Bolt vs Lever...I Need a History Lesson

[Kvon2]

So I've done a little bit of googling but haven't seen much.

Why did the bolt action get more military use than the lever in the 20th century? From what I've read it seems the two major arguments are that the reload speed was better and bolt guns better accommodate high pressure rounds. But wouldn't the increased capacity and rare of fire still make a viable option?

I'm sure someone will say that the rate of fire of a bolt gun in the right hands can be the same or better but I feel like the same argument could made on reload speed.

Were there any significant events or trials that led to the bolt gun being the go-to?

[Scorch]

I will answer your last question first.

In 1893 IIRC, Arthur Savage submitted his design for what would eventually become the Model 1895 to the US Army trials. It did not fare well. Difficulty operating the lever in the prone position, the action being prone to dirt damage and the stock being susceptible to breaking were major concerns. Other designs were submitted, and eventually the Krag-Jorgensen rifle was chosen.

Rate of fire and accuracy with the Savage was considered good, but difficulty reloading and difficulty operating the lever in the prone position were major faults. Even with a musket stock, the barrel was prone to damage.

Prior to the 1893 trials, other lever action rifles had been considered and adopted (Spencer and Henry rifles saw use in the Civil War), but they were not as rugged as other designs, and usually cost more (bit of trivia- Armstrong's troops had recently been issued Springfield rifles to replace their Spencers before the Little Big Horn incident).

Prior to the Winchester 1886 (and perhaps the Marlin 1881), lever actions were delicate and prone to damage (magazine tubes in particular), so they were not considered for military duty.

[jmr40]

Lever actions are the most complex rifle design, more so than semi-autos. Bolt guns the simplest. When it comes to reliability in harsh conditions it is no contest.

A lever action is only faster for repeat shots when standing, exposed to enemy fire. When firing from a fox hole, trench or behind cover a bolt action is the fastest manually operated action.

A typical lever action in a 30-30 class cartridge has a 6 round magazine, bolt guns hold 5 and can be reloaded much, much faster via stripper clips.

The bolt gun firing modern cartridges such as 6.5X55 and 7X57 were introduced and adopted in Europe several years before Winchester 94 and the 30-30. Both were in reality a step backwards in rifle and cartridge design.

[emcon5]

Keep in mind, the military opinion of the time, ammo capacity was not considered a good thing. The thought was it would encourage soldiers to waste ammo, and since resupply was usually hoofed, that was problematic.

[FrankenMauser]

Keep in mind, the military opinion of the time, ammo capacity was not considered a good thing. The thought was it would encourage soldiers to waste ammo, and since resupply was usually hoofed, that was problematic.

Precisely.

The biggest reasons for lever-action designs not getting adopted were:
1. Nearly all 'standard' designs that we all know and love MUST feed from the magazine. Until the days of semi-autos, nearly all armies favored single-shots. If they were willing to entertain the idea of a bolt-action, they still wanted to single-load while keeping the magazine "in reserve".
2. See above. Using a magazine cut-off and single-loading cartridges was SOP. Fancy 'high capacity' magazines were viewed as nothing but a way to waste ammunition.

[T. O'Heir]

A bolt is stronger and far simpler to manufacture in quantity than lever actions. Plus a bolt action lends itself to PBI drill movements while a lever does not(A very important thing to peace time armies.). Along with the generals not trusting the OR's not to waste ammo.
One must remember that generals were thinking in terms of the Napoleonic wars tactics until well into W.W. I. The PBI was supposed to break the enemy line to allow the Cavalry to get into the enemy rear. The PBI was expected to fire a volley and charge with the bayonet. Hiram Maxim put an end to that idea, but it wasn't until well into W.W. I.
"...introduced and adopted in Europe several years before..." Pretty much at the same time. The 7mm was adopted by Spain in 1892. The 6.5 in 1894. However, both Mauser cartridges were designed from the get go for bolt actions. The Winchester was not. It was a hunting cartridge right from the beginning.

[briandg]

I think that one can simplify it here. At what time did the lever actually become a real contender for the US armed forces? pretty much when the musket became obsolete. When the spencer and henry were made obsolete, it was to replace them with heavy single shots, such as rolling block and springfields. Rate of fire wasn't a big concern. Then, to replace the single shots, we went to bolt actions.

I believe that three things really mattered the most.

