Need help identifying old commercial FN mauser 98, serial#2177. Rifle has been rebarreled for 30/06 but the magazine seems more tapered than normal 06 size. This is a very elegant rifle with a straight stock design and cheekpiece. Rifle has large FN monogram on reciever and a strange symbol on magazine floorplate that looks like a feather or a Willie winky hat. Any help to identify this rifle as to age or original caliber would be greatly appreciated.
I believe that you are correct as it seems to be a bit too well finished and put together to be of much later origin. Is there something in my description that gives away its vintage? Incidently this rifle is a bit of a shooter as I have been testing it for a friend of mine. It came with an old Kales scope but the X hairs were so thick that I couldn't see the target, so I removed it put on a set of 1" rings and a modern scope. We tried it with 180g Sierra Match Kings, 165g Sierra Game Kings and 190g Speer round nose and with a good load it would shoot quite a few 3 shot 100yd groups around the half inch mark. Only did 3 shotters because the barrel is slim and the 06 caliber heats it up quite rapidly. My other observation is that scopes have come a long way in the last 60 years, that old German scope was dreadful and when you turned the dials everything seemed to move in the opposite direction.
Because I have one of these rifles in my collection from FN with the same logo on the action. Olsen says these action were produced at that time (before 1955). Long stories about these actions. I could go on for hours, but won't, I promise.
