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The firearm of the week is the Karabiner Model 1931 or K31. The K31 is magazine-fed, straight-pull bolt-action rifle. It was the standard issue rifle of the Swiss armed forces from 1933 until 1958, though examples remained in service into the 1970s. It has a 6-round removable magazine, and is chambered for the 7.5x55mm Swiss (also known as Gewehrpatrone 1911, GP11, or unofficially 7.5x55mm Schmidt Rubin), this round is similar to the .308 Winchester cartridge. Each rifle included a 6 round detachable box magazine with matching engraved serial number. A stripper clip loads the magazine from the top of the receiver.
There is an old joke that I will get wrong; a German officer was talking to the Swiss officer about what the Swiss will do when Germany sends 10 million soldiers into Switzerland? The Swiss officer responded my 1 million soldiers will fire 10 times then go home.
The K31 is an awesome rifle. They are very well made, “like a Swiss watch”, very accurate and fun to shoot. The barrel is a 1 in 10.5” twist. My AR 10 target rifle is 1 in 11. The bolt operation is unique on these. In the picture below you are looking down on the bolt assembly. You pull straight back to eject and push forward to feed a new round in the chamber. Very fast. The little ring looking thing to the left of the bolt is part of the firing pin assembly. Pulled out, the weapon is cocked. You can turn it 90 degrees to put the weapon on safe. The trigger action is just as smooth and crisp as my 1903.
Google this weapon to learn a lot more about its history.
The first time I shot my K31, we started at 100 yards not knowing anything about where it would hit. We were on the paper first time. I adjusted the front sight slightly for windage and was quickly zeroed in. There is no fun shooting 100 yards so we went to 200 yards, iron sights and easily hitting inside a 9” paper plate. I love this gun.
The Swiss were long believers in non-corrosive primers and powder. Any gun you buy is going to be in good shape unless the prior owner abused it. The 7.5 Swiss or GP 11 ammo is readily available, it is mostly milsurp stuff. Midway USA, Natchez Shooters Supply and many others carry the ammo. It’s about $35 for 60 rounds. Not cheap but not crazy either.
The very cool thing about this rifle is you can own one for about $300. Whether you are a collector, target shooter or hunter you will not be disappointed in this firearm. If you have your C&R collectors license you can get one sent to your front door or transfer it through your local FFL.
Check out http://www.jgsales.com/, go to http://www.gunbroker.com/ or http://www.auctionarms.com// ; look on the web and check around for availability and pricing.
As an added bonus, I read that the Swiss service guy the rifle was issued to put a tag under the butt plate with his name, unit, date, etc. Sure enough, I removed the butt plate and there was a tag with all the information about the guy who this weapon was issued.
Here are some pics of mine:
The above pic was taken at our historic rifle day at the range. We shot the K31, M1 Garand, Lee Enfield .303 and the Mosin Nagan Model 1944 carbine. The M1944 is a butt buster to shoot. It gave me E.D. for two weeks.
Happy shoot’n, Big Mullet