What is Your Favorite Military Bolt-Action Rifle? 1885-1955

I love military bolt action rifles. I've collected them surplus my entire life. The first one I purchased was an 1896 Swedish Mauser; my dad grew up with a 1903A3 Springfield which I hope to restore one day.

The 1903, in all its carnations, is my favorite Military Bolt Action rifle. The design is elegant but it has a ruggedness not found in most elegant designs. I realize it was "ripped off" from Mauser, but the turned bolt on it and the unique stock design give it qualities all of its own - that the Germans in turn incorporated into the 98K (or so I've been told, and looking at it, I can see it).

I also love the Lee Enfield. I have one made in 1916 - a MKIII. The action on it is inredibly smooth, and I can understand why the Germans often felt they were going up against machine gun fortifications when encountering a large group of troops trained in the "minute of hell." Has anyone heard of the minute of hell? I might have the term wrong.

What is your favorite military bolt action rifle?

The Mannlicher Carcano 6.5mm.

Lee Enfield No.1 Mk III.

The action is like butter and it holds ten rounds.

"Minute of hell." Yeah, I love those - mentioned it in my OP. I'm trying to figure out if a feed problem I have is from a bad magazine spring in mine. Not too keen on taking it to the gunsmith.

gotta mention the Mosin-Nagant, particularly the M44 with it's folding bayonet

I have an 1891 produced in 1917 for the Czar by a US company that wasn't shipped due to the revolution.

While accurate, I'm not a fan of the bolt. They're just not smooth, and I hate cone extractors. Give me a claw extractor any day.

if you are having problems with the bolt, your not cleaning it properly

It has never been fired...
I don't have problems with the bolt, you can just tell it isn't a British, German, or US design. It is just not a smith design.

I always blamed it on rimmed cartridges until I turned 12 and bought my Lee-Enfield mm III.

12 or 21? and yeah, the bolt is different, so what?

The difference is smoothness, like I said. The rifle just isn't smooth.

Look, it is a fine combat weapon.

Extremely accurate? Dead on.
Reliable? You're not gonna get more reliable (the same can be said of other era weapons).
Rugged? Long lasting? They're still in service in some nations as sniper rifles.

Great gun... just not my favorite. But I won't begrudge you for loving it.

I'm a lever-gun fan. But the only bolt I have is a genuine '03 Springfield that Dad liberated from the local VFW. He used it when he marched in the honor guard on Memorial Days and fired the salute at the cermony. Still shoots good! I wish it still had its awesome 15" bayonette, but I think the VFW still has that.

^I must'a had one o' them short rulers!

I'm not a big bolt gun guy. The three I have are all built on the Remington 700 platform. When it comes to rifles and carbines, I'm all about lever guns and semi-autos.

I take it back, I have TWO bolt rifles. The second one is a 7.7mm Arisaka that Dad got in a cave full of dead Japs on Okinawa. I've only fired it once or twice. Sucker has a punch! I especially like the folding anti-aircraft sights.

I always wondered why bolts, when they were first developed, supplanted lever guns for military service. Sure bolts are a bit sturdier, and you can't load pointy bullets into a tube magazine (hence the Winchester 95), but I always felt lever guns were faster and smoother to work.

I nice sturdy lever-action .30-06 with a 10-shot box magazine, IMHO, would be a way better combat rifle than an '03.

^ you can cycle a bolt faster than a lever and bolt actions aren't a finnicky as lever actions, and are easier to maintain, there's the weight and cost issues, too

Well, I've never cycled a bolt faster than a lever, but maybe that's just me. Ya got a lot of moving your hand around to do to cycle a bolt. A lever is just open your hand, flip-flip, close your hand and you're in the same position you started.

I nailed a running woodchuck with a fast follow-up shot with my lever-action .44 once that I never would have made if I had to rack a bolt.

Plus, bolt action rifles generally held fewer rounds than lever guns and, believe it or not, conservation of ammunition was a priority with military leaders back then. They placed a high priority on the carefully aimed shot versus a high volume of fire, believing that soldiers would "waste" ammo if they were given the ability to fire more than a few rounds without reloading.

I have a Japanese Type 99 with bayonette, anti-aircraft sights, dust cover, and cleaning rod that my father brought back from WWII. The mum has been defaced, but I have the original capture papers. Someone offered me $450 for it.

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I both love and hate the Mauser, it's the weapon that was issued to us in the Swedish Home Guard, so I learned to take it apart and put it together again in my sleep. But, I would have to say it remains my favorite.

I have two of your Swedish Mausers.

Also, everyone questioning why the bolt guns were chosen over lever guns? Prone firing.

Hence the cavalry's love for the single-shot trapdoor Springfields that helped doom Custer's boys.

The Springfield was the standard issue rifle for all of the US Army, not just the cavalry branch (which used the carbine version).

At the time of the Little Big Horn, those rifles used copper-cased rounds which jammed easily, a problem that was compounded in the carbine version because it had no ramrod that could be used to more easily extract a jammed casing.


The Springfield wasn't a bolt action and had no magazine at all.

congrats, I've just never been the lever action type, and I'm damn quick with a bolt-action

What have you got against woodchucks?

Probably the same vendetta I have against raccoons.

I've only ever shot my Krag, and I love that gun. Smooth as silk bolt, and dead balls accurate...

but I'm well aware of it's shortcomings as a military rifle, those being the single lug bolt, and the very user unfriendly magazine.

There's no doubt it is a fine shooter! I really wish I had gotten a chance to see it while you were in Memphis. Didn't someone really nicely sporterize it at one point?

Time for a bolt/lever face-off! Whoever can drop ten steel plates fastest!

There is no doubt that a properly functioning lever gun will be faster than a bolt. The mechanics are simple:
Lever: Rack out, rack in.
Bolt: Rack up, rack back, rack forward, rack down.

The only production military bolt action that I'm aware of that could compete with a lever gun would be the Lee Enfield, which has... gosh, its almost a rounded action. Its like the bolt moves in half circles instead of right angles.