The K-31 Refit

My nephew just finished installing a Boyd's stock on his K-31 Swiss rifle. Lots of fitting, sanding and painting on lacquer . Well worth it. The rifle looks great.

The K-31 is a very interesting design.


The Karabiner Model 1931 (K31) is a 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), a cartridge with ballistic qualities 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.

Many collectors of the K31 have removed the butt plate and recovered a small tag of plasticized paper from beneath it. This slip contains the name and address of the Swiss citizen to whom the rifle was issued. In some cases, collectors have used the information to contact the previous owners, and have recounted the details of those encounters on a variety of collector's web forums.

My nephew actually found the Swiss citizen name slip. He has been trying to figure out how to find the guy or his heirs. Cool stuff.


--It's the straight pull back bolt that I find interesting.