Three-line Mosin rifle. Military history, weapons, old and military maps

Mosin rifle 1891/30 - she is also "Mosinka", "Russian 3-line", "Three-line". Non-automatic rifle with non-removable magazine-fed for 5 rounds of 7.62x54 mm adopted by the Imperial Russian Army in 1891. Official name " 7.62 mm Mosin rifle mod. 1891 g. received in 1924. " Three-ruler"The rifle was nicknamed for the caliber of the barrel, before it was customary to measure calibers with lines. One line was equal to one tenth of an inch (1 inch equals 2.54 cm), hence 2.54 x 3 = 7.62 mm.

Mosin rifle was not the first magazine-fed rifle. So in the USA during civil war in the 19th century and military operations against the Indians, Spencer rifles were used with a magazine located in the butt. Henry's rifle had an underbarrel magazine. In 1877-1878, during the Russian-Turkish war, the Russian soldier in his "skin" had to endure the advantage of repeating rifles with a rifled barrel. These rifles were Winchester rifles with underbarrel magazines.

Rifles of that time with underbarrel or applied magazines had a number of drawbacks. As a rule, they used insufficiently powerful pistol cartridges with a blunt bullet, to increase safety, they had to use cartridges with ring ignition of gunpowder, since cartridge cases with a central location of the cartridge led to the cartridge of the cartridge in front being fired during operation. Rimfire cartridges often misfired. Shooting pistol cartridges was significantly inferior to the effectiveness of firing rifle cartridges. So the pistol cartridge could not penetrate many types of fortifications, did not have sufficient accuracy, and a small aiming range. The problem of rifles of that time was still the price, since in the 19th century there were no weapons factories that could produce firearms in a conveyor way, for this reason magazine-fed rifles were quite rare and expensive. Like all samples of the first generation had problems with reliability and maintenance.

In 1879, James Lee (James Paris Lee) patented the in-line store layout. The first rifle with a safe in-line arrangement of cartridges in the magazine was the Mannlicher rifle of the 1886 model. In 1889, they solved the problem of fast loading rifles with in-line cartridges using special clips. Clips significantly accelerated the reloading of weapons during combat, which increased the weapon's combat rate of fire.
In Tsarist Russia in 1882, the Main Artillery Directorate instructed to develop a multi-shot rifle. In 1883, the definition of “rifle” appeared in Russia, earlier any long-barreled hand weapon was called “guns”, that is, there was no difference between smooth-bore and rifled weapons. They wanted to use the first rifles for the Tsarist Army under the 4.2-line cartridge. More than 150 domestic and foreign rifles were considered. During the competition, the good performance characteristics of the S. I. Mosin rifle of the 1887 model of the year were noted, but nevertheless it was decided to refuse it, since it had store food. The disadvantage of such loading was described above in the article.
Also in Russia, rifles with a smaller caliber (7-8 mm) began to be tested. So in 1885, Colonel Rogovtsev created a 3.15-linear (8 mm) cartridge based on the Beradnovsky cartridges. Rogovtsev's cartridges were distinguished by an increased content of saltpeter and bullets with copper jackets, which significantly increased the life of the barrels and compression when fired, and the 13.6 gram bullet accelerated to 550 meters, which gave the cartridge a force of 2057 J.

Military masters of magazine rifles in Tsarist Russia faced the conservative views of the military, who began to argue that there was no need for such rifles, that such rifles needed a lot of “gluttonous” ammunition. There was no warrior with the massive use of magazine rifles. They also understood that re-equipping with a new rifle would require a lot of financial resources. In addition to conservatism, the factor in the emergence of new rifles and the rapid obsolescence of rifles, which a couple of years ago were considered as the main rifle for the Tsarist Army, played. At the same time, there was a revolution in ammunition, when black powder was replaced by smokeless powder, which significantly increased the performance characteristics of weapons.
In 1888, the Tsarist Army received the Austrian 8-mm Mannlicher rifles and the Danish Krag Jorgensen. During the tests, it turned out that the rifles have good accuracy, but a low bullet speed (508-530 m / s), since black powder was used for firing. Also, the shutter mechanisms did not meet the requirements.
In 1889, the famous chemist Dmitry Ivanovich Mendeleev had a hand in the creation of domestic smokeless powder. In the same year, N.F. Rogovev created a 3-line cartridge with a cupronickel shell bullet, a high-quality primer for cartridges was made only in 1890. At the same time, it was decided to adopt cartridges with a rim at the bottom of the sleeve. At this stage in the development of the 3-linear cartridge was not fully adopted, so soon to develop a 6.5-mm cartridge.

In 1889 S.I. Mosin presented his 7.62 mm rifle with a stacked magazine load, like the Austro-Hungarian Mannlicher rifle, but it needed some work. At the end of the same year, the Belgian Leon Nagant (yes, the same designer of the Nagant revolver) presented to the military commission 3 options for magazine rifles under 8 mm. The Leon Nagant rifles were well regarded for their good magazine design and the ability to load clips, but shortcomings were noted that needed improvement. In 1890, the Nagant rifle at the first introductory competition received 14 positive votes against 10 negative votes. In fact, the Nagant and Mosin rifles were structurally similar, but the Nagant rifle had an advantage in the quality of the finish, as it was made on high-quality machines, unlike Mosin's prototypes. But at the second stage of field tests, when 300 Mosin rifles and 300 Nagant rifles, Mosin rifles turned out to be more reliable: 217 delays of cartridges from the magazine, against 557 for Nagant rifles. In 1891 the commission decided to choose Mosin rifle, since the production of rifles was planned in Russia (technical independence), and not abroad, plus this significantly saved budget money. The commission gave instructions for finalizing the rifle with its subsequent adoption into service. For revision Mosin rifles it was recommended to take a clip for charging, a spring for a magazine and a reflector for spent cartridges. So to some extent it was fair to call the Mosin-Nagant rifle. But on behalf of the Nagan they left by renaming it to the "Russian 3-line rifle of the 1891 model." April 16, 1891 Emperor Alexander III decided to remove the “Russian” from the name and adopted it as a “three-line rifle of the 1981 model”. For the development of the rifle, Mosin was awarded the Big Mikhailovsky Prize. In 1924, the Soviet government decided to add the surname Mosin to the name of the rifle, as a tradition to name weapons in honor of the main designers. Although in foreign sources on weapons topics, the names of the main weapon designers are often written: the Mosin-Nagant rifle, the Tokarev-Colt pistol, the Makarov-Walter pistol, etc.

During the civil war in Russia in 1917-1923 and in criminal circles, the Mosin rifle was subjected to "circumcision" and a kind of pistol chambered for a rifle cartridge was obtained. Often such a sawn-off shotgun was called a "kulak sawn-off shotgun".

In 1892 Mosin rifle began to be produced immediately at three arms factories: Sestroretsk, Izhevsk, Tula. Since the production capacity of these plants was not enough. To speed up the armament of the army Royal Russia decided to place an order for 0.5 million rifles in France at the Châtellerault factory. The following year, the Mosin rifle was first used for its intended purpose in the Pamirs against the Afghans.
During operation Mosin rifles improvements have been made to it. In 1893, to protect the soldiers' hands from barrel burns, they began to wear a wooden lining on it. In 1896, the rifle began to be equipped with a longer ramrod, with a head larger than the diameter of the barrel, so that it would not fall into the barrel. Then they removed the notches on the sides of the store so that they would not wipe the uniform of the fighters.
By the end of 1897, the Russian army received more than 500 rifles, thus completing the first stage of rearmament. Before the start of the Russian-Japanese war of 1904-1905, 3.8 million three-line rifles were manufactured for the Tsarist army.
In 1908, cartridges with a pointed bullet began to be used for shooting from a rifle, before that the bullet had an oval head, like pistol cartridges. With the advent of the new cartridge, they began to install the Konovalov sight with ballistics for the new cartridge on rifles. The new cartridge weighed 22.55 grams, the weight of the bullet was 9.7 grams, had an initial velocity of 850 m / s from a Cossack rifle and 880 m / s.
By the beginning of WWI, 4.52 million " trilinear". During WWI, another 3.3 million rifles were manufactured for the army. Mosin rifle It was made in four versions: dragoon, infantry, Cossack, carbine. Even with this number of rifles, the army continued to experience a shortage of rifles and the government purchased various versions of rifles in other countries. During the civil war in Russia, only the infantry and dragoon versions of the rifle were produced. After 1922, the dragoon version and the 1907 model carbine were produced.