Bolts were cheap and reliable and levers were not. There were even brass framed levers. The army wanted rifles that could fire maybe even tens of thousands of rounds throughout a lifetime of getting the snot beaten out of them.

Bolts could fire high pressure rounds like the 30-40, and creating a lever to handle that high pressure smokeless loads very reliably and greater durability than the bolt would have been difficult. Unless I am mistaken, the army went from straight walled low power pistol type rounds to single shots in heavy rounds like 50-70 and 45-70.


a bolt rifle required very little hand fitting, the parts were simple and robust, there were no small pieces and only a few important springs. Take down and cleaning was a breeze. The thing could be manufactured on pretty simple equipment, and put together by semi-trained labor.

The end of the story is that the bolt provided a platform for powerful bottlenecked smokeless powder rounds, the lever wasn't up to that. The bolt was turned out by the millions all over the world, in dozens of designs. The bolt was cheap, and quick to make. that turned out to be an important factor in two wars. It was better suited to the demands of a soldier on the battlefield than a winchester. For example, could you use a stripper clip on a winchester 94?

It isn't just the us military. we may have been the only country on the planet that used lever actions as widely as we did, and the bolt was adopted by some countries long before we did. I believe that the mauser in germany was in use while we were still using single shots. I might be wrong.

[jimbob86]

Were there any significant events or trials that led to the bolt gun being the go-to?

The Battle of Plevna (1870) between the Russians and the Turks certainly demonstrated the superiority of the lever gun to single shots, and demonstrated that fire superiority is not a waste of ammo..... though the stodgy, stratified nature of the world's militaries prevented repeaters from being adopted, even in the face of such grisly evidence ....... I'd agree that the bolt guns were cheaper and more durable, and that's mostly why they got adopted over the lever guns...... though the similarity in appearance to single shot rifles probably helped the bolts ..... Stodgy Generals were silly like that.....

[FrankenMauser]

Bolts could fire high pressure rounds like the 30-40, and creating a lever to handle that high pressure smokeless loads very reliably and greater durability than the bolt would have been difficult.
(...)
The end of the story is that the bolt provided a platform for powerful bottlenecked smokeless powder rounds, the lever wasn't up to that.
(...)
For example, could you use a stripper clip on a winchester 94?
(...)
[W]e may have been the only country on the planet that used lever actions as widely as we did

Ahemmmm.

*Cough* Winchester 1895 *Cough*


....

[Dfariswheel]

Other factors are....

Bullet shape.
After the early 1900's spire point FMJ bullets became the standard military round, and unless you used a much more complicated magazine, the pointed bullets could set off other rounds in a tubular magazine under recoil.
A bolt rifle magazine is far simpler.

Extraction.
Bolt actions usually have a powerful camming action when the bolt handle is lifted, and that makes extraction much easier.
Lever action rifles usually don't have the camming action so cases are harder to extract and stick easier.

Accuracy.
Most bolt action rifles have one piece stocks that improve accuracy. These are easy to bed the rifle action and barrel in.
Lever actions almost always have two piece stocks that flex more, giving less accuracy, and it's almost impossible to do any bedding of the fore end that has to be attached to the barrel.

Loading.
Bolt rifles are easily loaded with stripper clips, and in earlier rifles with clips that fit into the magazine and dropped out when the last round was chambered.
Most lever rifles cannot be quickly loaded with any kind of clip device.

Simplicity.
No lever action rifle can ever be as simple as the Mauser bolt action.

Strength.
Lever action rifles in major power cartridges like the 30-06 can't stand up as well or be as simple as the very strong bolt rifle with it's simple locking system.
As example the Winchester 1895 design always gave trouble with head space due to action flexing.

Safety.
It's easy to do a manual of arms to inspect or make sure it's empty with a bolt rifle.
Lever actions are more complicated and it's harder to inspect the chamber.

Maintenance.
Disassembly of a bolt action is a simple matter of removing the bolt to clean the action and barrel.
Lever actions require tools to disassemble and this takes a lot of time.

Combat fouling.
A bolt action has essentially one moving part, and that's the large bolt.
It's easy to keep dirt and mud clear and to clean it quickly when it does get fouled.
Lever actions have many moving parts and it's very un-easy to remove mud and fouling.

While many of these problems could have had design work-arounds to moderate, the bolt action was good to go as-is and needed no special work to correct failings.

