Mauser 1934 disassembly problem

[vavasour]

I've been trying to field strip and clean a 1934 Mauser .32 ACP, following the list of steps found everywhere. After I insert the empty mag and pull the slide back, two problems. 1. The mag release is so stiff that I practically have to push it against a wooden table top or chair back. 2. When I move the mag release and remove the mag, the slide closes. I have also tried depressing the retaining latch under the barrel muzzle to rotate the retaining rod counter clockwise. No dice. The retaining latch depresses but the retaining rod doesn't rotate. What now?

 

[vavasour]

I kept the slide back by leaving the empty mag in. I managed to rotate the barrel retaining rod by pressing the button and rotating the rod counter clockwise with taps against a quarter inch hardwood dowel with a wooden mallet. At full rotation I had to tap the rod out slowly. Well. Now the barrel won't come out. What I can see of the interior is dusty. Could the difficulty of moving the parts be due to dirt? The barrel and frame have most of the blue though the bore is well worn. Maybe closer tolerances from rebluing?

 

[rcmodel]

Probably old dried oil & dirt.

Take the grips off.
Then spray it full of rem-oil or WD-40 to loosen things up, and keep trying.

rc

 

[vavasour]

Thanks! I wondered about that. How should I avoid the reported ease of cracking the grips? Just slow and steady? Now I have the barrel off: tapped a chopstick wedge (and fulcrum) under the barrel while tapping the top of the muzzle with a wooden mallet. Finally came off. Oily rust covering the post and hole where the barrel and frame join. Now slide won't come off. The grips it is.

 

[rondog]

Does it look like this? This is my 1914 Mauser, but I seem to recall reading your 1934 is similar? Anyway, search on YouTube for "stripping 1934 Mauser pistol" or similar, there's all kinds of stuff on YouTube. I found a video by Larry Potterfield from Midway showing how to field strip mine. But I needed to detail strip mine and do some fixin'. Shoots great now.





Here, found you some....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h45t4Xjbx3g&list=UUCsjeB6Hy6IVAG5hHFYoZ1A

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFog4qfZMxA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3nqTdqMAAE&feature=c4-overview&list=UUCsjeB6Hy6IVAG5hHFYoZ1A

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWx70YkrfHQ

 

[vavasour]

Rondog,
I'd seen the posts by ibaratti and couldn't get the slide off. He seemed to just wiggle the slide. The presence or absence of the mag helped nothing. I looked at the ejector/slide stop to try to depress it. Then I noticed the slide couldn't go forward because of a part to the left of that piece. Looked like a sear trigger interface, tho maybe not. I pulled the trigger and there it was. When I got to the last u-tube video by Mr. Potterfield, I heard "pull the trigger." No other instructions included that. (maybe it's routine for other people, but I was stymied.) I thank you and him. And I thank RC for his earlier post. Y'all kept me from giving up. I broke it down a little further: cleaned striker and spring, removed latch and safety and button and cleaned them. Afraid to go further. Reassembled.
My pistol must be the 1934 rather than the 1914. The grips swell out at the heel more than yours. They have no checkering. It reads the same as yours on the left, except the serial no. is in line, there is no date stamp, the first three letters of "waffenfabrik" are heavily worn down despite dark bluing (Hmm!). On the right side, mine is not marked for caliber, but like yours has the empty recessed area above the grips. The vertical grooves at he back of the slide are like yours. The rear sight looks like it could be drifted for windage. Behind it is a crown above a "u." There's another mark in front of the rear sight. The mag plate seems to have been broken and re-welded. This leave hollow behind the mag floor plate that the mag release annoyingly hooks into. The mag release is an absolute bear to move.
Thanks again.

 

[vavasour]

I see from the article by Burgess Mason (Mauser 1910 PDF) that according to the serial number and slide markings it is 1914, as you said. It must have had the 1934 grips added later.