After WWI and the Civil War, the Soviet government decided the issue of modernization Mosin rifles or abandoning it due to the rapid obsolescence of magazine rifles and the desire to arm the army with self-loading rifles. In 1924, the military commission decided to upgrade the dragoon version of the rifle, as a more convenient option. The new rifle received the GAU index -56-V-222. The rifle began to be widely used in OSOAVIAKHIM for training in shooting "Voroshilov shooters". In 1928, Soviet industry mastered its own production of optical sights for Mosin rifles: PE, PU. In 1923, military factories began to produce a sniper version of the Mosin rifle (index GAU-56-V-222A). The sniper version was distinguished by improved quality of the barrel, selection of barrels with better accuracy, a shutter handle bent down, since the optical sight did not allow the use of the classic version of the shutter, for this reason loading sniper rifle Mosin took place on one cartridge. Differed in the quality of the trunk, which had a check. 108,345 Mosin sniper rifles were produced. Let's move away from the topic a little, but 120,000 PE sights, PU-500,000 pieces were manufactured.
In 1938, it was adopted Mosin carbine representing Mosin carbine 1905 - with a 5 mm barrel removed with a sight at 1000 meters. As a rule, fighters who needed a compact and light self-defense weapon were armed with such a carbine: cavalry, signal troops, artillerymen, sappers.

In 1938, the Tokarev-SVT self-loading rifle was adopted by the Red Army, which was supposed to replace Mosin rifle. The military departments planned to supply 1.8 million SVT rifles to the army in 1941, and 2 million SVT rifles in 1942; in fact, about 1 million SVT rifles were manufactured by the start of the war. But during the war Mosin rifle became the small arms of the Red Army fighters, so the factories could not quickly produce more complex automatic weapons in large quantities (machine guns, automatic rifles, submachine guns). To share Mosin rifles accounted for half of the small arms involved in the Second World War. Production Mosin rifles was terminated at the beginning of 1945, when the outcome of the war was decided, and there were enough weapons accumulated in the warehouses. The Mosin carbine of the 1944 model was produced until 1949. Last upgrade Mosin rifles happened in 1944: the bayonet was made folding.

Automation

The rifle barrel has 4 grooves. The distance between the rifling ranges from 7.62 to 7.66 mm. The magazine has a springy bottom and places 5 cartridges in one row, so that one cartridge runs over the body of the previous cartridge with the rim of the bottom, so that the rims do not overlap. One cartridge was immediately fed into the chamber when the bolt was closed. The rifle could be unloaded by jerking the bolt or opening the bottom of the magazine. When the bolt was reversed, the striker spring was cocked; when the bolt was pushed forward, the cartridge was captured and fed into the chamber. After the shot, the sleeve was pulled out and flew off to the side with the help of a spring reflector. The trigger assembly consists of a trigger, which releases the course of the combat larva, which is pushed by the spring. The trigger travel is quite tight and the shot occurs without a conscious warning. Stock stocks were made of birch or walnut wood. The cut-off of cartridges in the store occurs with the help of a reflector, one cartridge at a time. Mosin rifle has an open sight bar in steps (arshins) on rifles manufactured before 1930, subsequently replaced by a sight in meters with an effective range of 2000 meters in 50-meter increments made under Soviet power. The aiming bar at 2000 meters does not imply shooting at such a distance, since a person at 800-1000 meters is not able to see a human figure against the background of buildings or shrubs.
The bayonet is one of the elements three-ruler” which served for use during hand-to-hand combat. Also, the bayonet should always be attached to the rifle during firing, and its removal was provided only on the march or moving in transport. The use and shooting of a rifle should always take place in the presence of an attached bayonet, in its absence, the sighting line shifted significantly and at long distances it became difficult to hit the target.
Mosin rifle has a "chic" accuracy for a weapon that was mass-produced. So at a distance of 100 meters, the deviation is no more than 3 cm (SVD-10 cm rifle), at 1000 meters - 33 cm, and at 2000 meters - 170 meters.

The advantage of the Mosin rifle:

• Price and own production
• Ammo Penetration
• Long barrel life
• Reliability and reliability in any climatic conditions
• Excellent accuracy at different distances
• Sturdy stock and stock
• Fast charging with clip
• Quick release shutter
• Removable bolt head that can be replaced separately without changing the bolt
• Did not spoil the cartridge when fed into the barrel

Disadvantages of the Mosin rifle:

• An outdated cartridge with a rim, although a very controversial point, since the cartridge is widely used now and they are not going to abandon it
• An obsolete bayonet that should have been attached during firing. The second point is that with a bayonet attached, the fighter lost much mobility while moving through the trenches or fighting in the city.
• Low rate of fire
• Lack of a regular place for a bracket for an optical sight
• No muzzle brake compensator
• The magazine is only 5 rounds, it could be increased to 10 rounds or upgraded to use magazines of various capacities.

Just the number of produced Mosin rifles 37 million pieces speaks of its popularity and reliability. The rifle is / was in service with many countries of the world, produced / produced by several countries. On the base Mosin rifles modern sniper rifles with excellent performance characteristics were created. In the post-war years, smooth-bore guns of the 32 caliber, which were nicknamed "Frolovki", began to be made from rifles. Also, on the basis of the Mosin rifle, sports versions chambered for 6.5 mm were made. Number of shots

I asked the author to return once again to this important and interesting topic. Open it up deeper. Tell in detail the history of the creation of the famous rifle, which faithfully served the Fatherland in many bloody wars.

And here is the article for you...

« Mosin rifle - 124 years in the service of Russia

Recently, on the website of Nikolai Starikov and on his pages in social networks, my article was published about Russian weapons as an object of information attacks from the West. I am sincerely grateful to readers for their feedback on the article, but I would like to continue this conversation in a slightly different, narrower perspective. This is partly due to the essence of the comments to the previous article. But more than that requires the very logic of the development of the topic, to which, dear reader, we will return more than once. The subject of this article will be one of the tactical tricks of our geopolitical opponents, which consists in creating and fixing in the mass consciousness of the people of Russia a myth about the chaotic randomness of all its achievements and systemic chaos in all spheres of Russian government. And since we started talking about weapons last time, let's continue it (I remind you that we were talking about Sergei Ivanovich Mosin and his legendary three-line rifle). In the final part of the article, we will also talk about purely practical things - the combat qualities of this weapon, incl. - from today's point of view.

To understand the essence of the problem, you need to know its background. Therefore, let's start from the very beginning, which for our three-ruler does not belong to 1891, when it was put into service. And not even by the eighties of the nineteenth century, when Sergei Ivanovich began work on his first samples. It all started earlier, even with the predecessor of the Mosin three-line rifle - the 4.2-linear (10.67 mm) Berdan rifle of the second model of the 1870 model. Yes, Berdan was a foreigner, an American. But, there are a few "buts" here, more on that later. In the meantime, we look even a little further, to the 1870s, when military officials in European countries began to figure out whose rifle is still better. Like last time, I will ask the reader to be patient, the article turned out to be quite large in volume. But it will be better this way to present and understand all the vicissitudes of such a complex and very expensive event, which is the development and adoption of a new type of small arms for huge army Russian Empire.

Predecessors of the three-line

In 1875, on the territory of the Volkovo Pole, which served as an experimental shooting range for the Russian Artillery Academy, comparative tests of the latest models of small arms of the armies of the leading European countries- Russia, Prussia and France. The Russian army, having suffered with an incredible variety of outdated systems in the 1860s. (the period of the "arms drama", according to the apt definition of the then Minister of War D. Milyutin), then it was just re-equipped with the aforementioned 4-line Berdan rifle No. 2 arr. 1870.

Since 1869, the French have been reworking their Chasspo needle rifles arr. 1866 under a unitary cartridge, and the Prussian army was armed with a Mauser rifle arr. 1871. In addition to these three copies, our specialists optionally tested and described the rifle of the American designer Hotchkiss. It was assumed that this system would be adopted by the French army, so the Russian military became interested in it in advance.

The secret of comparative tests was not made - after field tests and compiling comparative descriptions of the tested rifles, the students of the Academy immediately received public lectures based on the results of the analysis of constructive, ballistic and performance characteristics studied systems.
Our Berdan-2 rifle (as well as sources for its study and any amount of ammunition) was available and well known. The experimental commission, deciding the fate of the 2nd model of the Berdan gun back in 1870, noted the advantages of the new model over all the then existing systems.

The Mauser gun in 1875 was presented in Russia in a single copy and, interestingly, was a gift from Emperor Wilhelm to the Russian Tsar Alexander II. In addition to the Mauser rifle and cartridges for it, the specialists of the Academy had the original instructions for the gun and information about its testing in the Prussian infantry training battalion. It is difficult to say whether family ties were the reason for such a broad gesture on the part of the Kaiser, but, as it turned out, in this case, our specialized services insured themselves in a timely manner: the Mauser rifle was well studied in Russia even before it was put into service in Germany (!). With the help of Russian military intelligence, fragments of barrels and parts of a “secret” rifle were taken to Russia from private German arms factories, which made it possible to theoretically calculate its parameters and ballistics with great accuracy.

