The Russian Mosin Nagant Forum

The Mosin Nagant rifle was a conglomeration of two rifle designs. One "3 line" rifle design put forward by Sergei Ivanovich Mosin and one "3.5 line" rifle put forward by Leon Nagant. Apparently Mosin's rifle was chosen with the addition of the feeding system from Nagant's rifle.

My question is, is there any record of Nagant's original design ? Such as pictures or technical descriptions other than the "3.5 line caliber" ?

There is some information on pages 14-19 (including three pictures - two photos and one drawing - showing parts of Nagant's rifle) in Vol. I of Karl-Heinz Wrobel's books on Mosin-Nagant rifles (in German languague). According to this source, Nagant's rifle was of "3.15 line (8 mm) calibre".

It owes some of it's heritage to the earlier Berdan rifle as well as the French Lebel. They were stealing ideas back and forth constantly back then.

A few details about Nagant's rifle as described in KH Wrobel's book:

- Caliber 3.15 lines (8 mm)
- Round receiver
- Bolt handle position behind receiver bridge, handle with a smooth, ball-shaped knob
- Magazine protruding from the stock
- Rear sling swivel attached to the stock immediately in front of the magazine

Same features of Mosin's rifle for comparison purposes:

- Caliber 3 lines (7.62 mm)
- Hexagonal receiver
- Bolt handle position in front of receiver bridge, handle with a knurled, egg-shaped knob
- Magazine flush fitting with the stock
- Rear sling swivel attached to the stock immediately in front of the trigger guard

I found this link interesting.

http://curioandrelicfirearmsforum.yuku. ... otype-pics

That is an interesting link. Nagant sure had some other interesting parts. Mosin 's design was much simpler than Nagant's and easier to manufacture.

Longcolt44 wrote:That is an interesting link. Nagant sure had some other interesting parts. Mosin 's design was much simpler than Nagant's and easier to manufacture.

Interesting link, indeed. But one detail puzzles me there. The bolt handle knob of Nagant's rifle shown in this link is of egg-shaped Berdan type, while the one shown on the two contemporary photographs of Nagant's rifle in KH Wrobel's book clearly is of the same round ball-shaped type like that of the later MN rifle. The pictures in the link look like photographs, but they could be also very good computer-generated illustrations after my impression. The pictures in Wrobel's book are 100% genuine photos. But it is also not unlikely that there may have been more than one specimen of this rifle with variations of details - or they changed details during the testing period. Who knows...

There would have been many specimens of the rifle made, it would have to undergo some form of field testing before being presented to a government for sale . Nagant would have been offering the new design to many governments, not just one, the rifles may have been tailored to this or that country. If they had tooled up to make one rifle they could have run off a hundred, or a thousand, who knows.

This is fantastic information guys.

racerguy00 wrote:I found this link interesting.

http://curioandrelicfirearmsforum.yuku. ... otype-pics

Very interesting indeed. Is it just me or do the two rifles look surprisingly similar ?

No surprise, they were both stealing ideas from the French.

We call the 1903 Springfield a Mauser action because of it's action being copied from the Mauser. Is the Mosin a "Lebel" action completely copied from the French or is the bolt itself an original design ? Sorry if this is a horribly stupid question, I'm not familiar at all with French rifles or early Mosin design history in general.

I was thinking that perhaps Nagant contributed more to the Mosin's design than the Russians would care to admit, but as you said, apparently they were both just copying the same rifle.

FR0STY54R wrote:We call the 1903 Springfield a Mauser action because of it's action being copied from the Mauser. Is the Mosin a "Lebel" action completely copied from the French or is the bolt itself an original design ? Sorry if this is a horribly stupid question, I'm not familiar at all with French rifles or early Mosin design history in general.

I was thinking that perhaps Nagant contributed more to the Mosin's design than the Russians would care to admit, but as you said, apparently they were both just copying the same rifle.

Well, the U.S.did pay the Mauser company for the privilege of shooting Germans during WWI with the 1903.

The US was forced to pay the Germans when they lost in court after Mauser sued them for copyright infringement, we didn't pay Mauser because we felt like it. If you look over the bolt design of both the Lebel and the Mosin you will see similarity's. Of course there is also the fact that the Mosin is a smokeless powder rifle, and the French invented smokeless powder, we all stole that idea from them starting with the Germans, and then the spitzer bullet not long after.

Oh, but the irony of paying Mauser, then shooting Germans with it.

jones0430 wrote:Oh, but the irony of paying Mauser, then shooting Germans with it.

we got even for losing the case, payback's a bitch.