I have an old Mauser 8mm barrel... what can I do with it?

[the naked prophet]

I have an old Mauser (VZ24) 8mm barrel... [BIG PICS]

Is there anything I can do with it? I am not sure of the bore diameter, but a .308 bullet will fall through the bore with little friction (cleaning rod will push the bullet through with only its own weight). I figure it's too big to shoot a .311 AK bullet through.

I don't feel like building a Mauser (though I do have the entire wood stock) but I'd like to build some sort of gun.

I was kind of thinking about having the barrel cut down from the breech end and having the gunsmith rechambering it for something else. Any suggestions? I don't know what the diameter of the 8mm Mauser barrel is, but I thought it might fit the .32 acp. Not that a .32 acp rifle would be all that great, but it could be a fun squirrel/rabbit gun.

I was thinking about building a bolt action rifle from carbon fiber, using hex bolts as the lugs on both the reciever and the bolt. .32 acp isn't exactly high pressure, and I am guessing that a good thickness of carbon fiber composite could hold the lugs in place pretty well.

Is that reasonable? Possible?

 

[rcmodel]

I don't know what kind of accuracy, if any, you would get with the very short .311" .32 ACP bullets in your .323" bore barrel.

It is also doubtful the Mauser 9 1/4 rifling twist rate would work too well with 70 grain undersize bullets.

I don't care to speculate on the safety of hex-bolt locking lugs in a carbon fiber reciever, even at .32 ACP pressures.


rcmodel

 

[dmftoy1]

Is the barrel in good shape? If so, why not sell it and buy a Mosin.

I don't think I'd want to be sitting behind a bolt that was held in place in a carbon fiber receiver that someone had put together. If you're a carbon fiber expert then maybe it'd doable (??) , but not for me!

 

[flashhole]

Lots of the 8mm Mauser guns were converted to 8mm-06.

 

[spiroxlii]

You could mandrel-bend it into a fun shape and have the world's heaviest crazy straw.

 

[dirtyjim]

old mauser barrels make good whacking sticks. when the starter on my truck was acting up, instead of crawling under the truck & whacking it with a hammer i would pop the hood & stab it with the barrel shank. that got me by untill my new starter showed up.
another option if you have acsess to a lathe is to cut the barrel about 6" long then ream it for a brass rod to make a home made bolt facing tool or lug lapping tool

 

[LAK]

If it is in excellent or better shape I would clean it thoroughly, grease it and seal it for storage. One day original barrels might be worth more than a few bucks.

 

[the naked prophet]

You see, these are useful things to know. Apparently the diameter of .32 acp is too small for a mauser barrel, and nobody thinks carbon fiber would be safe. Good things to know. Now that plan will never pass beyond speculation.

And no, the barrel is in what I would call "abused" condition. There is a section of no finish where I can only assume it was scraped off with a file? It's where I would think the rear sight had been mounted. The front sight mount is all dinged up, and there is a bit of rust on it (not a lot).

There are no caliber markings on the barrel, either.

I don't suppose it's worth anything in that condition, is it? The stock isn't in such bad condition, but there's probably a bazillion of those floating around, so I doubt it's worth selling either.

 

[41magsnub]

Make a really heavy blow gun?

 

[transformerguru]

use it at 4th of July time and shoot bottle rockets out of it

 

[silverlance]

there's actually an outfit that's selling sewer pipe mauser barrels. I think it might be samco. their description was: "real rats... you'll love em!"

personally, I wanted to get five of them, drill and tap a cylindrical piece of steel, screw all five in, then basically make a fake minigun thing. great conversation piece.

more practically, however... turn it into a lamp? a walking stick? ream it out, reline it with a 22lr liner?

 

[Essex County]

Had an old 7X57 barrel that I shortened and used to seat 10" spikes into pine logs when I built My cabin. 8X57 should work equaly well........Essex

 

[Ian Sean]

There is a section of no finish where I can only assume it was scraped off with a file? It's where I would think the rear sight had been mounted. The front sight mount is all dinged up, and there is a bit of rust on it (not a lot).

What does the rifling look like? All the missing external finish and a little rust hurts nothing as long as the bore and chamber are good.

Clean it up, take some pictures and offer it for sale....likely someone has an old beater mauser wanting a barrel.

 

[rcmodel]

old mauser barrels make good whacking sticks.

Hey!
There is a guy over in the "Non-Firearm Weapons" forum looking for an unobtrusive bat or club to carry in his car! You know, something the cops wouldn't recognize!

Theres your chance!


rcmodel

 

[Colt46]

Go 8mm-06

Townsend Whelen said it was the most useful wildcat.
I'm pretty sure it was attributed to him, anyway.

 

[MRIman]

What kind of Mauser?
If you really want to waste money on it
to re-chamber,go with it!!
If you just want to get rid of it,let me know what
you have.

MRI

 

[the naked prophet]

I'll get pics and post them later tonight. Bore doesn't look too bad, but the finish is missing from a section of the outside.

 

[dirtyjim]

ream it out, reline it with a 22lr liner?

the .22 barrel liners sold through brownells should be a perfect fit in a 8mm bore. i have a shot out chinese copy of a banner mauser that i'm going to convert to 22lr.

 

[the naked prophet]

I wouldn't say the barrel is great, there are some pits, and the bore isn't shiny. But the rifling is quite strong - deeper in fact than the rifling on many of my new rifles. The lands are fairly nice looking, as is the crown. The threads on the breech end are clean and sharp. I couldn't get any pics of the bore.

I did find some markings on the barrel, on the underside near the muzzle: VZ24 8MM CZECH. Near the breech is stamped over the chamber: UR 2750

I took some pics, here they are:

This looks like rust, but it isn't:

And pics of the stock:

And here's some letters on the stock:

 

[rbernie]

Tomato stake.

 

[LAK]

I wouldn't worry about the minor corrosion/discoloration; the lost finiish where the rear sight would have been is where the rear sight band/mount wrapped around the barrel. Clean up with 0000 steel wool and WD40 - likewise the front sight.

Unless you have storage space problems, I'd still keep it. They may be common as muck now - down the road they may be harder to come by in decent shape, and worth selling or using on another rifle.

 

[the naked prophet]

I have severe storage space problems. And I don't ever plan to build a Mauser of any sort.