And the Gras and Hotchkiss rifles were delivered to the GAU shortly before the tests thanks to the efforts of a Russian military agent in Paris. Here it must also be assumed that these guns were not exported to Russia in a completely legal way, because there were only 90 cartridges for them and no technical documentation. All the data provided for the analysis of these systems was obtained through a thorough study of French rifles at the experimental shooting range of the Academy, where, using available ammunition, our specialists obtained all the necessary data on ballistics and materiel. Thus, there were all the prerequisites for an objective comparison of serial infantry rifles of the leading European countries (at that time no one considered the USA a worthy opponent, even theoretically).

Without touching on the design details of the rifles involved in the comparative shooting, I note that according to the results of the tests, the Russian rifle turned out to be the most original structurally. Let's not forget that when the Berdan-2 system was adopted, the sliding bolt did not have a dominant distribution. The future has shown that the foresight of our GAU specialists has fully justified itself. After a detailed impartial analysis, the opinion of the Academy's specialists was as follows: the domestic rifle in terms of rate of fire, reliability of extraction and ease of disassembly surpasses the best of foreign guns.

4.2-line rifle Berdan-2 mod. 1870

Now back to the name Berdan in the name of our rifle. Let's omit a huge array of historical information about the search for the best weapon system Russian army, which was eventually found in the United States by Russian military agents A.P. Gorlov and K.I. Ginnius (the most competent specialists and real patriots who brought great benefits to Russia). Let me remind readers only that General Hiram Berdan was a hero of the American Civil War, where he commanded a sniper unit, and was the author of both models of the Russian "Berdanka" arr. 1868 and 1870 It is known that he ceded to Russia the rights to design his first rifle for 50,000 gold rubles (38,000 dollars). But few people know that Gorlov and Ginnius made so many changes to the design of the rifle and the technology of its manufacture (this also affected the cartridge) that they practically created a new type of weapon. At the same time, they defended Russian interests in America in the most worthy manner, where the production of Berdan-1 began. Then they also had to work on an incredible scale to establish the production of a new rifle in Russia. And already in 1870, the more advanced Berdan-2 rifle with a longitudinally sliding bolt was adopted by the Russian army - it was impossible for our country to lag behind in the race to improve infantry weapons. Interestingly, at first the Berdanks of the second model were assembled in England, but our specialists did everything possible to establish their production at Russian factories.

Rifle Berdan-2 arr. 1870 and a three-line rifle mod. 1891 (photo by S. Eremeev)

Rifle arr. 1870 was never modernized, having gone through a whole series of battles, incl. Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878 Plevna, Shipka, Bayazet - these are all the battles of Russian soldiers with a "Berdan" in their hands. Having worthily served in the Russian army for 20 years, before the adoption in 1891 of a small-caliber (at that time the 7.62 mm caliber really seemed like a “small thing”) rifle mod. 1891 system S.I. Mosin, "Berdanka" was by no means withdrawn from service. She fought in both World War I and the Civil War. The rifle, by introducing lugs in front of the bolt, was also tried to be adapted for a powerful three-line cartridge (designed for the Mosin rifle), since the strength of the structure completely allowed.

A significant number of famous rifles were sold to hunters, incl. after reworking for a wide variety of cartridges - from a revolving cartridge to the "Smith-Wesson" to a hunting 12 gauge. The well-known Dersu Uzala did not part with the Berdan-2 rifle. And to this day, any alteration hunting rifle in Russia is called a "berdanka".

So, before moving on to the history of the development of the three-line Mosin rifle and its famous author, we specifically note that Russia in the 1870s had practically no modern machine production at that time, but the Russian army was armed with an excellent rifle , which today is admired by the beauty of the elegant silhouette and thoughtful design.

The formation of S.I. Mosin as a designer

Let's get back to the Mosin rifle, which in the West is called nothing more than the Mosin-Nagant rifle. To understand why, to this day, so much provocative misinformation and outright lies are thrown in regarding the authorship of this weapon, imagine what benefit a foreigner could get with a ringing gold coin who would “push” his design into the armament of the huge imperial army and navy rifles. And what a trump card for the commanders of the information war is any pretext, one way or another connected with foreign participation in the national weapons system of any country. In this case, our country. And that's pretty much how it all happened!

When designing the rifle, Sergei Ivanovich Mosin took into account not only the vast experience of the Russian weapons school, but also the generalized military experience of the Russian army, constantly howling in the vast expanses of Eurasia in a wide variety of climatic zones. This is not surprising - his father was Ivan Ignatievich Mosin, who deserved his "George" back in Russian-Turkish war 1828-1829, as a result of which the Black Sea coast of the North Caucasus went to Russia. Sergey Ivanovich walked a long and thorny path of selfless study, faithful service and constant self-education to a high officer rank and extensive scientific knowledge. The first important milestone in the biography of the future designer was the Tambov Cadet Corps, where Sergei Mosin entered in 1861. And already in 1862 he was transferred to continue his studies in the more prestigious Voronezh Mikhailovsky Cadet Corps. In 1867, Mosin successfully graduated from this educational institution, which by that time had been transformed into a military gymnasium with a predominance of the exact and natural sciences in the program. For further studies, Sergei chose the Mikhailovsky Artillery School, although at first, due to a lack of vacancies, he had to study at the Third Military Alexander School in Moscow.

You can often hear that S.I. Mosin was allegedly self-taught and, in principle, could not design a rifle that was modern at that time and, in the shortest possible time, establish its production at several factories at once. This is complete nonsense and an outright lie! The Mikhailovskoye Artillery School, founded by Peter the Great himself, had a long and remarkable history. It was the oldest and most prestigious military school in Russia, which produced officers with a very high level of professional training. The curriculum of the school provided for a solid mathematical course, which included integral and differential calculus, analytical geometry, the beginnings of higher algebra, all artillery disciplines, including fortification and topography. Therefore, Sergei Ivanovich strove to get there, whose potential at that time was already obvious.

Three years have passed. Mosin easily passed his final exams, having received the rank of second lieutenant for his academic success and almost immediately departed for his duty station in Tsarskoe Selo, where he quickly gained the authority of an intelligent and active officer. Interestingly, Soviet sources, more than favorable to Sergei Ivanovich, nowhere indicate his desire or at least a predisposition for any revolutionary activity. Rather, on the contrary, behind this restraint was Mosin's sincere desire to devote his life to serving the Fatherland (which happened), which did not fit into the essence of the destructive activities of various revolutionaries.

Go ahead. After a couple of years of successful service and ongoing systematic self-education, Sergei Ivanovich enters the Mikhailovskaya Artillery Academy, which at that time was a real military university. This is an educational institution where world-famous and recognized experts taught. the highest level, graduated from many outstanding creators of Russian and Soviet weapons. Sergei Ivanovich studied at the academy for two years, completed a full course in artillery sciences, in the summer of 1875 he brilliantly passed the final exams and was released from the academy in the first category with production as a staff captain in field horse artillery, after which he was immediately assigned to the Tula Arms Plant. Some sources note that the famous plant at that time was one of the most advanced and equipped weapons enterprises in Russia and Europe. The reason for this appointment was precisely the excellent scientific and technical training and Mosin's pronounced penchant for invention. I think the reader has long understood that it is simply inappropriate to talk about Mosin's "homegrown" as a designer and manager.

At the Tula Arms Plant

By the time Mosin appeared in Tula, the production of the Berdan rifle was in full swing at ITOZ. For five long years, Sergei Ivanovich, having changed several job specialties, in the role of "eternal deputy" is engaged in practical acquaintance with the smallest nuances of weapons production, until in 1877 he finally receives his first leadership position. Needless to say, Mosin thoroughly studied all the systems of small arms known at that time, while brilliantly mastering all the subtleties of the organization technological process? And certainly we can confidently say that Sergei Ivanovich perfectly understood the need to develop a rapid-fire magazine infantry rifle. This type of weapon proved its destructive effectiveness in the hands of Turkish soldiers on the battlefields of the war of 1877-1878, when the Russian infantry could only oppose the enemy with single-shot Berdan rifles and even older Krnka rifles converted from flintlocks. The era of magazine weapons has begun.

A whole decade in the 1880s for Mosin, it turned out to be woven from an endless series of tests and a relentless search for the optimal repeating rifle system. In the midst of the second scientific and technological (industrial) revolution, the leading gunsmiths around the world were engaged in solving one problem - a radical solution to the problem of the rate of fire of infantry weapons. And here is the first success! In 1885, the first rifle designed by Mosin became the best of 119 tested systems, which did not go unnoticed, incl. and abroad. But this was only the beginning, although in 1886 experiments with 4.2-linear systems of small arms were practically stopped in Russia - the whole world switched to small-caliber weapons, in which smokeless powder began to be used. The empire needed a completely new rifle.

