So found this. I'd like to understand all the markings. I believe this was a war bring back from someone a family member knew. What's it's value?

I'm going to clean her up metal with brass wool to scrub off any rust, then normal hoppes 9 then some kroil for a final deep clean followed up with nice layer of barristol to let it get soaked into the metal on all parts.

For the wood, I'm using only mineral spirits until rags come out clean then I'm getting the stuff I've seen recommended (Howards feed and wax) and that's it.

Only issues I've seen...the long piece that holds both barrel bands like my m48 well it went missing so someone put in a similar pin that only fits the top portion but doesn't hold the bottom band since in essence its like they cut the band in half if you get my description. The same piece of wood has two nails on the stock to hold the bottom in place. I can gently remove those and get a replacement for the band retainers and you'll never know.

Bolt - everything including firing pin matches

barrel / stock - everything matches, unfortunately the bolt is not matching to the barrel / stock. :-(

history and value? What I do know.... made by Obendorf, these are prewar so all milled. that's about it



buttstock -



butt plate



barrel lug bolt



receiver



sight



crown



rear sights



under rear sight


barrel



upper barrel band



behind trigger



mag plate


I've yet to clean the barrel, she looked a little dirty maybe rusty but can't tell so well. once I clean her up i'll throw a bore light on her and post pics. but that may be next weekend.

A quality non import Bolt mismatch is usually 600-800.

Given its bore condition i would rate it at around 600.

Wow, they are more affordable than I thought :-) So what if I clean it up and the bore is decent looking? I'm simply asking because I'm probably going to make an offer to buy this rifle at a fair value for both me and the seller as they are related though distant. also curious about the markings lots of 655 marks, I guess those are QC marks?

if the bore turns out to be decent its worth 700 all day long. It looks very nice.

Waa655 are build marks/acceptance marks. Each manufacture had its own code.

http://mauser98k.internetdsl.pl/kodyen.html

WaA655J.Sch.Baj.1940

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waffenamt_codes

The Rifle pictured in your OP is a

Mauser Werke A.G.
Oberndorf-am-Neckar

Dont clean the stock like you suggested you are going to do in your first post. dont add anything to it either. id suggest a very light soap and water with a cloth rag, dry it and call it good.

+1, the stock doesn't need anything.

This is a rifle where doing TOO much cleaning can hurt you.

Don't do anything, clean the bore shoot it, and look at it.  It's a bolt mis-matched bringback, and is worth more than your run of the mill RC.  Like Spax says, around 6-800 bucks there.

Awesome i want to do it right and saw suggestions in other post on the mineral spirits for milsurp.

So for soap would Murphy's oil soap be fine? Thats what I've cleaned all my mosin sand other milsurp a with mostly so far.

Bore pics. First ran several wet patches of h9 the. Soaked bore brush more h9 then  Ran some bore cleaner the Remington dark grey stuff has a slight grit to it. Then back to h9 till she came from black to green the. Finally white clean.
Then ran kroil soaked patch slowly let it sit for 15 min. Then bare patch finally a ballistol patch to leave it lightly coated in my safe

Here are post cleaning pics









And then finally the half piece band retainer i need to get full band somewhere.
Anyone got a spare wanna trade components or something for? Otherwise I'll check numrich

Note I did the illuminate function to make it stand out rifle is not silver looking like the photo

Use what the germans used. Ballistol on a rag

Luftwaffe issue. That's what the L on the stock between the bird and the WaA655 stamps means.

Condition being equal the L and K (Kriegsmarine) marked stocks makes them worth a bit more than the normal H (Heer) marked K98s.

Great find.

Hah! Sweet exactly some info i was looking for! Makes me want it even more considering my love of aviation!

So hows the barrel look? I think i see in the pics some stuff between the rifling that looks like it could be crud still needing to come out or maybe what's left from rust ?? Help me learn to read a barrel. Thanks for help

I have the same code a 42 1939. Mine is a rc however. Bore looms like what I hear called frosted. Rust pitting in the grooves. Try firing a few rounds, it usually gets that fine gunk out then really clean it up to see what you have.

