Styer M95 Back in Commission! Photos...

[barnbwt]

Recently, I purchased a cheap Steyr M95 because, well, it was cheap, and because it's a nifty straight-pull clip-fed bolt-action carbine. It looked quite well made for a milsurp, and appeared to be in very good condition for a 100 year old rifle. I grabbed the one with the newest looking bolt/reciever, and I was on my way.

At home, as I ventured deep into the cosmosline that time forgot, I found some bad news. At the tail of the bolt sleeve (near the handle) the notch that holds the funky safety toggle in place was starting to crack on the outside. A modest tug on the safety lever pushed it over the edge, and the tab that holds the safety in place broke loose. Sharp inside corners magnify stresses, allowing corrosion to occur easily along microcracks, widening the crack until fracture.


Yeah, I know... I love my camera's super macro function

This portion of the bolt is only necessary for proper safety alignment (simple bolt/striker interference type) and is non-load bearing. Aside from the disabling of the safety, no other function of the rifle should be affected. Nonetheless, I thought it a good idea to shell out 20$ for a replacement bolt sleeve. Within a week of my order, Numrich had a new sleeve and safety screw (original is peened on), despite the disruptions of Hurricane Sandy.

I was hoping for a drop-in fix, since the sleeve doesn't lock the bolt, or headspace, or anything "precise" like that, and I was right. After fighting/filing the old safety screw, I had the safety toggle off the old bolt and mounted on the new. The new bolt has a crummier finish condition, but the original wasn't much to brag about (or matched, either).



While I had the bolt apart, I also fixed a problem endemic to these old rifles. The tail of the extractor claw/spring has a stud that engages a slot on the bolt head, snapping it into place in both the "open" and "closed" positions.

This is crucially important when removing the bolt from the rifle. If the interface is worn, the extended/cocked bolt head will spin down into the "in battery" position once its lugs are freed from the reciever tracks. Only by pulling/twisting the bolt head back into position (against the recoil spring) can the bolt be reinserted. This is annoying if it snaps down back accident (easy to do, too). It is maddening if the notch is so worn the bolt head is not held in place at all, as was mine. I had to manhandle this slippery/sharp bolt head against about ten pounds of tension and torque, while sliding it back into place.

Enough was enough; I read up online where the problem lay, and dug out a file to resharpen the stud on the extractor claw spring.

(I shaped the side of the stud facing toward the camera)
My first attempt was too aggressive (locked too well), and I nearly couldn't get the bolt back apart. A more judicious pass or two with the file, and the bolt head was held secure, but could still break free to rotate into the "in battery" positon once in the reciever.

(you may or may not be able to see the left side of the slot is worn, too, but is much more difficult to correct)
I was instantly ten times happier with my purchase than the first time I tried to pull the bolt (it held its place properly in the store, of course :banghead

I also picked up two en bloc clips with the bolt sleeve (rifle didn't come with any). I'm no coin-a-sewer, but these things seem ridiculously elaborate and well made for what they are. Numerous unneccessary stamping details (I actually think they look cool, lol), good-seeming steel is very springy and fairly thick for a disposable item (unlike the mild sheet steel on my AK/SKS clips). Most importantly, they hold the rounds very securely. Shaking a loaded clip, you hear nothing but powder (again, unlike the AK/SKS clips)


That's good news, because the Mannlicher action of the M95 relies on the en bloc clips to function properly; they position the rounds in front of the bolt head for feeding. It's nice that they look like they'll last a while (at 6$ a pop, I don't want to be burning through them).

