Bought A Turkish Mauser

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ojibweindian

New member
Hello Everyone!

I'm not new to the board; used to post under HM3 awhile back. Never got to post too much, though. College and what is now the end of my marriage prevented me from posting more than I wanted.

Anyway, as a graduation present to myself, I bought a Turkish Mauser yesterday for $129.95. The bolt, receiver, and rear sight have matching serial numbers, 1102, and the year stamped on the receiver is 1938. It appears that the rifle has been reblued, and there is a bit of, I think, cosmoline in the inside of the barrel and action.

Can anyone fill me in on the generral quality of the Turkish Mausers? Also, who manufactured them for the Turkish government? The rifle istelf seems to be in good overall condition, except when pulling the trigger, the firing pin doesn't appear to strike as hard as it should.
 
I went to the range yesterday with my Turk, made in 1933, according to the receiver stamp. I was shooting the Turkish corrosive 8mm ball, on 5-round strippers, in 70-round bandollier/bandolier... (damn) stripper clip holders. Also brought a Yugo K98 as well. Neither shot well with this ammo. Good thing I've only got 1400 more of these rounds. Maybe I can gravel my driveway with 'em. Any other suggestions? Maybe I can pull the bullets, dump the powder, and reload w/ commercial powder/bullets. It'd still be corrosive though. What a butt-ache.
 
I forgot how to edit my posts, or I'd have added this. Does anyone know how to adjust the sites for windage on these old 98's?
 
Sights are adjusted for windage by drifting the front sight opposite the direction you want the bullet to land.
Brownells sells a special tool for doing this. I have one and it works good.
 
In response to your question about the quality of the Turkish Mausers: its very difficult to say anything about this.
The Turks were a major user of the Mauser system. They bought Mausers from Germany before WWI and mostly from the Czechs, I think, after the war. All the rifles that they bought were originally of excellent quality.
In the 30's, they decided to rework and standardize the many models of Mausers that they had. I am not sure of their real specification for this, but it involved cutting them all down to a standard length, standardizing the hardware such as swivels, bayonet lugs, etc., converting all to 8mm Mauser if not so already.
In doing this work, they added componets of their own and mixed up all the parts. You are lucky to have one with a matching bolt and reciever. I have been looking for one like that for a while now.
Even worse from a collector's point of view, they made a concerted effort to grind off all the old markings and replace them all with new ones of thier own. This makes it difficult to determine what the orignal rifle actually was.
But the refinishers did not get every original mark off the rifle. Last week, I was at a show and met a man who was selling a large number of Turkish Mausers he a refinsihed for his own collection. He showed me a Turk M38 that clearly still retained part of the marking "Gehw. 98". This was not a Mauser made for Turkey at all, but was originally a German WWI army rifle. He showed me another that could still be determined to be a Czech VZ24.
So, if you look closely and have the references and the time to figure out what you are seeing, you can probably figure out what your rifle originally was from little clues the Turks left behind, but it is beyond most of us at this point.
Another thing that impressed me about this man's collection was the quality of some of the stock wood that can sometimes be found on these Turks. Three of his rifles had lovely mineral streaked European walnut stocks that anyone would be proud to have on his most prized sporting rifle. Turkey is in fact famous for its fine walnut, and it is clear that some of the very nice stuff made it onto at least some of thier rifles.
Unfortunately, my own Money Tree in the back yard has not come into fruit yet, so I had to pass on this man's wares.
I hope this gives you some indication as to why you probably won't get a lot of satisfying answers to questions about Turkish Masuers. The truth is, the book is not written on them yet, but it is probalbly a good time to look out for the nicer examples of them right now.
 
Here's a link (I hope will work) to the Turkish Mauser Forum: www.members.boardhost.com/parallax
No, cannot make it work. Sorry.
[This message has been edited by Herodotus (edited April 23, 2000).]

[This message has been edited by Herodotus (edited April 23, 2000).]

[This message has been edited by Herodotus (edited April 23, 2000).]

[This message has been edited by Herodotus (edited April 23, 2000).]
 
Herodotus

I looked at the receiver and found no German markings. The markings on the receiver are:

T C then

AS FA then

the cresent moon opening upward with the star at the top of the opening

finally
ANKARA

There appears to be no evidence of grinding on the receiver at all.

The rear sights bear the same serial number as the receiver and bolt. Near the muzzle, on the right side of the barrel, is the 8MM stamping with TURKEY stamped next to it. On the left side of the barrel near the muzzle, there is a stamping that says RIDGEFIELD, NJ. I assume that the barrel was made in that city. Had no idea that the US manufactured barrels for the 8MM Mauser.

Anyone have any info concerning this?



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For God so loved the world that he gave his onlly begoten Son...
 
I think you are looking at the most recent Turkish stamps. The ones I am talking about would older proof marks and inspeector's marks left on befor the reciever as repolished in the 30's. It is possible that they got them all, or there may be more marks under the stock line. If you do find more marks, very few people would be able to identify them off hand. I think there is little doubt that a 1938 marked Turk is a refinished and rebuilt Masuer of an earlies kind.
I forget what the TC and AS-FA mean, but Ankara is, of course, their capital, and , I think, the ste of the arsenal in which the work was done.
Ball (Mauser Military Rifles, 1996) only says of the Turkish Model 38 Short Rifle: "All original markings have been professionally ground off, with the reciever now marked in Turkish with the Star and Crescent, arsenal markings and the date of renovation."
 
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