The Russian Mosin Nagant Forum

I recently purchased an unscrubbed Balkan 1909 Izhevsk M91 from Zeebill at a local gun show. According to my research on mosinnagant.net, the correct sling for a Great War Mosin is a 1 inch wide leather strap with a buckle and a button and held to the rifle with two leather dog collars like the later slings.

I know I am not going to find an original nor do I want one as the rifle will be going to the range often and possibly be used in reenacting. I just want to fabricate something that looks the part and can be used for its intended purpose.

The closest sling I have found that matches the description of the original is a leather Yugo SKS sling. Would that coupled with Soviet dog collars work? Is there another type of sling the would be even closer?

Sounds similar to many early leather slings that are not the US M1907. I have seen French LeBel slings and Japanese Arisaka slings that sound like that. I was buying original LeBel slings from the home of reproduction stuff, IMA, International Military Antiquities. Check with them and see what they have.

Never say never, leather can last a very long time, I have slings that have passed the century mark. Both of my US M1903 rifles that were Great War bringhomes have original US M1907 leather slings still on them. Rare to be sure, and likely only still here because both rifles service ended in 1918-19

I looked at the Lebel slings and in fact have one on my Berthier M1916. They are about as wide as a US 1907 sling which is a bit much for an M91. I took a second glance at the pictures of the original M91 sling on mn.net and it looked almost identical to the green leather Finnish M39 slings except the leather was brown.

I have a Finn m30 that someone had stuck a well used yugo mauser sling on with the Finn dog collars. Works well enough I left it on. Might want to look into one of those.

It seems that the leather Yugo slings, be they for the Mausers or the SKS, are the most similar to Great War M91 slings. By pairing a Yugo sling with a standard set of dog collars, you have a close replica of an Imperial Mosin sling.

Finn versions

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One of these might work ok. You could darken the sling up with a little Pecards or similar product Denny
https://www.libertytreecollectors.com/p ... category=6

I ended up making a fairly correct sling. I combined repro dog collars with a West German G3 sling that I removed the clip from. I know it’s probably sacrilege to put a German sling on a Mosin but it was the closest I could find in dimensions and appearance to the original Imperial Russian slings plus it was cheap. I think my cobbled together repro looks pretty good.

Sestroryetsk1907 wrote:I ended up making a fairly correct sling. I combined repro dog collars with a West German G3 sling that I removed the clip from. I know it’s probably sacrilege to put a German sling on a Mosin but it was the closest I could find in dimensions and appearance to the original Imperial Russian slings plus it was cheap. I think my cobbled together repro looks pretty good.

Got any pics of it ? I could use a sling for my new 1897 Sestroryetsk. Haven't done any research yet figured it would be hard to find a correct type. TIA

Joe

Got any pics of it ? I could use a sling for my new 1897 Sestroryetsk. Haven't done any research yet figured it would be hard to find a correct type. TIA

Joe[/quote]

Here are some pics. Hope they help. I bought the sling for $7.50 on Numrich and the repro dog collars on GunBroker for $10.

Very nice, many thanks for the pics and ideas.

I also saw that Forum Vendor Liberty Tree Collectors has a wide variety of slings. Almost forgot to shop " at home " first.

I looked at Liberty Tree’s selection of slings. Of the options they have I would say your best bet is either the G3 sling like I used or the leather Yugo SKS sling. The G3 sling is much cheaper for what it’s worth.