 

[rondog]

Oh hey, you have a reference to look up the s/n dates? Can you look mine up? The "1920" on mine is supposedly something to do with the Nazis nationalizing all the guns or something, I can't remember for sure. I'd love to know the date of mfg. of mine.

And yeah, gotta pull the trigger to get the slide off. Tearing it all down isn't bad, but I'd recommend taking lots of closeup photos with a good camera and good lighting. There's one spring that might give ya fits. Wolff has a spring kit for these too, BTW. And yes, the mag release is a PITA. The safety is kinda odd too.

 

[vavasour]

rondog,
I got to this data from www.mauserguns.com. From there I went to Mauserwimages.doc. (I can't make blue links). Here's the text:

1914 WWI era, Manufactured from 1914 to 1923, serial number range 13500 - 296000 (1 line address, “Mauser 7.65” stamping added on right side of slide around serial number 1625000, milled panel on right frame discontinued around serial number 277000, most examples in the high end of the serial number range will not have the Mauser Banner on the side plate.

Here's the text on markings, including the "1920"

Use markings
Use markings define the greatest number of variants as these pistols were exported all over the world and markings include acceptance, property
or inventory by a number of agencies. Some markings indicate export/Import, contract or military acceptance/inventory. The “Germany”, “Made in Germany (in Chinese)” and Portuguese contract mark (circle triangle) appear to be
factory applied (under the finish). Other markings like intertwined SK, intertwined WM, intertwined HD on the rear of the frame may also have been
factory applied. The commercial proof marks of other Countries such as British proofs, Austrian commercial proofs and Czech commercial proofs were stamped during importation. German military acceptance marks were stamped at the factory by government personnel. Agency property or inventory numbers as well as some import markings were engraved or stamped after the pistols left the factory. There are a good number of 1914 models that were used and marked by German police units. Examples stamped ‘1920’ were
so marked during the post WW1 era to identify it as property of the German government.

Vav

 

[rondog]

Interesting, thanks! I took mine out the other day and stress-tested it real good, and it did very well. So I've decided it's OK for pocket duty, got it in my pocket right now. It actually carries very well.

 

[vavasour]

I still have the problem of an impossibly stiff mag latch spring. On the video, the guy just pushes the latch like a normal one. I have a CZ 52, a Yugo Tok and an Ortgies. The mag latches on all three are OK. But on the Mauser I barely have enough strength to push the mag by pressing with a block of wood. I suppose I could remove it and thin it with a dremel. Tomorrow I'll probably test fire it before working on the mag latch.

 

[rondog]

Mmm, I wouldn't dink with modifying it, myself. Not without buying a spare first! FWIW, mine is stiff too, it's not user-friendly; but I'm not about to modify it.

 

[vavasour]

rd,
I'm sure you're right. Spare parts for these seem to be expensive if available. Along with your advice, I've never accepted the plan to thin the leaf spring of a 95 nagant. Just shot the mauser. It worked fine on S&B ammo, not at all on my reloads. Well, I know what that means: it's not the pistol. On another site there's a whole slew of people having trouble assembling after having done so multiple times. Also some mention of the tough mag latch.

 

[Jim K]

That mag catch spring (which also operates most of the internals of the gun) is pretty stiff, but often the wood interferes and needs to be relieved (carefully, please).

This is not as much fun as watching some guy fumbling around on a U-Tube video, but here is how to field strip that gun.

First, remove the magazine and make sure it is empty. Then retract the slide. It should stay back. Make sure the chamber is empty.

Now, press the little button under the muzzle, and swing the front end of the barrel retainer to either side. Pull it forward and out of the gun. Lift the barrel straight up and out.

Hold the slide to keep it from jumping and insert the magazine. The slide will unlock and you can ease it forward. When it reaches its normal position, pull the trigger to let down the firing pin. Let the slide go forward another 1/4 inch. Then remove the magazine and let the slide go forward and off the frame. That is all there is to field strip. Further dis-assembly is at your own peril.