[jimsouth]

Nothing locks up as tight as a well made bolt action. Still, there is something, I guess you could say, sexy, about a lever action. Seems to ooze history. At my grandmother's house, there were two Winchesters; a 44 40 and a 50 110. I always used the 44 40 for deer. Never shot the 50 110. Both long gone. I guess a family member just never returned them. Every family has it's jerks.

[Fishbed77]

Why did the bolt action get more military use than the lever in the 20th century?

Have you ever tried to cycle a lever action while lying prone?

That right there eliminated the lever action from most military service (aside from seated cavalry).

[reinert]

Since the OP didn't mention what country the question necessarily pertained to, I've always thought the Winchester, M95, use in Russia during WWI, chambered in the Mosin round, has always been interesting to me. Evidently, 300,000 were made and sent to the Russians during the "Great War." Stripper clip accommodation was supplied on the rifles, too.

Here's some info on the Russian M95s:

http://www.google.com/search?q=russi...clip&hl=en&tbm

[tangolima]

Lever action is an American thing. European never really care much about it. In the probably most successful case of Winchester m95, the Russian purchased them only as a stop gap measure. They wanted the mosins.

At the time, American military was nothing compared to Europe. Almost all the technological advancement were from there. European like bolt actions for very good and sensible reasons. And that was about it.

Knowing what we know today and assuming we can do it again, I still don't thing lever action has much future. Bolt action is still being used in our military today. I can see any sanity if lever action is used in its place.

-TL


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[Mike Irwin]

It's generally considered that the bolt-action was invented by Dreyse, in Germany, in the 1820s.

However, the first bolt-action design to have seen combat was the Greene, in the American Civil War.

http://www.nramuseum.org/guns/the-ga...ion-rifle.aspx

Not a particularly successful design for a number of reasons, but it provided the way forward for the United States.

After the War, numerous bolt-action designs were assessed by the War Department, including the Remington-Keene, the Winchester Hotchkiss, and an early prototype designed by James Paris Lee.

In fact, the Winchester Hotchkiss bolt rifle was in limited service with the US Navy from initial purchase for testing in 1880 until 1895, when they were replaced with the Winchester Lee straight pull.

So it wasn't just Europe that was looking at the viability of the bolt action rifle. It was seen as a potential primary military arm as far back as the 1870s.

[RC20]

There was a series of lever guns made by (Winchester)

They used a box magazine.

I read about a Mexican bandit that used a 30-06 variant to bad affect.

Interesting levers were really the first multi shot vs a simpler bolt.

As for Custer and the massacre (or victory depending on which side you were on) , that was purely driven by idiots.

The Army had a long stuck in the mud tradition of single shots, they really preferred a musket but could not quite force the tech back that far.

So the Troopers gave up their very functional spenders for Single shot musket conversions into rolling block (I think that is right)

Until recetanly6 (I have no stats for the all volunteer force) about 10% of the troops were really functional killing machines. The other 90% participated to some degree to none.

That is an average, top notch outfits participated fully, but those have always been limited.

So rather than good training they just redistricted the ammo expenditure with single shots or magazine cutoff.

The Germans solution to the issue was to stick with bolt action and focus the squad on a high volume machine gun.

So it goes. A well taken care of Lever worked as well as a bolt, badly cared for ones would be far more of an issue.

[44 AMP]

Something else to consider, and that is the strength of the lever action rifle, overall. I don't mean the strength of the action to handle high power rounds, I mean the overall strength of the rifle as a hand to hand combat weapon.

The typical levergun is inferior to the bolt action (and many single shots) for strength when it comes to hand to hand fighting (bayonet and buttstrokes), and this was a major military consideration, greater, at the time, than the firepower of the rifle.

Compared to a bolt action, the stock on the lever gun is "flimsily" attached. Buttstocks used as clubs and the usual lever gun's method of attaching the buttstock simply don't go well together.

It's seldom something civilians think about, but the military view that a suitable rifle had to be able to physically beat the enemy to death, and survive and still be functional, was an important factor, until fairly recent times.

Lever guns are simply not built for this, and never have been.

Plus, lever guns are expensive to make, with complex and somewhat delicate mechanisms. It wasn't so much that the lever gun was inferior as a shooting tool, but it was inferior as a fighting tool.

[Mike Irwin]

"The Army had a long stuck in the mud tradition of single shots, they really preferred a musket but could not quite force the tech back that far."