The next chapter of this rifle's life will be a range test, possibly followed by horrific mutilation. That's right, this'll be a project gun. Supposedly a conversion to 45-70 or similar is possible, and would make the gun even more fun from a reloading and recoil perspective. I'll need to do a rebarrel, slight mods to the bolt-face, and come up with a way to feed the new cartridge from the magazine (too big for the clips). Gotta long road ahead, but I'll start by shooting the rifle in the caliber that was intended (yeah, it's already a conversion, but you know what I mean)

Oh, and here's a good trivia photo:

No it's not the rotted interior of a Mosin-Nagant barrel (or the M95), 'tis the interior of the new bolt sleeve. They somehow cast/machined helical bosses inside the bolt to engage the helical grooves in the bolt head, rotating it as the bolt head slides in and out of the sleeve (into and out of battery, respectively)(highlight for answer )

TCB

 

[sansone]

nice pics, thanks for sharing

 

[Cosmoline]

Is that the inside of the bolt body?

I would worry a bit about my locking lugs, since whatever caused that crack could have caused subtle damage to them.

 

[barnbwt]

DING!DING!DING! Cosmoline has it

I have no clue how they cast those bosses inside the bolt sleeve, my only guess is a sand/destructive moulding of some sort, since you couldn't get the bolt out of anything permanent.

I'm really not worried about the bolt lugs, since they are on a completely separate part (with much better metal), and don't have the design flaw causing the first crack. This is a non-load bearing part, so an overload would not be indicated here. The zero-radius sharp corners in the safety notch are terrible stress mulitpliers, but that science predates this rifle by about 30 years, so it wasn't accounted for. Not only that, the way the safety works is by blocking movement of the bolt when engaged. What does one do when a military bolt action feels "stuck"? Yank on the bolt some more .

Sadly, that extra force (especially bad if trying to reinsert the bolt with the safety engaged), coupled with the stress multiplication at the corners, and the thin (~1/8") material thickness--your're looking at very likely fatigue cracking. The red area on the fracture is where the crack originated, was oxidized, and worked the crack open a bit more. Each time the bolt was loaded, it spread, rusted, and held itself open. By the time I got it, a smart tug on the extractor finished the job.

My main goal is figuring how to prevent this on the new bolt. I'm half tempted to file or machine the slot a bit wider, but with a smooth radius in the corners, or simply cut the slot deeper (again with radii), and shim the safety as required. Considering how smartly you are supposed to slam the bolt home and yank it out, the stresses on the safety toggle support is a serious design flaw (could tie up a gun if it broke the wrong way).

TCB

 

[Cosmoline]

That makes sense. I just worry about the M95's because of the awesome pressure of some of the ball loads. No idea why they did it, but they ended up being the most potent of all WWII era military shoulder rifle rounds this side of an anti-tank weapon. IIRC it was over 3,200 ft. lbs. at the muzzle. Crazy stuff. But it looks like you're loading with the newer custom softpoints from Privi or one of those outfits. I believe those are more sane.

 

[barnbwt]

the most potent of all WWII era military shoulder rifle rounds this side of an anti-tank weapon

That's the word on the street about the Nazi 8x56R ammo--hottest there ever was. All that in one of the lighter bolt-actions fielded . Them Nazi's really were sadists! I'm actually hesitant to try the stuff out because 1)everybody seems to think they're historical because there's a swastika stamped on the head and price them accordingly, and 2)M95 + Nazi surplus shows strongly on every "most painful gun I've ever shot" thread I've read, and I already have a bad shoulder joint

Which is why I think the 45-70 concept has legs, due to the cartridge's flexibility and potential. Sweet shooter to big thumper, in a fast handling, quick cycling bush rifle . Lever's are cool, but not if you ever have to take one apart, and this rifle can be (mostly) disassembled sans tools.

TCB

 

[Cosmoline]

Do you know what the pressure max is for that conversion? I ask because the natural choice for a magazine loader would be the .450 Marlin without that honking rim on it. But that pressure may be outside the specs of the conversion. If it isn't, I'd strongly urge you to consider that option. There's a lot of .450 brass out there actually and it loads just like a .45-70.

 

[barnbwt]

Thanks for that tip, it also looks like 458 win mag would work, too, except for very high SAAMI spec loads (not that I'm looking for that much punch). I would need to figure out how to feed and extract without a rim, tjough. 444 marlin is another possibility.

TCB