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Welcome to the Mosin club comrade! That is a very nice looking M44 that you've got yourself there.

Looking around, the going rate in RFD's is around £300 for a basic Russian model. I put a wanted add in a few shooting forums online and picked mine up for under half that with a lovely bore. I could refinish to woodwork but think that it adds character and the bayonet is certainly a talking point.

I love owning something that was part of real history and getting to shoot it is a bonus, what to get next is the question!

My 1945 M44

Thanks for the welcome Livefast, your M44 looks good too! Hoping to take mine up to Bisley soon and try it at 500 yds, wondered if anyone on here has done that and have any advice?
Cheers
Steve

steveveets wrote:Thanks for the welcome Livefast, your M44 looks good too! Hoping to take mine up to Bisley soon and try it at 500 yds, wondered if anyone on here has done that and have any advice?
Cheers
Steve

At 500yds on paper with a M44 you may be (very?) disappointed if you lose sight of what these rifles were designed for........which was "minute of man" accuracy.The M44 came into being as a result of the increase in urban warfare, taking lessons from Stalingrad etc, where engagement ranges were more often than not below 300m (more often one side of a street to the other or room to room!) so long range use wasn't a major consideration.
The ideal place for a M44 is a field-fire range with Fig11 targets such as "F" or "G" ranges at Sennybridge out to around 400m.
The front sight post width will pretty much cover a 10"-12" target at 100m which isn't ideal for precise shooting, but as said they weren't designed to be a tack driver.

Edit......just to be clear I'm a big Mosin fan

Edit 2.0..........please, please please don't fit a scope to it!!!, its just wrong!.

RDC wrote:I'm struggling to find any (within reasonable distance) less than 350 these days, many quite a chunk more! I wish I had bought one 12 months ago when cheaper examples seemed to be everywhere.

I'll find one though!

Fultons of Bisley have a nice looking & matching M44 for £295 if your still looking. http://www.fultonsofbisley.com/firearms ... x54r-f3351

Sorry did not read your post correctly needs to be more local to you....

Cheers Snayperskaya - definitely no scope for me and thanks for the advice. I'll have a go and see how I get on. Probably be the operator that fails rather than rifle !!!
Steve

Ammo makes a big difference...my best score with my M44 was 5/4 at 300m on fig.11,silver tip bullets,jb

bnz41 wrote:

RDC wrote:I'm struggling to find any (within reasonable distance) less than 350 these days, many quite a chunk more! I wish I had bought one 12 months ago when cheaper examples seemed to be everywhere.

I'll find one though!

Fultons of Bisley have a nice looking & matching M44 for £295 if your still looking. http://www.fultonsofbisley.com/firearms ... x54r-f3351

Sorry did not read your post correctly needs to be more local to you....

I'm down there in a few weeks time for my work's competition, so it's certainly not a wasted suggestion. Cheers for the heads up!

After the heads up from bnz41, I headed into Fulton's last week to look at this Russian wartime M44. And look at it I did! I also looked at the Polish M44 made in 1952 and comparing them side by side I ended up settling on the Polish example mainly because the rifling appeared to be in better condition and I'd feel guilty about modifying a wartime manufacture if I ever decide to change things.



As can be seen, the buttstock has some staining from a rubber buttpad. This doesn't bother me as I can remedy that when I need to.

Without the bayonet deployed, it shoots way left! Took it on the 100yds firing point on Century to see how much it was out and it was significant. With the bayonet deployed, it was dead on. I was using Privi, already looking at hand loads for it.

For 175 quid, I really can't complain.

polemass wrote:Ammo makes a big difference...my best score with my M44 was 5/4 at 300m on fig.11,silver tip bullets,jb

Russian silver tip or Hungarian?.

RDC wrote:After the heads up from bnz41, I headed into Fulton's last week to look at this Russian wartime M44. And look at it I did! I also looked at the Polish M44 made in 1952 and comparing them side by side I ended up settling on the Polish example mainly because the rifling appeared to be in better condition and I'd feel guilty about modifying a wartime manufacture if I ever decide to change things.



As can be seen, the buttstock has some staining from a rubber buttpad. This doesn't bother me as I can remedy that when I need to.

Without the bayonet deployed, it shoots way left! Took it on the 100yds firing point on Century to see how much it was out and it was significant. With the bayonet deployed, it was dead on. I was using Privi, already looking at hand loads for it.

For 175 quid, I really can't complain.

Well done but you did not buy that rifle you stole it for that price... Welcome to the Mosin club

For your reloads you need bullet dia .311 same as the .303 I use 174gr Privi bullets good enough through a M44.