There were some reasonable arguments for wanting to get away from the Civil War era Spencer and Henry lever action rifles.

First, both were commercial products, and the US military didn't get into the whole commercial procurement as standard practice until after World War II.

Second, lever actions of that era were low-powered affairs and were not able to handle the sized cartridges (specifically length) adopted for military service until development of the 1886 Winchester, by which time the military was well on its way toward dropping the single shot and adopting the bolt action.

Third, early cases suitable for use in lever actions were rimfires, and early rimfire cartridges tended to be more unreliable than the military wanted.

Fourth, in the post Civil War era, military budgets were being slashed in high double figures across the board. The single shot rifle was known, proven, reliable, and most of all, relatively inexpensive, technology.

[tangolima]

Originally Posted by Mike Irwin

So it wasn't just Europe that was looking at the viability of the bolt action rifle. It was seen as a potential primary military arm as far back as the 1870s.

The American did look at the bolt action. But we were probably the only one who were serious about lever action. It doesn't matter if we were foolish enough to keep the lever action. American military was too small to make any difference. It was what the European chose that set the trend.

Even with our unique affinity to lever action, we still ended up making the right choice to adopt bolt action. That shows the real difference in potential between these two designs.

-TL



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[Mike Irwin]

"But we were probably the only one who were serious about lever action."

Commercially yes we were, but in large part I think that had more to do with the unique opportunities and conditions faced by Americans vs Europeans, especially in a nation that was rapidly growing and expanding west.

Militarily, no. The half-hearted adoption of the Spencer during the Civil War was an expediency forced on the military by Abraham Lincoln and the necessity to get arms into the hands of troops until manufacturing and procurement could catch up.


"It was what the European chose that set the trend."

Uhm... Yes. And No.

European choices set the trend for Europe and, to a degree, in Asia, but after the Civil War the United States went into a nearly 30 year period of not really giving a damn what Europe did militarily.

Part of that was, as I noted above, economic, and part of it was what I noted here -- a rapidly expanding nation that was rapidly expanding west.

And that westward expansion brought with it conflicts with native Americans in wide-open spaces where the power (actually, lack of power) of the lever action simply wasn't sufficient, so the next logical step after the single shot was the bolt action.

I truly think that the bolt action would have come out as the choice as the primary action for the US military even if Europe had been completely pacifist and unarmed.

[FrankenMauser]

Have you ever tried to cycle a lever action while lying prone?

That right there eliminated the lever action from most military service (aside from seated cavalry).

Nah. That argument doesn't do much for me.

Martini-Henry
Sharps
Maynard
...Just a short list of single-shot designs that had the same, if not greater problem with operation; yet they were well-loved.

[Mike Irwin]

Probably the biggest failing of the lever action as a battle rifle is its insanely slow reload times (with the exception of the Winchester 1895 with charger guides, of course).

It's the same reason that tubular magazines in various French, Italian, and German bolt-action rifles were tried, and subsequently dropped quickly when Mannlicher enbloc clip, the charger-fed box magazine, and various other magazine improvements were adopted.


"Maynard"

Virtually all Maynard carbines used in the Civil War were issued to cavalry troops, either Union or Confederate.

"Martini-Henry"

I'm not 100% sure, but I don't think that the British Army at the time the MH was in use really taught or considered prone firing to be a thing. I'll have to dig around and see if I can find a period manual of arms.

"Sharps"

Not at all familiar with the service history of the Sharps.

[Slamfire]

I truly think that the bolt action would have come out as the choice as the primary action for the US military even if Europe had been completely pacifist and unarmed.

History is not always inevitable, but I cannot see any other outcome than this. But, the US Army Ordnance Bureau tried, and tried their best, to stay rooted in the last war. After the Civil War, what the US Army wanted, was something as close to the 1861 Musket as possible. The Ordnance Bureau passed up several, better, single shot designs, the Rolling Block and the Martini for two, to adopt a rifle that was as close to a muzzle loading 58 Caliber musket as possible, and still use a cartridge! I am certain the requirements group knew of lever actions, and of course, many would have been familiar with the Spencer, which was an outstanding weapon in the hands of US Cavalry, and decisive, against musket armed Confederates. But what they wanted, was something so similar to the 1863 musket, that the Union troops in Buster Keton's movie, The General were using Trapdoors! Even in 1926, on a movie set, you could issue actors with the Trapdoor and the general public would not know the difference between the cartridge rifle and the musket!. The Ordnance Department had reached Nirvana!

