[amafrank]

I have a lot of experience with the broomhandles as I used to collect them in the 70's and 80's. There was not much ammo available for them at the time and we shot the tokarev ammo in them with not terribly bad results for a while. We started noticing the locking blocks in the broomies were cracking. I saw at least 3 guns with cracked blocks and another with a broken one. It doesn't necessarily need to blow up the gun to cause damage. It also doesn't mean that one round through the gun will damage it but over time it will damage it. Are the rounds interchangeable???? Thats a judgement call because the tok round was copied from the mauser round which was copied from the Borschardt round. The loadings are not the same though and you shouldn't use the mauser round in the Borschardt and the tok round in the mauser. As an interesting aside, I tried firing the mauser commercial ammo in a PPSh41 and a Steyr MP30 and it wouldn't cycle either gun. It would fire but not push the bolt back far enough to even eject. That difference of 200fps is quite a lot recoil wise and a lot pressure wise.

Good luck arguing with the writer, He may or may not be open to reality and it may have just been a slip on his part.

Frank

 

[amafrank]

actually the weak link in the mauser is not the bolt stop. I've never seen any damage there that would make me concerned about a bolt in the eye. The weak spot is the lock block which is the internal part that all the trigger parts and the locking lugs fit onto. It is a machined piece that is a bit thin walled in the mid area where the locking lugs reside and abut. Overloading the gun creates more pressure on the lock which will in turn increase the pressure on the locking block. Since its a shock load it will cause cracking in the thinner sidewalls of the locking block where machine marks tend to hide and be stress risers. After a time the locking block will crack and perhaps separate which normally causes the trigger to no longer work protecting you from unlocked firing. Those Mauser brothers were pretty smart after all and didn't want dead customers. It is true that the bolt will come back a little harder with hotter ammo but the recoil spring tends to handle that pretty well and the bolt speed isn't that much higher. If you are concerned about your mausers look on the inside.....that lock block is the part that may bring you grief.

Frank