Work on a three-line rifle

In the form in which we know Mosin's three-ruler, the rifle did not appear immediately. First, Sergei Ivanovich designed a single-shot version of the rifle mod. 1889. And only then, after several stages of the competition, the rifle received a single-row magazine with an original cartridge cut-off mechanism. It should be noted here that the then experts, like some of today's researchers, also did not consider Mosin the sole author of the new rifle. The Minister of War Bankovsky imposed the following resolution in the magazine of the weapons business of the Artillery Committee: “The new model made contains parts proposed by Colonel Rogovtsev, the Commission of General Chagin, Captain Mosin and gunsmith Nagan, so it is advisable to give the developed model the name: Russian three-line rifle of the 1891 model of the year” .

Trilinear arr. 1891 early release (photo by S. Eremeev)

From the point of view of a number of researchers and the official history of Russian weapons, this is a rather controversial resolution. Judging by the compensatory payments to the Nagant, something really could have been taken from a rifle of his design, although this, I repeat, is a very controversial and difficult point, the discussion of which is beyond the scope of our story (actually, the design of the clip was taken from the Nagant rifle). It is possible that a number of people from our side were interested in adopting the Nagant system for the banal reason of the promised “rollback”, but the Belgian’s rifle was very expensive and indeed had several serious design flaws. An important nuance there was also the difficulty of adapting it to the production capabilities of our arms industry. Therefore, in the report to the emperor, we still read the following: “The system proposed by Captain Mosin deserves in many respects preference over the system of the foreigner Nagant, both in terms of a simpler device and the cheapness of gross production, and in the fact that, with its adoption, our factories can more likely begin to produce guns in bulk” . As they say, no comment.

And in the order for the military department of May 22, 1891, it was announced: “The Sovereign Emperor, on the 16th day of last April, the highest deigned to approve a tested sample of a new reduced-caliber burst rifle and a cartridge for it, as well as a burst clip for cartridges, and the highest command deigned to call this rifle “3 line rifle of the 1891 model of the year”. The surname Mosin was not in the name of the rifle. In fairness, we note that the name of the Nagant revolver, adopted by the Russian army in 1895, did not include the name of the Belgian manufacturer either. There were no names of Smith and Wesson in the name adopted in 1871 in service with the Russian army and a 4.2-linear revolver.

Sergei Ivanovich, who shared a state award with a team of fitters working with him for his participation in the development of a rifle, allegedly tried to fight for recognition of his authorship for a rifle, but to no avail. It is difficult to say here whether this is true or not, but it makes sense to note that such “oblivion” can be considered quite fair - after all, Mosin was on public service, received a salary and really worked on a rifle within the framework of the state technical assignment and by no means alone. The Russian state ideology of that time clearly did not provide for the exaltation of individual gunsmiths. Indicative is the fact that after the 1930s. modernization of the three-ruler, she never received the name Mosin. And in one of the Soviet military documents it was directly stated: “7.62-mm rifle mod. 1891, adopted by the Russian army in 1891, was designed by Captain Mosin together with other members of the commission formed for this.

Imperial decree on the start of production of the dragoon trilinear

But the main thing was different - as a result of this whole epic, a domestically developed rifle was adopted by the Russian army, after which the most difficult work began to establish the production of a three-ruler at the imperial arms factories. The tasks included ensuring the complete interchangeability of parts for new weapons, including those produced at different factories, which was a new level of quality for our industry. Sergei Ivanovich began to do this, continuing to cheer for his offspring with his soul. But here again we must understand that he could not deal with such complex tasks alone - at several factories a large number of people worked on this at the same time. Most likely, Sergei Ivanovich acted as a curator and coordinator of the work, which by no means begs his merits in this matter. Without going into unnecessary details, I note that this task was completed by Mosin and "his team" on time and in full.

Gross production of the new rifle was started at the end of 1892 at the Tula, Izhevsk and Sestroretsk arms factories. And by January 1, 1903, the re-equipment of the Russian army with magazine rifles was completed. In total, the troops received 2 million 964 thousand rifles manufactured at domestic factories, and about 500 thousand rifles from the first batch shipped from factories in France. The long journey of the Russian rifle across countless battlefields of large and small wars began.

Russian soldiers with a Mosin rifle. World War I.

Operational features of the Russian three-line rifle

Some readers' comments on the previous article about the Mosin rifle carry a whole set of myths, which let's deal with together. Fortunately, now any model of the three-ruler is available as a hunting carbine. Of course, the most affordable in all respects is the most common dragoon modification of the rifle (the price at the end of 2015 is about 10-25 thousand rubles). Basically, these are specimens of arr. 1891/30's pre-war and military editions. Carbines in good condition are quite rare, rifles produced before 1917 and the 1920s. - even rarer and they are expensive, and sometimes very expensive. Now you can buy a sniper version of the three-ruler (price 20-40 thousand rubles). As a rule, these are weapons of the Izhevsk factory, produced during the war years, with a PU sight on the Kochetov bracket.

The rarest collector's item - a three-line carbine arr. 1907 in perfect condition

The tsarist army was armed with three-line rifles of the following modifications: infantry, dragoon and Cossack. The carbine was not considered a full-fledged weapon then, but it was introduced in 1907 to arm the crews of machine-gun teams, artillerymen, and so on. In Soviet Russia, only the dragoon modification was left in service with all branches of the military, although in 1938 a carbine nevertheless appeared, last modified in 1944 and produced in Izhevsk until about 1950. At the end of the war, the dragoon three-line was also taken out of production - its excess length in a maneuver war was obvious to everyone. During the war, a huge number of “three rubles” were produced, mainly in Izhevsk (in total, Mosin rifles, according to various estimates, about 39 million were made). The conditions for the work of gunsmiths were terrible, and after all, mostly women and teenagers were employees of the factories, which should not be forgotten either. Nevertheless, it was possible to increase the production of rifles to 12 thousand units per day (!), thereby fully providing the Red Army with small arms (we do not touch other infantry small arms in this article).

7.62 mm carbines mod. 1938 and 1944 (photo by S. Eremeev)

After the war, a number of three-rulers were collected from the remaining backlog. Our rifles were also produced abroad, in the countries of the ATS, for example, in Poland, Romania and Hungary. All Eastern European “mosquitoes” rust terribly in the trunks and, compared to the Soviet ones, have a much smaller resource. In service with some units of the Soviet Army, a rifle arr. 1891/30's stood until about the 1960s, after which it was replaced by SKS carbines and Kalashnikov assault rifles (by the way, the names of the main developers were not forgotten in the name of these weapons). In the 1990s. due to the lack of SVD, old sniper three-line war-years of release were used in the combat units of the Russian army in the Caucasus in the 1990s. Interestingly, the three-ruler has not yet been withdrawn from service with the Russian Army. The terms “out of production” and “out of service” should not be confused here, because the T-34 tank was removed from service only in the 1990s.

The two photos above show the original three-line sniper rifles from the 1930s. with PE sights

And this is the most common sniper three-line, produced after 1942

In this photo - the weapon of the Wehrmacht - a modified Mauser carbine mod. 1898 with a telescopic sight. That is - a sniper "Mauser", and the original one.

Now some terminology. The name "three-ruler" for our rifle comes from the caliber of the bore, which is equal to three lines (the old measure of length, equal to one tenth of an inch, or 2.54 mm). Accordingly, three lines are equal to 7.62 mm, this is the caliber of our rifle along the rifling fields. By the way, one line is equal to ten points. Ordinary dots, placed in a row close to each other with a fairly sharpened pencil. Hard? And you remember about arshins, vershoks, sazhens and other versts. The inch measurement system in the domestic weapons school was used even after the war (calculated drawings of the Kalashnikov assault rifle barrel were made in inches). However, remember also what the diameter is still measured in water pipes in our homes? What about car rims? That's right, in inches. And it doesn’t scare or confuse anyone, right?

Next, the design features of the cartridge. You can often hear about the obsolescence of our flanged cartridge (which, by the way, is called Russian in the West). Like - because of the flange (welt), it is inconvenient and outdated even exactly at the time of its development by 1891. In fact, this design was required by the specifics of the combat use of our rifle in cold regions - for the “hat” of our cartridge it is simply easier to pull it out of the cartridge belt (I know about clips, but initially the three-ruler was generally developed in a single-shot version). Yes, and the rifles of the armies of France and England in both world wars used cartridges of the same "obsolete" design, but for some reason no one considers them obsolete. And we left the cartridge even after the Second World War, they don’t look for good from good, and our sofa experts should not consider themselves smarter than domestic gunsmiths.

