U.S. government had sold some U.S. M1 carbines with barrels less than 18". This also benefitted the Swedish carbine, which, before the change, had to have a 1/2 " extension welded onto the barrel to take it out of the "short barrel rifle" category of the National Firearms Act. After the change, that was no longer needed and many of those extensions were removed by the owners. So you can see Model 94's with the extension, but that barrel length is not original.)


Jim