just hear me out.--
my little carcano came to me by an odd route, even though i was aware of its odious reputation. but, it was just irresistible to an inveterate tinkerer like me. it all started with an advertisement posted by sarco, the well known liquidator & purveyor of all sorts of things. sarco had for sale a bare receiver, and i mean bare, except for having an 8x57 mauser barrel attached to it.*** the action had no trigger, no ejector, and most importantly, no bolt. i bought it anyway ... who can resist a bargain.
and, oh yes, it had no stock, nor action screws, no any stripper clips. who says i am not an idiot?
so, from various sources, i got all the little things that come with a complete rifle. a bolt, bottom metal complete with the cartridge feed system, screws, ... , etc., etc.
there remained the little matter of making the rifle work with 8x57 ammo. the obvious course would have been to get a 6.5mm carcano barrel, and to fit it to the action, now more or less complete. i figured this would be the act of a coward, as i purchased an 8x57mm chambered rifle. (and, yes, deep within the confines of a basement bedroom, i have the spare 6.5mm carcano barrel. laughing.)
to me, the only route was to make the little dear a shooter, w/ the 8x57mm barrel. and, the only obvious course was to make the 8x57mm feed from the clips required to make the rifle function as designed, e.g., a bolt action repeater, and the only way i could figure out how to make that work was to rebate the rim diameter and rim thickness of the ammunition fit the gun.
i am not a machinist. i don't have a lathe and mill in the basement. all i have is an odd assortment of files, some sharp and some dull, and an old bench grinder that a friend gave me when the worm gear for the big wheel gave out. well, you use what you have. a little time passed, and a little work transpired, and pretty soon i had a small supply of 0.473 to 0.476 diameter cases with the rims filed down by hand at the bench grinder, and thinned, and smoothed out by twirling in 150 to 400 grit sandpaper, such that they would fit the bolt face of the carcano bolt.
o.k., so where do you go to get carcano clips? well, the internet, of course. i found a seller selling brass and steel carcano clips. so i bought two (2) of each, and found the brass clips the best. and, i got the buggers to accept my "home-rebated" cases.
the rest was easy, sorta.
a friend gave me some 8mm cast bullet molds, and i melted lead and cast the bullets, coated by a plastic/epoxy/god knows only what stuff, and loaded the bullets up. with a very mild load, courtesy of some reading and the older reloading manuals on hand. (it seems that the new manuals are more directed to the mainstream shooters these days, while the old manuals were more directed toward those with an "experimenters outlook" on life.
now, to the point of this whole exercise.-- all of the components to my rifle were mixed in origin, and as a direct result were subject to a bit of "oxidation," and were also made by a bunch of people not working to the same operating tolerances and mechanical dimensions as would be deemed desirable.
the only recourse was files and sandpaper. i cannot tell you the hours and moments i have spent sanding down scuff marks and burnishes on the bolt to get it to work properly, and how much mischief a little high spot here and there can cause in the proper cycling of a rifle action. as it turns out, the biggest impediment to proper cycling was the carcano cartridge ejector, which "glides" in a recess cut into the bottom of the bolt ... it was like trying to make progress in a boat with the anchor dropped.
but, finally, after much work, and a judicious application of a lithium based lube, i have the action working just about as smooth as a nice commercial action of recent vintage. (and, don't forget to spend a little time on the compound curve and angle of the pathway cut into the bolt for the cocking piece. if you follow that, you understand the issues involved. laughing.)
what started out with an action that would barely open i have an action that works pretty smoothly, and with a modicum of effort required to operate. and, oh yeah, i have it to the point where it feeds quite nicely, and reliably, to the point why you could understand why a modern industrial society would choose such an arrangement for an infantry rifle. (if you think the italians singularly obtuse in choosing the action, you should take a look at the german model 88 action, and the austrian military action of the same vintage, both of which have the same sort of cartridge feed system. the austrian action has gone on to assume a beloved status amongst civilian bolt actions. you look it up.)
and, the stock. the action now resides in a stock built for the 1903 springfield action, and i purchased it for $7.00 from sarco. (actually, 4 stocks for $28.00 . so grime and dirt coated that they were all black, and required hours to get to the wood. but, a very nice piece of walnut in each of them, with "generous" allowances in dimension. a separate story, indeed.)
well, that's it. i have now a very trim outfit, with a short and compact action in a short and compact stock, fitted w/ rudimentary "iron sights," and someday if i live long enough, i will take it deer hunting where they grow stupid deer which allow you to get very close to them, to see how the entire contraption works. i am positive that it will work just as it would have in the 1890's as first built, and in circa 1943 when the germans grabbed everything they could get their hands on.****
john jay @ 01.24.2022
*** to make a long story short, at about the time nazi germany began to be very hard pressed during wwii, they suffered a serious shortage in small arms. as they were being evicted from italy by the allies, they prevailed upon several italian gun makers to chamber the carcano rifle in the german service round, the 8x57mm. this was not a marriage made in heaven, as the carcano bolt face was not large enough to accommodate the case rim diameter of the 8x57mm, and the cartridge clips needed by the carcano to be a repeater were not large enough to handle the german round: nonetheless, the germans had the guns made.
**** btw, the carcano's so described were used in battle by the finns against the russians, until such time as the russians, soldier by soldier, died in battle discarding his weapon on the ground. there & then, rumor has it, the finns promptly assumed ownership of the russian rifle (the previous owner having no need for it), and left their carcano's on the ground in fair trade. it was not, needless to say, as beloved by the finns as it might have been. perhaps they needed some lithium?
i have never read just exactly how the germans, or finns, or anyone else for that matter, addressed the dimensional problems associated with the 8x57mm mauser case heads and the obviously much smaller bolt faces of the 6.5/7.35mm manufactured carcano rifles. anybody out there have any ideas, or recourse to historical writings which addresses this issue? it would be much appreciated by me to be informed about it. well, ttfn. fini. as they say.