Range. Do not confuse aiming range with effective fire distance. On the aiming bar of the three-ruler there are numbers up to 2 km. This is a very long distance for modern large-caliber sniper weapons with precision optics. Yes, a bullet from a “three-ruble note” will reach 2 km and kill a person, but at such distances they usually fired in volleys and at targets like an infantry column. But at 500 m from an open sight it is quite possible to hit a growth target with a gross cartridge from a three-ruler, if the vision allows you to see the target. During the Second World War, our snipers effectively shot up to 1 km from sniper rifles, but the real distances were limited to 400-600 m - the sight was only with a 3.5-fold increase, which is still frankly not enough. The survivability of the barrel of our rifle is more than sufficient - 15-20 thousand shots while maintaining the proper parameters for the accuracy of the battle.

Accuracy and accuracy of combat. I declare with all responsibility that a pre-war three-ruler with a good barrel and high-quality cartridge is capable of ensuring accuracy, which is also considered an indicator for modern weapons - within 1 MOA (one minute of arc or 30 mm per 100 m distance). I personally got an accuracy of about 1.5 MOA (40-45 mm) at 100 m when shooting from an open sight with a gross hunting cartridge from a 1928 rifle with a native barrel. Repeatedly met military-issue rifles with an accuracy of no more than 1 MOA. I know for sure about consistently positive results when shooting from a pre-war three-line rifle with a rare “Fighter” diopter sight at a distance of 1 km at a growth target and very accurate shots at a small target from the same rifle with a modern sight installed at a distance of up to 1250 m inclusive. This is the real indicator. So sofa warriors can once again be recommended to break away from computer games and find an opportunity to shoot from well-preserved historical weapons before mindlessly repeating worn out clichés.

Ergonomics. You can often hear that the three-ruler is an uncomfortable rifle. Like - the bolt handle is straight and too far from the shooter. Another nonsense from couch and computer theorists. Believe me, the bolt handle of the Mauser rifle, which is almost a reference for many, is not more convenient than the bolt handle of our rifle. And the practical rate of fire of a three-ruler in the hands of a trained shooter is comparable to a self-loading rifle - during the war years, Sergeant Nemtsov developed a method for rapid firing from a Mosin rifle, which allows hitting a chest target at a distance of 100 m 50 times within 52 seconds! it's one sighting shot per second, with clips reloading! So there is nothing to blame on the mirror ...

The three-ruler has a comfortable stock, relatively small mass, excellent balance and good weight distribution. Go to the military souvenir shop - now you can buy a mock-up of almost any weapon, which is an emasculated combat model. Twist the “three-ruble note” in your hands, throw up. Many questions will disappear by themselves. Generally speaking, our rifle was at least as good as its “classmates.

In 1934 on Vii party congress I.V. Stalin from the Tula gunsmiths was awarded unusual gift- 7.62 mm sniper rifle mod. 1891/30's

Conclusion

Probably, it is unlikely that anything would have changed in the military history of Russia if the name Mosin was officially added to the name of our three-line rifle. In any case, this weapon is the personification of Russian military glory, this is undeniable. The three-line, unlike the products of the Mauser brothers, was not originally designed for export and, in general, apart from several countries of the Warsaw Pact, was in service with the armies of the Russian Empire and the USSR.

One of the strategic postulates says that the most important quality of any type of weapon is the ability to quickly and completely replenish it during a big war. That is, mass army weapons should be as technologically advanced and cheap as possible. Here it must be recalled that before the war, the Red Army began to rearm with semi-automatic weapons, and the modern SVT-40 became the main infantry rifle. But, as you know, at the very beginning of the Second World War, the stocks of weapons available in warehouses and in the army were quickly exhausted for various reasons. And the evacuated factories simply could not cope with the production of a sufficient number of expensive and complex self-loading SVT (yes, there are still a considerable number of brand new SVT / AVT manufactured in 1944 in warehouses, but at the end of the war the situation allowed resuming the production of self-loading).

The rarest specimen is the Simonov ABC-36 automatic rifle.

SVT-40 (bottom) and AVT-40 (AVT - Tokarev automatic rifle, ordinary SVT, forced to be converted at the beginning of the war to the possibility of continuous fire).

Therefore, in the winter of 1942, our gunsmiths had to urgently restore the mass production of the Mosin rifle, at the same time bringing its manufacturing technology to the maximum possible threshold. At the same time, the rifle did not lose its fighting qualities. The front received the necessary number of weapons. The three-ruler fulfilled its purpose completely. And, probably, it is no longer so important who has priority in its development. Indeed, among the people, the “three-ruble note” is still called the “mosinka”.

Soviet female snipers during the Second World War with three-line sniper rifles issued after 1942. Pay attention, what beauties!

Yuri Maksimov.

The Mosin rifle, also popular as the eminent "three-ruler", was the main weapon of the 1917 revolution, as well as the Great Russian War. Specifically, the Mosin rifle of the standard of 1891 is rightfully considered one of the most famous examples of Russian guns. The royal three-line took a role in the Russo-Japanese, and later in the First World War.

The Russian "three-ruler", made before the twentieth century, for decades remained a modern and reliable weapon for a fighter, was one of the first Russian models adopted by the army. Now mmg Mosin rifles can be seen in museums. There are also existing modifications of the rifle, and not only in Russia, but also abroad. The design has changed, the drawings have been finalized, the technical properties have been changed, but the principle of the gun has remained the same. What is the history of the creation of the Mosin rifle? We offer an overview of the famous guns.

Creation story

The Mosin rifle was developed during the period of a sharp rise in technology and science, when the emergence of smokeless powder made it possible to switch to reduced calibers. And thanks to the development of weapons technology, it became possible to make a replacement for single-shot systems - store-fed systems. Naturally, our homeland was also in the process of developing weapons. Drawings and standards of small arms were created.

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As a result, the Russian army was presented with a choice of two magazine-type rifle systems - Belgian, Leon Nagant, also Russian, captain S.I. Mosin. Tests showed that the Belgian rifle was better than the Russian one. But top management took into account that:

• the Belgian rifle had twice as many misfires;
• the Russian rifle was cheaper and easier to manufacture.

The generals eventually made a compromise: in 1891, the Mosin rifle was adopted by the Russian army, but the design of the 5-round Nagant magazine was installed on it. Together with the rifle, a new three-line cartridge (7.62 mm) was also adopted. The rifle of the ball was adopted as a three-line, and the fighters dubbed the gun as a "three-line". This gun received the name Mosin only in Russian times, when it was modernized in 1930. The Russian three-line rifle has always been called "Mosin-Nagant" abroad.

Inventor of the "three-line"

The history of the creation of the "three-ruler" was complex. Several designers took part in the development of the best repeating rifle in the world, but Sergey Ivanovich Mosin made the most significant contribution. History was not fair to him in almost everything, because his rifle during his lifetime did not bear the name of Mosin, this was very disappointing for the designer.

Inventor Mosin was born in the Voronezh region in the village of Ramon. He graduated from the military and artillery school, the artillery academy. In 1875 he became the head of the tool workshop of the arms factory in Tula. By 1880, he was already developing single-shot rifles and was an expert in weaponry. In 1894 he became the head of the Sestroretsk arms factory.

Cartridges for the "three-ruler"

The cartridge was created by the Russian designer Veltishchev by analogy with the French cartridge from the Lebel rifle, caliber 8x56 mm R. It used:

1. blunt shell bullets;
2. smokeless powder charge;
3. sleeve with a protruding bottle-shaped rim.

The mechanism of the sleeve with a rim, which was already obsolete, was adopted due to the low level of development of the Russian industry - the tolerances used are the least strict. This determined the economic and military base.

Adoption

The standard gun of 1891 (caliber 7.62) was put into service in 3 versions (in practice, they were distinguished only by the length of the barrel):

1. Infantry rifle - longer bayonet and barrel.

2. Dragoon (cavalry) rifle - the barrel length is shorter, well, the method of fastening the belt has been changed.

3. Cossack rifle - there was no bayonet and there was a smaller barrel.

The bayonet for the rifle was adopted by a slightly outdated standard - a tetrahedral needle-like one, with a tubular sleeve fastened, which was worn on the barrel. The bayonet had a square section with small valleys along the edges; when disassembling the gun, a point sharpened to a plane could be used as a screwdriver.

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The main drawback of the system, which was corrected only in 1938, was that the bayonet had to be always carried in a combat position, attached to the rifle, disassembly was not supposed. "Three-rulers" were shot (not counting the Cossack) with an attached bayonet. If disassembly and removal of the bayonet was carried out, then the balance of the gun was disturbed - the bullets flew past the target. In addition, over time, the attachment of bayonets led to loosening, and the accuracy of shooting deteriorated. The defect was eliminated only in the modification of 1930.