Jim

 

[rondog]

Peril? Shoot, t'ain't no thang! I've had mine apart and back together more times than I can count, trying to figure out why it wouldn't fire. Finally found out the side plate was bowed very slightly. Tapped it back straight with a tiny hammer, and it shoots great now!

 

[Jim K]

They are not hard to disassemble as long as you know that the slide locks back on both an empty magazine and on no magazine, and that the only way to release the slide and let it go forward is to insert a magazine, empty or loaded.

Many of those guns have been ruined by the "bigger hammer" guys when the slide locked back and couldn't be released by removing the magazine.

Jim

 

[vavasour]

Jim K,
On my pistol the mag latch is just as difficult with the wood grips off. The leaf spring barely extends past the cross bar that the grip screws go into (about even with the bottom of the trigger guard) and seems to operate nothing else. Oh, it is possible get something in upside down. I reversed the slide latch spring the first time i reassembled, and the latch wouldn't return to position when I pressed the button. The picture on Numrich clued me in. I'm using light strokes of an emery board on the back of the spring. At this point, the back of the spring is slightly smoother.

 

[Jim K]

I think you have some kind of gunsmith repair. AFAIK all those Mauser mag catches are one piece with the spring, and that spring operates the sear and the slide lock. Here is the Gun Parts Corp. schematic. (Part No. 13).

http://www.gunpartscorp.com/Manufacturers/Mauser-33384/AutoPistols-37346/1934PocketPistol-35076.htm

Mine is a little different from the illustration, having a cross piece on the spring that interacts with a slot in the frame to keep the spring from moving upward; that appears to be a change to fix a problem, but the basic idea remains unchanged.

Jim

 

[vavasour]

You could be entirely correct. Mine has the cross piece you refer to. ?Evidence to support the gunsmith hypothesis: Though the serial numbers (all matching) indicate a 1914, the grips are 1934, and the floor plate of the mag has a weld or solder repair and as a result doers not go all the way back to the flat spine of the mag. The latch getting caught in the resulting opening is one of the causes of the latch being difficult to move. And, even though the bluing is worn on sharp edges it seems to be on top of the worn WA of WAFFENFABRIK and on top of a small bit of pitting. Maybe this is the reason that the slide does not stay open when I remove the slide. The action seems to work otherwise.

 

[Jim K]

Yep, if the top of that spring is broken off, the slide won't stay back. Still, if the bottom part is original, the mag catch should not require excessive force to work.

I would check Gun Parts and see if they have the spring, though, so the gun works as it should.

Jim

 

[rondog]

When I bought mine it was to help out a friend, I'd never heard of these before. But now I'm surprised to find out how many there seem to be around, and I'm actually taking a liking to the lil' popgun now.

 

[Jim K]

Those guns were not only a common and favorite WWII vet "bringback" but they were sold commercially in the U.S. for many years both before WWI and between wars. Like the later HSc, they are more complicated than necessary, mainly due to that idea of having a fresh magazine release the slide automatically. It sounds good, but the mechanism is complicated and confusing to people not familiar with it. Plus the guns are pretty notorious for spring breakage and for breaking the cocking indicator part of the firing pin.

Jim

 

[vavasour]

I've liked these since the fifties, iconic like the C 96, Luger, or P 38, (which I will never own) though less so. Black and white movies, Peter Lorre, the Orient Express. When I started looking at them five years ago, I only saw them for over $400. Too much for a skinflint. Then I began to see them on gunbroker at lower prices and got one. The Colt 1903 seems to go up and up, on the other hand.

 

[Jim K]

Every collector of pocket size handguns needs at least one Mauser. But for a practical gun, the Colt pocket model is a whole lot better and more reliable pistol.

Jim

 

[vavasour]

Today the repaired mag floor plate slid all the way back to the flat spine of the mag so there was no hole there for the catch to go down into. I can move the latch with a thumb while pushing of the mag floor plate with my other pinky finger. Well.