Armorer's bolt??

I have a question on this bolt.

I like the bolt body alot. I can see no signs of re-work on the body.

Its the back-half that has me. Its all scrubbed parts but the whole thing has been blued and shows the same wear. Also, there is some varnish left in spots on all parts so I think its been like this for at least a while.

So, the question is, would they have scrubbed parts and mated them to a new bolt body?

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Great pics TA. Nice find.

Yes, the Germans scrubbed parts and re-used them. Now, is this a product of that scrubbing??
IMO it’s not.
My reasoning is this and please correct me if I’m wrong.
Safety- There would be little reason to scrub a safety even late in the war, as there were plenty of unmarked ones to be used, as well as armorers safeties that had still not been numbered. Also, normally you would see either a totally unmarked, ‘M”, ‘e’ e/221, or “e” unproofed safety with an Astrawerke bolt,,if German assembled.
Bolt Sleeve- While your bolt sleeve displays the typical way they were scrubbed , as seen on Astrawerke bolts ( one side a little “off”), this particular Bolt Sleeve has no waffenamt nor maker code (ghn, e, n), so I think it’s incorrect for this bolt.
Cocking Piece - Up in the air on this one. I see unnumbered ones like this occasionally on Steyr’s, but hadn’t seen one on an Astrawerke Bolt. So as of now I would lean towards not original to the Armorers bolt, due to the amount of ‘e’, E/221 , and ‘e’ marked cocking pieces encountered, and normally seen affixed to Astrawerk bolts.
FP – This is numbered and isn’t a normally encountered maker/ inspection code assembled with an Astrawerke bolt. However, at the end of the war many parts were shipped from manufacturer to manufacturer. But since this one is numbered, instead of being an armorers or a re-work (at least shown by your pics), I would guess that it’s not original to the armorers bolt build.
But we sure haven’t seen it all. So, that’s my best guess on it.

Don, I think you logic is backwards. A collector wouldn't bother scrubbing these parts because of the prevalence of un-numbered parts still in circulation. The Germans however WOULD bother scrubbing these parts, as evidenced by the numerous re-claimed parts that show up on late war guns.

My gut feeling is that this bolt is all period and correct.

Same here.. I think its probably good, the bolt body is anyway and I the f/p is cool too, even if serialed.

Nice bolt TA!

PS- Although it is odd they would scrub the acceptance off the safety.

MauserWerke said:

My gut feeling is that this bolt is all period and correct.

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MauserWerke said:

Don, I think you logic is backwards. A collector wouldn't bother scrubbing these parts because of the prevalence of un-numbered parts still in circulation. The Germans however WOULD bother scrubbing these parts, as evidenced by the numerous re-claimed parts that show up on late war guns.

My gut feeling is that this bolt is all period and correct.

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Yes, the Germans did scrub parts. As to collectors not scrubbing parts I have to disagree with you on that one MauserWerke. I see scrubbed parts every day on GB , AA, ebay, gunshows, etc etc.

The bolt body is clearly good though, but that wasnt ever in question in my mind.

Arch, I would like to see that one in person. If you still have it next SoS, please let me see it.