The gun of early samples was distinguished by the absence of barrel linings, and also by the barrel, which was open at the top along the entire length. Since 1894, wooden top plates have been used to protect the shooter's hands from burns. At the time the gun was put into service, Russian enterprises could not yet start producing new rifles, so the initial order was placed in France, in the town of Chatellerault.

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Exclusively in 1893-94, the rifle device went into mass production, it was established near St. Petersburg at the Sestroretsk Arms Plant under the direction of Mosin, in Izhevsk and Tula a little later. During the First World War, rifles had to be ordered from the United States to make up for front-line losses. Orders in 1916 are located at the factories of the Westinghouse and Remington companies. After 1917, most of the rifles remained in the United States, where they were sold or used for initial soldier training in the army.

Technical properties

Standard rifle 1891/1930 Is a bolt action magazine rifle with twist-lock action.

Technical properties:

• Caliber - 7.62 mm.
• The total weight without cartridges with a bayonet is 4.5 kg.
• The total length without bayonet is 114 cm.
• The total length with bayonet is 166 cm.
• The shape of the paresis is rectangular.
• The number of grooves - 4.
• Magazine capacity - 5 rounds.
• The weight of the clip, together with cartridges - 122-132 g.

Shooting can be carried out with regular cartridges with heavy and light bullets, with incendiary, tracer and armor-piercing bullets.

Device

The scheme of operation of the Mosin rifle is based on the following principle:

1. The barrel is locked on two lugs with a longitudinally sliding rotary bolt behind the receiver. The stops are located in the front part of the shutter, they are placed in the locked state in a horizontal plane.
2. The cocking of the drummer, as well as putting it on a combat platoon, is carried out when the shutter is opened.
3. The shutter mechanism is conventional in design. The reload handle is located in the middle of the shutter.
4. Instead of a fuse, a trigger head (drummer) is used, located behind the bolt.
5. The shutter from the receiver is simply removed without the help of a tool.
6. The magazine is box-shaped, with a single-row arrangement of cartridges, non-removable. Due to the fact that the lower cover of the magazine is hinged, the magazine is cleaned and quickly unloaded. Store equipment - one cartridge with the shutter open through the upper window of the receiver or from lamellar clips for 5 rounds.
7. Due to the peculiarities of the store, the design has a special detail - a cut-off that overlaps the 2nd and lower cartridges in the store when the top one is fed into the barrel.
8. The mechanism involves turning off the cutoff, if the shutter is one hundred percent closed, this makes it possible for the next cartridge to rise to the supply line.

Dismantling the rifle due to its manufacturability was not a problem.

Modifications of rifles were not limited only to the types of troops, the Mosin sniper rifle was also created. The sniper rifle was also created on the basis of the 7.62 mm Mosin system. The sniper rifle was adopted by the Red Army in 1931. Only the best fighters who had received special training were allowed to shoot from a similar sniper rifle.

The Mosin sniper rifle is great for point shots at distant single targets. Shooting accuracy with an optical sight was ensured at a range of 100-1300 meters. But because of the optical sight, it was unrealistic to make a rifle design for a magazine - it was necessary to load only the cartridge.

The review was applicable, the scope had 3.5x magnification. Accuracy was provided with the help of an aiming stump, also an aiming thread perpendicular to it.

Trunk modifications were not actually provided, they were taken from ordinary rifles or were manufactured using special technologies. The latter - led to an improvement in the accuracy and properties of shots. The Mosin sniper rifle was extremely popular during the 2nd World War, in which the soldiers of the Red Army destroyed enemies with it. The gun made it possible to drastically limit the mobile capabilities of opponents, because they knew that maneuvering routes were under the gun of similar sniper units.

Technical properties of the rifle:

• caliber: 7.62 mm;
• weight: 4.27 kg;
• initial bullet speed: 865 m/s;
• length: 1230 mm;
• magazine capacity: 5 rounds;
• effective range: 1300-2000 m;
• rate of fire: 10 shots per minute;
• loading type: manual.

Sight properties:

• increase: 3.5-fold;
• exit pupil diameter: 6 mm;
• field of view: 4° 30';
• the distance of the exit pupil from the surface of the eyepiece lens is 72 mm;
• resolving power: 17″;
• sight length: 169 mm;
• sight weight: 0.270 kg.

Rifle pros and cons

For decades, the Mosin rifle was praised by Russian propaganda as the best weapon that surpassed other standards of its class. But, it must be admitted that she was not a flawless prototype.

Rifle pros:

1. cheap and ordinary in manufacturing, maintenance;
2. available to poorly trained and illiterate fighters;
3. high strength and reliable;
4. for its own time, the rifle had excellent ballistic properties.

Rifle flaws:

1. a bayonet of an outdated design, permanently attached to the rifle;
2. the horizontal bolt handle was not very comfortable when reloading and carrying the gun;
3. the bolt handle is located far from the neck of the butt - it contributed to knocking down the sight and slowed down reloading.

In general, the Mosin rifle is the usual standard of the Russian weapons idea, when ergonomics and convenience in appeal were sacrificed for ease of development and production, reliability and low cost.

Mosin rifle video

Mosin sniper rifle shooting

The legendary "three-ruler", the famous "Mosinka" faithfully served the Russian soldier for over 50 years. And the Mosin carbine created on its basis served as the progenitor of hunting weapons, which are still used today! What characteristics, advantages and disadvantages does the Mosin hunting carbine have and in what modifications is it produced?

A bit of history

At the end of the 19th century, the Russian imperial army faced the problem of a serious technical lag in terms of small arms. The 7.62-mm Mosin rifle of the 1891 model was called upon to correct the situation, which for many years became the main weapon of rifle units and subunits. In 1910, the rifle underwent the first major upgrade for a new cartridge with a pointed bullet. Another major restyling was made in 1930, after which the rifle received its final name: the Mosin rifle of the 1891/1930 model.

Various modifications were produced in different periods. The most famous and common are the following options:

• shortened Mosin cavalry rifle;
• infantry rifle;
• Cossack carbine.

As for the carbines, the first of them saw the light in 1907. It was shorter than a rifle, but the firing range was only 1,000 meters, as opposed to 2,000 "rifle" meters. In 1938, the Mosin carbine was seriously upgraded. In fact, it was a new type of weapon that was equipped with artillery units, auxiliary units and military personnel who were forced to carry out operations in confined spaces.

It is curious that the Mosin carbine of the 1944 model of the year became a kind of "gravedigger" of the three-ruler. The fact is that simultaneously with the adoption of the carbine into service Soviet army rifle production was discontinued. However, it was this option that served as the prototype for the hunting version of this weapon.

Design and principle of operation

The carbine based on the Mosin rifle is a rifled weapon of 7.62 mm caliber. The magazine holds 5 cartridges, which are manually reloaded using the cut-off function of the lower cartridges. The barrel is locked and reloaded thanks to a sliding rotary bolt with two stops. The shutter is equipped with a cylindrical mainspring and a simple drummer.

The so-called Mosin cavalry carbine, like most modifications of the "three-ruler", did not have a fuse, the role of which was played by the drummer. In addition, one of the distinguishing features of the carbine model 1944 is the presence of a fixed side-folding bayonet.

Shooting and reloading take place in several cycles. The main component of both a rifle and a carbine is the action. He sends the cartridge into the chamber, locks the bore during the shot, removes the cartridge case or cartridge that misfired. In order to fire a shot, it is necessary to insert a cartridge, and by moving the bolt forward, send it. Having fired, it is necessary to turn the bolt handle up and pull it towards you to eject the cartridge case. After that, the shutter must be returned to its original position by moving forward and down. Assembly and disassembly of the Mosin rifle is not particularly difficult.

Advantages and disadvantages

Mosin carbines of various modifications are quite popular among modern hunters.

Among the advantages of this family of hunting weapons, the following should be noted:

• high accuracy;
• sufficient accuracy inherent in rifled weapons;
• unpretentiousness in operation and maintenance;
• reliability.

True, it was not without drawbacks. The main bottlenecks of Mosin hunting carbines are:

• difficulties with the selection of the sight, which will be discussed below;
• relatively low resource of a rifled barrel;
• insufficiently comfortable regular bed;
• the almost complete absence of ammunition suitable for use in hunting.

However, these problems can be solved. So, as ammunition, in addition to regular ones, you can use an army cartridge for the Mosin rifle or corrective (for caliber 7.62 mm). With a certain skill to the carbine, you can pick up and fit the appropriate optical sight.

