M1903 Springfield?

The sticky bolt think is usually easily fixed by scrubbing out the chamber. I used a .45 bronze brush chucked into my cordless drill.

Please elaborate on "the safety doesn't work" They are generally a PITA to use, but pretty foolproof.

Also define "It's accuracy sucks". What kind of groups are you getting, with what ammo? A Mosin will not generally shoot as well as a modern bolt action rifle, particularly if you are using surplus ammo.

That being said, if you find ammo your rifle likes, or can handload, you can probably improve the accuracy significantly by doing what the Soviets did, wrapping the barrel and shimming the action. Lots of people have got their rifles below 2 MOA by doing this stuff.

This link shows what the Soviets did to prep Mosins for competition. Illustration and translations:
http://forums.gunboards.com/showthread.php?294174-Yur-yev-quot-Sport-Shooting-quot-Book

More on wrapping and shimming:
http://forums.gunboards.com/showthread.php?283648-In-praise-of-wrapping-and-shimming

Lots of people have had good luck doing what the Soviets did.
 
I'm shooting very large groups at 50/100 yds. Not sure exactly how big the are. How exactly would I go about bedding the barrel?

The safety doesn't work because the cocking piece is stuck/won't move.
 
03

2. how do they shoot?
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Quite nicely, thank you. I shot my first minute of angle group with my handloads and a ladder sighted 1903. 165 grain Remington PSP bullet, 54 grains of AA4350.
Interestingly, that rifle was the first centerfire rifle that I owned.
It was/is a low numbered gun, made in 1905. I had never heard about the recommendation not to use "low numbered" 1903s. (evidently the gun store hadn't either - or they saw an inexperienced shooter and a chance to get rid of a white elephant). In any case, I shot it for years before l learned about the heat treat problem.
I still have the rifle; it sits in the gun safe.
It was a good shooter, though.
Pete
 
How exactly would I go about bedding the barrel?
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There's dozens of different ways it could be done and probably twice that many ways can be explained differently on a forum. I would suggest viewing several different Youtube videos and looking at each step independantly and choose which methods you think would best suit your abilities and tools- and then put them toghether one step at a time.

By the way- it's the action you'll want to bed.
 
How exactly would I go about bedding the barrel?
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See the two links I posted.

The safety doesn't work because the cocking piece is stuck/won't move.
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Mine you need to pull it back slightly to turn it. Then again, I don't really use mine, because I generally only load them if I am going to shoot.
 
Lock time and follow through

Rifles like the '03 that have longer 'lock time' might require more 'follow through' and aggressive trigger control.

With me behind the wheel and on the trigger, longer lock time isn't my friend. An experienced rifleman, most likely, won't notice.

salty
 
The cocking piece can't be stuck, or the rifle wouldn't fire.
The "disc" just has to be pulled HARD to the rear when cocked & then rotated.
Denis
 
There's dozens of different ways it could be done and probably twice that many ways can be explained differently on a forum
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also keep in mind that many of those dozens are really easy to get wrong and completely ruin the rifle if not done properly. accurizing is pretty hard to do to any military surplus rifle without losing a lot of the milsurp feel. a timney trigger, a bedding job, a bolt polishing, and new sight job down the road may do a lot to fix accuracy but it also will feel nothing like what a soldier would have carried 75 years ago. not a huge deal for most people that want an accurate rifle but a big deal for someone that buys these rifles for their nostalgic/historic properties.

OP,
I notice a while ago you were asking in a different thread about military surplus ammo and that to date you had only shot commercial ammo? if this is the case then what is the weight of the bullets? if memory serves, and I could be mistaken, the russian surplus was 147grain projectiles while a lot of the commercial stuff is about 174-180gr because it's hunting ammo. depending on the twist rate of your barrel, which I do not have the slightest clue what was used with mosins, your rifle may just perform poorly with heavier bullet weights. try shooting lighter bullets in the 145-ish weight range and shoot from a stable rest such as from sandbags. I have had a mosin that did gigantic groups at 50 yards, as in 8 inches huge but I also heavily modified it and probably did much of that myself inadvertently.
 
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