My Izhevsk M44

[Velba]

This is technically my second firearm purchase, although I was in possession of it before the 91/30 I purchased, because I got this one at a local gun show. My 91/30 came in the mail. Photobucket album of my M44 here There is one part of the stock that has some sort of damage, not sure from when, where, or what. But everything else is perfect on it. I somehow failed to get a photo of the receiver stamps , I'll have to get to that this week along with more photos of my 91/30. If anyone has any thoughts on the cause of this damage to my stock, I would love to hear them

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[Ironnewt]

Possibly "Ivan" hit the deck with his carbine infront of himand landed on some debris which gouged the stock. Upon being refurb'ed the armorer decided that the stock did not need a plug/slice/repair and it was left as is. Conjecture on my part, but unfortunately we will never know for sure.

[redhat10]

Damage, a recruit or other user simply tapped the ammo clips, point first to line up the bullets for loading..They did not always stay in line...I have noticed the same damages for other rifles, esp the M1 garand, where bullets needed to be push in alignmet to load properly....Either that or they were very nervous and dug at the stock while on duty..try a clip of ammo, I will BET the holes line up with the bullet tips...BTW, the rest of the rifle is simply very nice. metal is great...RH10

[SA1911a1]

Damage, a recruit or other user simply tapped the ammo clips, point first to line up the bullets for loading..They did not always stay in line...I have noticed the same damages for other rifles, esp the M1 garand, where bullets needed to be push in alignmet to load properly....Either that or they were very nervous and dug at the stock while on duty..try a clip of ammo, I will BET the holes line up with the bullet tips...BTW, the rest of the rifle is simply very nice. metal is great...RH10

I would bet that that damage is post service. If not, the soldier who did that to government property would either still be cleaning latrines or he found out what the Nagant revolver was used for.

[Junk Yard Dog]

No, this is one of the early imports, they came in from the Balkan states, see the early tiny import mark up by the muzzle? From what we have seen on more recent Balkan import M44's there seems to have been more tolerance for stock customization than would be found in the Soviet Red Army.

[Velba]

Here is the picture(s) of the actual barrel stamps! Sorry for the poor quality of my photos, stuck using a phone camera.