Comparison of the characteristics of a rifle and a carbine

Carabiners and Mosin's three-ruler: the technical characteristics inherent in a rifle and a carbine can be clearly seen in the following comparison:

Mosin rifle, characteristics:

• caliber: 7.62 mm;
• weight: 4.27 kg;
• length: 1230 mm;
• muzzle velocity: 865 m/s;
• effective range: 1300-2000 m.

Mosin carbine, specifications (sample 1944):

• caliber: 7.62 mm;
• weight (with bayonet): 4.00 kg;
• length (with bayonet): 1330 mm;
• muzzle velocity: 765 m/s;
• sighting range 1000-1300 m.

As you can see, despite the fact that the carbine has become, as it were, a logical continuation of the evolutionary chain of development of the Mosin rifle, the characteristics of the two representatives of this family differ quite noticeably in some parameters.

Overview of hunting modifications of carbines

If we talk purely about civilian (hunting) modifications of the Mosin carbine, then the most notable of them are the following.

Hunting carbine "Moose" (KO-8,2)

This is also a Mosin rifle, the caliber of which, however, is not the traditional 7.62 mm, but 8.20 mm. The carbine is designed to work on large and medium-sized animals. It is characterized by a fairly high muzzle velocity and relatively low weight. It is produced in several modifications, which differ in the rifling pitch, the shape of the stock, the presence of a sector sight and some other nuances.

The most important performance characteristics of this model:

• length: 1010 mm;
• weight: 3 kg;
• initial shot speed: 440 m/s;
• magazine capacity: 5 rounds.

Hunting carbine "Moose 7-1"

Weapons of a more familiar caliber 7.62 designed for animal hunting. Designed for various brands of imported cartridges, which are placed in a removable magazine. It can work with both optical and conventional diopters.

Other performance characteristics of this model:

• weight (without optics and ammunition): 3.5 kg;
• muzzle velocity: 830 m/s;
• effective range: 100…300 m;
• magazine capacity: 5 rounds 7.62x51 mm.

Hunting rifle KO-91/30

The Mosin shotgun is a civilian (hunting) modification of the 1944 model carbine. Designed for hunting large and medium game. The main distinguishing feature is the presence of a fuse. Designed for the 7.62x54 R cartridge. It can be used with both conventional and optical sights.

It has the following main characteristics:

• length: 1232 mm;
• weight (without ammunition and sight): 4.0 kg;
• muzzle velocity: 800 m/s;
• sighting range: up to 300 meters;
• magazine capacity: 5 rounds.

There are Mosin rifles and carbines of some other modifications, today already discontinued or not fully related to hunting weapons. An example is the pneumatic version of the carbine, produced in the cutoff form factor. Such weapons are used for self-defense, sports shooting (ammunition in the form of balls), and can also be used for hunting game and small animals (shot).

Sights

The Mosin rifle with a telescopic sight has become a real classic of the Great Patriotic War. Regular optical sights for the Mosin rifle were designated PU or PE. They had a 3.5-fold increase and provided fairly acceptable accuracy and accuracy of the battle. However, due to design features, the use of optical sights excluded the possibility of batch loading. In addition to the fact that there was a special sniper version, the optical sight on the Mosin rifle was often installed on conventional weapon modifications. True, this was due to tangible inconveniences associated with fitting the bracket, zeroing in a rifle or carbine, and balancing weapons.

These same problems have remained almost unchanged to this day. Although there is a variant of the KO-91/30 hunting carbine with a standard sight of the same name. But the use of conventional army-style sniper optics or imported ones is associated with great difficulties, first of all, with the installation of the sight, since not every of them is purely structurally suitable for those fasteners that hunting models are equipped with.

Nevertheless, despite some shortcomings and minor disadvantages, Mosin carbines quite regularly serve as a hunting weapon. Good ballistic performance, accuracy and accuracy, use different types cartridges, reliability and unpretentiousness made this gun and its various modifications a worthy choice for a serious hunter!

Video

We provide for viewing a documentary video about the legendary weapon of the Second World War - the Mosin rifle.

7.62 mm (3-line) rifle, model 1891 (Mosin rifle, three-ruler listen)) is a repeating rifle adopted by the Russian Imperial Army in 1891.

Name three-ruler comes from the caliber of a rifle barrel, which is equal to three Russian lines(the old measure of length, equal to one tenth of an inch, or 2.54 mm - respectively, three lines are equal to 7.62 mm).

PERFORMANCE AND TECHNICAL CHARACTERISTICS
Model:	M91/30	M38	M44
Manufacturer:	Tula arms factory IzhMash
Cartridge:
Caliber:	7.62 mm
Weight without cartridges:	4 kg	3.4 kg	4.1 kg
Weight with cartridges:	4.13 kg	3.53 kg	4.26 kg
Length:	1232 (with bayonet 1500) mm	1016 mm	1016 (with bayonet 1330) mm
Barrel length:	730 mm	514 mm
Number of grooves in the barrel:	4 right hand
Trigger mechanism (USM):	Impact type
Operating principle:	Sliding Butterfly Valve
Fuse:	Turn the trigger
Aim:	Front sight with namushnik and sector sight
Effective range:	800 m	400 m
Sighting range:	2000 m	1000 m
Muzzle velocity:	870 m/s	816 m/s
Ammunition type:	Integral magazine, equipped with clips for five rounds
Number of rounds:	4+1
Years of production:	1930–1945	1938–1945	1944–1949

History of creation and production

In 1882, the Main Artillery Directorate of the Russian Empire set the task of developing a multi-shot, “repeating” rifle. In 1883, the "Commission for Testing Magazine Guns" was formed (then any long-barreled hand weapon was called guns, and the word "rifle" denoted a type of gun) under the chairmanship of Major General N. I. Chagina.

As a result of long-term work in this area of ​​​​the Russian army in 1889, two systems of magazine rifles were presented to choose from - domestic, developed by Captain S. I. Mosin, and Belgian, developed by Leon Nagant. The tests revealed some superiority of the Belgian rifle over the Russian one; in any case, the officers and soldiers who took part in the small arms tests of weapons unanimously spoke in favor of Nagant rifle. However, the top management took into account that for all its excellent qualities, the Belgian rifle misfired twice as much as the Mosin rifle, as well as the fact that the Russian rifle was simpler and cheaper to manufacture. In the end, the members of the commission compromised: in 1891, the Mosin rifle was adopted by the Russian army, on which a 5-round Nagant design magazine was installed.

In the new model being made, there are parts proposed by Colonel Rogovtsev, the commission of Lieutenant General Chagin, Captain Mosin and gunsmith Nagan, so it is advisable to give the developed model a name: Russian 3-lin. rifle model 1891.

On April 16, 1891, Emperor Alexander III approved the sample, deleting the word "Russian", so the rifle was adopted under the name " three-line rifle model 1891».

Mosin left the rights to the individual parts of the rifle developed by him and awarded him the Big Mikhailovsky Prize (for outstanding developments in the artillery and infantry unit).

However, the rifle did not remain without a personal name for long - very quickly the soldiers gave her the nickname "three-ruler", under which she went down in history. Mosin's name was returned to the weapon only in Soviet time, during its modernization in 1930. Abroad, the Russian rifle has always been called "Mosin-Nagant".

Rifle production began in 1892 on Tula, Izhevsk and Sestroretsk Arms Plants. Due to the limited production capacity of these factories, an order for 500,000 rifles was placed at the French arms factory in Châtellerault (Fr. Manufacture Nationale d'Armes de Châtelleraut).

Already in the first years after the adoption of the rifle into service, during the production and operation of the weapon, changes began to be made to the original design. So, in 1893, a wooden handguard was introduced to protect the shooter's hands from burns, in 1896 - a new ramrod, longer and with a larger diameter head that does not go into the barrel, which simplified cleaning of the weapon. Eliminated the notch on the sides of the lid of the magazine box, which, when carrying weapons, wiped uniforms. These improvements were also made to the design of previously released rifles.

By the beginning of the Russo-Japanese War, approximately 3,800,000 rifles had been supplied to the army.

After the adoption in 1908 of a cartridge with a pointed ("offensive") bullet in 1910, a new version of the rifle was adopted with a sight of the Konovalov system, corresponding to the ballistics of the new cartridge.

By the time Russia entered the First World War, the Russian army had 4,519,700 rifles in service, and three versions of the rifle were in production - dragoon, infantry and Cossack. During the war, the Russian military industry produced 3,286,232 three-line rifles, repaired and fixed 289,431.

Due to the catastrophic lack of weapons and the problems of domestic industry, the Russian government began to purchase rifles from several foreign systems abroad, and also ordered in the United States from companies Remington and Westinghouse 1.5 million rifles mod. 1891/10 Some of them were never delivered to Russia - after the Revolution they were confiscated by the US government.

