The Russian Mosin Nagant Forum

So,

I made this little target this morning. What you are looking at is a red circle with a diameter of precisely 3.5 centimeters (1.38"). The standard for a PU sniper (presumably rifle and shooter) was 10 shots within this circle at 100 meters. The ammo you see is PPU 182gr. Match. I have not fired my original Tula PU in a long, long time, and she is nowhere near dialed in. I was not a sniper, but am a pretty good shot. I am telling you right now, there is no freaking way I can drill 10 consecutive rounds into that circle at this time, with this rifle, I mean, short of Divine intervention or something. Kind of puts it into perspective regards what was expected of men and their equipment.




GS

The rifle is only a tool, it is the skill of the shooter that is required to get the most performance out of the tool. You are measuring yourself up against the expected performance of 18-22 year old near perfect physical specimens with excellent eyesight who were specifically selected from a much larger group of same for the natural shooting skills they showed. These selected kids were then given special training in marksmanship and all the other many skills one must master to be a real sniper and issued with brand new PU sniper rifles. Mix in a serious dose of anger and hate for the enemy they will be set against and you have the formula for perfect killing machines. Do you fit into any of the above categories other than being the owner of an antique Soviet PU sniper rifle? If not then you are like 99.9% of PU owners, enjoy the history of the rifle, plink some tin cans and be thankful you don't have to be that Soviet kid crawling around in the cold mud on some 1944 battlefield blowing peoples brains out to avenge what's been done to you and yours. Have fun and don't worry about how well, or poorly you shoot with it.

Dial your bolt action deer rifle scope down to 3.5 and see how you do at 100 yd. Some people have high expectations of an old WW2 fixed power scope, when you may have a better one on your .22 squirrel rifle.

I would rank the PU scope as near dead last among my scoped rifles, all the others being commercial sporters with Western optics.

steelbuttplate wrote:Dial your bolt action deer rifle scope down to 3.5 and see how you do at 100 yd. Some people have high expectations of an old WW2 fixed power scope, when you may have a better one on your .22 squirrel rifle.

That is true. My $40.00 Bushnell .22 scope beats the pants off of a PU scope.

However it is as Chuck Yeager said, "It is the man, not the machine." In 1941 the PU was a winning proposition. The Soviets did much the same with sniper systems as they did with other systems; overwhelm the opposition with numbers and losses be damned (men included) ....and it worked. While the Germans wasted resources and manpower building "wonder weapons", the Soviets built something that worked and then built overwhelming numbers of them.

Russians and the Germans who captured the PUs did a lot of deadly work with these combinations of rifle and scope. Sniping is as much, or more, about getting in position and range to make a shot, then getting out alive, then about marksmanship. The Soviet and German snipers did very well at ranges up to 400 yards. In Carlos Hathcock's book, he talks about when the US was ramping up it's sniper school system during Vietnam, one of the leading instructors said that he could teach anyone to shoot accurately in just a few weeks, but he could not teach just anyone to be a "sniper."

In shooting the scout scope system on 91/30 and T-53, I seen that using the bottom thick vertical line. Use the Tip of the thick part at 500-600 yd. like you would a PU. When its set up right, the accuracy is amazing for a $200 package, or it was a few years, a while back. These were those cheap Mosin accessory pack w/scopes, mounts, recoil pad strap etc.

Best group I have ever shot with any rifle is this one. Shot prone with just a sling for support. 100yds. With the 2 flyers it might be an inch. But 8 made a ragged hole. Granted, it is no Mosin.

The qualifying 10 rounds were fired from a bench rest. Locked down and held in a vise grip.

With a person the effective engagement range was 300 meters and less. And the target was a torso or head. Sniper targets are a bit more forgiving than the 3.5 centimeter target. A head or torso. In combat, you are not restricted to the tight shot group, only to the kill.

I've got two M-39's that will come close to that, 4-5 yrs ago. I've got a 50 mile drive to a bench rest now, the damn NC Wildlife tore our regular one made from pallets down. but I'll make an effort to get there and see what I can do with them at age 60. All Mosins that still have good bores will outshoot any other iorn sighted rifles I've got, but I'm still working on a Carcano and my M1A might do as well. One '39 Tula would be in the contest also.

Genetically Swiss wrote:So,

I made this little target this morning. What you are looking at is a red circle with a diameter of precisely 3.5 centimeters (1.38"). The standard for a PU sniper (presumably rifle and shooter) was 10 shots within this circle at 100 meters. The ammo you see is PPU 182gr. Match. I have not fired my original Tula PU in a long, long time, and she is nowhere near dialed in. I was not a sniper, but am a pretty good shot. I am telling you right now, there is no freaking way I can drill 10 consecutive rounds into that circle at this time, with this rifle, I mean, short of Divine intervention or something. Kind of puts it into perspective regards what was expected of men and their equipment.




GS

Don't be so hard on yourself, GS. The rifles were brand new, right off the production line, and sighted in by Armorers at the factory. All a good shot had to do was fire one group to see where they were hitting, re-zero, and qualify.

During WWl & WWll most of the best snipers from all countries tended to be farm boys who had a lot of hunting experience. You didn't need to teach them to shoot just get them familiar with the weapon. 89% of all enemy planes shot down during WWll by Americans was done by only 11% of pilots. Almost all farm boys that hunted. A quoted by someone already it's the Man not the Machine by Chuck Yeager. I had the honor to meet this living legend once and he's still alive and kicking.