I gave in and bought the AdvanceTech Mauser 98 Stock. I put it on a Turk 98.
It is much too heavy. I thought that since this was a scout type stock that it must be LIGHTER than the military stock. WRONG. The stock does away with the trigger guard, floor plate, both barrel bands, cleaning rod, rear sight assy. Not to mention the steel butt plate on the original stock. The full military rifle with cleaning rod weighed about 9.5 pounds. With the new stock, same length barrel and a small 1.5x compact scope the rifle weighed about 10.5 pounds. I was not very happy about that!
I had thought that the scope rail was aluminium. NOT. It is made out of the same fiberglass or whatever heavy resin the rest of the stock is. It was reinforced with metal plates embeded in certain places. I am willing to give it the benifit of the doubt temporarily. It was slightly wide for the standard Weaver mount, but it would fit.
Assembly was fairly straight forward. Instructions were well written. The recoil lug provided the only hiccup in the assembly. The turkish 98 lug is forward of the contact point in the stock. A small spacer is provided to fit in the stock and fill this crucial gap. The spacer was too thick and I had to thin it down to be able to install the action into the stock. There does seem to be a little movement between the action and the scope rail even with all the other screws installed. The rail does seem to bear on the barrel and seems to be moderately sensitive to barrel heating.
The forward scout scope mount worked fine without having to bend the straight bolt handle, but you do need to watch yourself working the action so you don't pinch your finger between the bolt and the rear of the scope rail.
The screws that attach the front and rear of the rail are countersunk up front but not in the rear near the bolt. Functional but unsightly.
I cut the barrel back to 22" and that helped a little with the weight. Accuracy was increased about 50% but I put most of that down to the trimmed barrel.
Would I buy it again? Not sure. I like the appearance. And you get the scope mount, sling swivels, recoil pad without having to bend the bolt or alter the safety. For 70 bucks its not a bad deal. But if you are looking for a true scout stock with what that implies concerning weight and fast reloads this is not the stock for you! I only have $125 in the rifle and that is one of the things I like best about it. Still, it does kinda grow on you.
Reb