During the civil war, two types of rifles were produced in Russia - dragoon and, to a much lesser extent, infantry. After the end of the war, since 1922, only dragoon rifle and carbine arr. 1907 year.

In the early years of Soviet power, a wide discussion unfolded about the advisability of upgrading or replacing an existing rifle with a more advanced one. As a result of the discussion in 1924, a committee was formed to modernize the rifle mod. 1891

As a result of the modification of the dragoon version of the rifle, as shorter and more convenient, a single model appeared - rifle model 1891/1930. (GAU index - 56-B-222). Although she contained whole line improvements relative to the original model, compared with analogues that were in service with the armies of the states-probable enemies of the USSR, it still did not look the best. However, the magazine rifle by that time was no longer the only type of infantry small arms, therefore, in those years, the emphasis was placed primarily on the creation of more modern and advanced types of it - submachine guns, machine guns, self-loading and automatic rifles.

Mass production also began in 1932. sniper rifle mod. 1891/30(GAU index - 56-B-222A), characterized by improved quality of bore processing, the presence of an optical sight PE, PB or (subsequently) PU and a bolt handle bent down. A total of 108,345 units were produced. sniper rifles, they were intensively used during the Soviet-Finnish and World War II and have established themselves as a reliable and effective weapon. Currently, Mosin sniper rifles are of collectible value (especially the "nominal" rifles that were awarded to the best Soviet snipers).

In 1938, a modernized similar to the main model was also adopted. carbine arr. 1938, which was a modification of the 1907 model carbine. It became longer than its predecessor by 5 mm and was designed for aimed fire at a distance of up to 1,000 m. , who needed a light and easy-to-handle weapon, mostly for self-defense.

The latest version of the rifle was carbine arr. 1944, distinguished by the presence of a non-removable needle bayonet and simplified manufacturing technology. Simultaneously with its introduction, the 1891/1930 model rifle itself. has been taken out of production. The shortening of infantry weapons was an urgent requirement put forward by the experience of the Great Patriotic War. The carbine made it possible to increase the maneuverability of infantry and other branches of the armed forces, since it became more convenient to fight with it in various earthen fortifications, buildings, dense thickets, etc., and its fighting qualities both in fire and in bayonet combat compared to a rifle practically did not decrease.

Carbine mod. 1944 with fixed needle bayonet

After the fairly successful Tokarev self-loading rifle (SVT) was adopted in 1938, it was assumed that in the early 1940s it would almost completely replace the Mosin rifle in the Red Army and become the main weapon of the Soviet infantry, following the US Army, which adopted in 1936 on armed with a Garanda self-loading rifle. According to pre-war plans, in 1941 it was supposed to release 1.8 million. SVT, in 1942 - 2 million. In fact, by the beginning of the war, more than 1 million SVT were manufactured, and many units and formations of the first line, mainly in the western military districts, received a regular number of self-loading rifles.

However, the plans for the complete re-equipment of the Red Army with automatic weapons were not fulfilled due to the outbreak of World War II - since 1941, the production of SVT as more complex in comparison with a magazine rifle and a submachine gun was reduced significantly, and one of the main types of weapons of the Soviet army remained modernized rifle mod. 1891 of the year, although supplemented by very significant quantities (more than half of the total number of small arms at the end of the war) of self-loading rifles and submachine guns.

Soviet soldiers in the field during the offensive in the Kharkov direction. 1942 year

In 1931, 154,000 were produced, in 1938 - 1,124,664, in 1940 - 1,375,822.

In 1943, in the occupied territory of Belarus, a railway engineer T. E. Shavgulidze developed the design 45 mm rifle grenade launcher, in total, in 1943-1944, in the workshops of the Minsk partisan unit, Soviet partisans manufactured 120 rifle grenade launchers of the Shavgulidze system, which were mounted on rifles of the Mosin system.

Production of the main rifle mod. 1891/30 was discontinued in early 1945 Carbine mod. 1944 years was produced until the start of production of the Kalashnikov assault rifle. Rifles and carbines were gradually removed from service with the army, replacing the SKS carbine and Kalashnikov assault rifle(although a number of carbines arr. 1944 continued to be used in the paramilitary security system).

Design and principle of operation

Cut-off reflector is controlled by the movement of the bolt and serves to separate the cartridges fed from the magazine box to the receiver, preventing possible delays in feeding caused by the engagement of the edges of the cartridges with each other, and also plays the role of a reflector of spent cartridges. Before the modernization of 1930, it was a single piece, after that it consisted of a blade with a reflective protrusion and a spring part.

Complete disassembly of the rifle (click on the picture to enlarge it)
1 - barrel with receiver, 2 - stock, 3 - handguard, 4 - magazine box with trigger guard, 5 - tip, 6 - tip screw, 7 - front spring of the stock ring, 8 - rear spring of the stock ring, 9 - front false ring, 10 - rear false ring, 11 - ramrod, 12 - ramrod stop, 13 - dowel bolt, 14 - dowel nut, 15 - butt nape, 16 - butt nape fastening screws (2), 17 - magazine fastening bolt, 18 - receiver mounting bolt, 19 - front sight with a front sight, 20 - sight parts, 21 - cut-off reflector, 22 - magazine box cover and feed mechanism parts, 23 - cover latch, 24 - trigger mechanism parts, 25 - shutter and its parts, 26 - gun belt with two trenchers.

The cut-off reflector is considered one of the key design details of the rifle introduced by Mosin, which ensures the reliability and non-failure operation of the weapon in any conditions. At the same time, its very presence was caused by the use of obsolete cartridges with a rim, which are not very convenient for feeding from a magazine.

However, even the Lee system stores adopted for English rifles Lee Metford and Lee-Enfield, who also used a rimmed cartridge, did not have a reflector cut-off, instead of which the magazine had spring jaws on top and a diamond-shaped profile, due to which the cartridges were located in it so that the rim of the upper cartridge stood in front of the rim of the one following it, and their engagement was excluded (herringbone). It was this scheme that later became generally accepted for stores for welted (having a rim) cartridges.

Advantages and disadvantages

Dignity

• Good ballistics and high power of the cartridge (at the level of .30-06), despite the fact that many analogues at that time still used black powder;
• Great survivability of the barrel and bolt;
• Undemanding to manufacturing technology and large tolerances;
• Reliability, non-failure operation of the rifle mechanisms in any conditions;
• Simple and robust construction shutter, consisting of only 7 parts; it disassembles and assembles quickly and without any tools;
• The magazine box is well closed at the bottom;
• Durable stock and butt;
• Cheap frame clip;
• Easy-to-remove shutter for cleaning;
• Sufficient rate of fire of the rifle;
• A separate combat larva of the shutter, the replacement of which in the event of a breakdown is much cheaper than replacing the entire shutter;
• Cheap replacement of wooden parts.

Flaws

It is worth noting that both the experimental Mosin rifle of 1885 and the Nagant rifle had a bolt handle moved back, located in a special cutout, separated from the window for ejection of spent cartridges by a jumper, which also strengthened the receiver; however, when testing the 1885 rifle of the year, it turned out that with this arrangement of the handle, delays often occur when reloading, caused by the fact that the long sleeves of a soldier's overcoat fell between Bolt stem - de-tal or constructive-tiv-but combined de-ta-whether in a moving system of arrows-of-the-th-weapon, attachment -dying in the movement for the creative. "> the stem of the shutter and the receiver, and from a separate cutout for the handle, it was considered necessary to abandon, returning to the same configuration of the receiver as on the Berdan rifle;

• A straight butt neck, less comfortable when shooting than a semi-pistol neck on the latest rifles at that time, although more durable and comfortable in a bayonet fight;
• The Mosin fuse is very simple, but inconvenient to use and short-lived due to the brightening of the safety protrusion with frequent use (how much a fuse is needed on a magazine rifle is a moot point);
• Some lag behind advanced foreign counterparts in the design of small parts and accessories, for example, outdated and quickly loosened stock rings, a sight vulnerable to impacts, less comfortable than side, lower "infantry" swivels (since 1910 replaced by also not the most convenient slots for belt passage, originally available on a dragoon rifle), uncomfortable ramrod stop, etc .;
• Low quality wooden parts due to the use of cheap wood, especially on later releases

Usage

The rifle was actively used from 1891 until the end of World War II.

Video

Rifle shooting, weapon handling, etc.:

An excerpt from the film "Weapons of the First World War" of the documentary series "Domestic Small Arms" tells about the history of the creation of the famous three-line rifle of the Mosin system and its modifications. Mosin rifle (three-ruler) 1891 - Jerry Michulek (Jerry Miculek) Overview of the sniper rifle model 1891/1930. with a PU sight (in English)