I keep a supply of Turk nickel plated ammo on-hand to shoot out frosted bores. Works well on RCs that had their bores dip blued (with the attendant crud/frost still in the barrel) to shine them up too. It makes cleaning the bores a lot easier.

when I said use some soap and water on a rag to clean the stock, i literally meant soap - I just get a tiny bit of hand soap on a rag with water, run it up and down the stock, then another damp rag with only water to get the soap off the stock, and dry one to dry it off. it gets the oily feeling / grime / dirt off of there without stripping the finish or aged color of the stock. remember, "less is more"

another thing to keep in mind is when you plan to oil + scrub the rust off of the metal.... start in a spot like on the under the wood line where no one can see -  I was removing rust from a 1939 K98 under the barrel where the wood covers it, and the bluing came right off with it - and I was simply using a rag and oil or gun cleaner.  All Im saying is start small and somewhere out of sight.

that band spring- should be very easy to find one. if you search hard enough you may find one stamped with the last two digits which match the receiver serial number.

That is a nice straight up bolt mismatch, great find...I agree with the value assesments right around $700 + or -...might do a bit better on Gunbroker, but its a crapshoot there.

I wouldn't do a thing to the stock, wipe it down, call it good...if anything I wouldn't touch it with soap or water, moisten a rag with some blo and rub it in buff it real good...but it looks perfect the way it is...

Band spring is easy...if you have trouble finding one, PM me, I have some spares, and can get more...just make sure you get the 98k type...I think Yugo M48's or something similiar have ones that are too long, and they won't work....

Yes too on the Luft marked stock....they marked those like that until 1941 or so...H for Heer (Army), M for Kriegsmarine, L for Luft. Enhances calue a bit, but not tremendously....Kriegsmarine marked will bring a bit more than Luft...Heer of course are the most common.

If you tell what the WaA mark under the bolt root is, we can give you the maker of the bolt...

1643 bolt wonder what the odds are of someone having a 1498 bolt on a 1643 rifle to trade me :-) man that'd be sweet. i'll be looking at every single mauser I ever see from now on for the bolt number. lol

every bit has to match for it to mean anything. Its either all matching down to the bayonet lug or its not.

Bolt is 100% matching and all screws wood lugs bands plates etc all match unfortunely boot being complete different match from rest of rifle :-) but hey shoots awesome!

I own its older brother.  It is a 1939 42 SN 4874 m in all matching condition with no import marks.  Looks like blood pitting on the bolt, action and mag floorplate.

Well keep me in mind if you ever think of selling her :-)

So I fired her today and the glue didn't hold. Are there any videos or pictures of the steps I need to take in order to mate the duffle bag cut back to the rifle? I want to make sure it's almost like it was never cut. Don't want to ever have it loosen up. That or if anyone knows a really good gunsmith in ga. I don't want to trust this to anyone thsts not very sensitive to the historical significance of this rifle.

Also I put 15 rounds down her today (Romanian surplus) and cleaned with hoppes after soap and water down barrel. I got blue on my patches for patch after patch like six of them. Am I oulling very old copper fouling out ??? How can I get it all out and the barrel squeaky clean of all crap?

Also I put 15 rounds down her today (Romanian surplus) and cleaned with hoppes after soap and water down barrel. I got blue on my patches for patch after patch like six of them. Am I oulling very old copper fouling out ??? How can I get it all out and the barrel squeaky clean of all crap?

sounds good to me.

If your pulling blue patches, your pulling Copper.  As far as getting it squeeky clean, good luck, and don't really waste the time, you remove all the copper out of the bore, and shoot it again, your back to square 1, just remove the powder fouling, lightly oil it, and call it good.

+1

Hell, with most of my milsurps that have any kind of pitting, I just pull patches until they turn light grey.  Some you'll never get all the fouling out of.  I have cleaned enough to know when it's clean enough to stop.  The most important part is flushing the corrosive salts out.  Most people completely over do the cleaning part of a milsurp weapon.  It should not take 2 hrs to clean a bolt rifle