By the 1890's is was getting to be obvious that the Springfield Trapdoor was outdated. By then the Russians, the Germans, the English, the French, the Swiss, had adopted bolt action rifles, the tube fed ones were in the reserves, the primary front line weapons were magazine fed bolt actions. And the US primary service arm was still the Trapdoor Springfield. When the US invaded Cuba, and 760 Spanish troops faced 15,000 Americans, the Spanish armed with Mausers, and the vast majority of Americans with Trapdoors. Even with these odds, the Americans suffered five times as many causalities as the Spanish! The most successful American action was with Gatling guns, and that lesson was ignored. Gatling guns and machine guns "wasted ammunition".

There were still lots of military, and military advisors, who were claiming single shots were still the best military service rifle, and a primary reason touted at the time, was to prevent "ammunition wastage". Logicians thought it much better for the troops not to shoot too much ammunition at the enemy, thus avoiding the vicious cycle of restocking ammunition. Obviously, a lever action would shoot too much ammunition at the enemy. It is a humorous fact that logistical laziness hampered combat weapon effectiveness. It was difficult to supply an Army in the field, and yes, it was costly, yes, but guess what, if you can't keep the food, clothing, shelters, ammunition, weapons, flowing, you will lose a protracted war against a foe who can.

One point not mentioned is how difficult lever actions are to dismount and clean. They simply have too many parts and are too complicated for not merely the average recruit, but the 95% recruit. You can verify this for yourself by going to the local gunstore and examining 100 year lever actions that were never cleaned by their owners! Too many screws and springs. I have examined a number of early military rifles, some are complicated and have too many parts, but, by the time you get to the 1880's, rifles are getting simplified. Maintenance actions are simplified. On the Martini Henry, you push out a split pin, lower the lever, and the breech block pops out. From there you can wipe out the mechanism. It does require a screwdriver to remove the trigger mechanism, but overall, you can clean the weapon without having to do that. The better designs don't require a screwdriver to dissemble the firing mechanism. Does anyone know of a lever action that does not require a screwdriver to remove the lever? That is a screw, and a screwdriver, that will be lost out in the field. Another important factor is that any military rifle which can be assembled incorrectly, will be assembled incorrectly. (Anyone remember the Ross?) Creating a design which the parts can only be assembled in one order, and it is "intuitive" how they go together, is hard.

There was some great debate between Edward Crossman and Charles Newton, in print, between the lever action and the bolt gun. I have never read any of the discussion, but it would have been interesting to read the arguments these ego manic's created, trying to prove the other wrong.

[Mike Irwin]

"After the Civil War, what the US Army wanted, was something as close to the 1861 Musket as possible."

I think you are greatly overplaying the "if it's not 1565-era technology (yes 1565), we don't want it," and VASTLY underplaying just how little money there was in the years after the Civil War to do much of anything and how reticent Congress was to release any kind of money to procure new equipment.

[Slamfire]

I think you are greatly overplaying the "if it's not 1565-era technology (yes 1565), we don't want it," and VASTLY underplaying just how little money there was in the years after the Civil War to do much of anything and how reticent Congress was to release any kind of money to procure new equipment.

The Army played a game of "in for a penny, in for a pound". Now lets understand, the Department of Defense is always broke. Last year they got $603 Billion, but if you listen to the Chief of Staffs on CSPAN, they are all begging poverty. After the Civil War there was far less money than today, obviously, but how the Army spent it and on what, that was their decision. The post Civil War idea to use as many musket parts as possible in their new cartridge gun did not play out as advertised. From what I read, those Civil War parts were not interchangeable, improper steel, etc, and in the end, the US Army made its Trapdoors from completely new parts. If you are old enough you remember the same justification being used in the adoption of the M14 over the FAL. The Army claimed they could use parts from the Garand and make the M14 on Garand machinery and tooling. I think the triggers will swap out, maybe some trigger pins, not much else though. Whatever machinery was left over from the Korean war M1's, had been worn out and scrapped. And the whole thing was bogus anyway since the majority of M14's built were made by Contractors, not Springfield Armory. The Contractors got to buy nice new equipment, as no one had factories sitting around, collecting cobwebs, full of M1 Garand tooling. But the important thing was, the FAL went away, and the Army got a service rifle as close to the Garand as was possible, given that the new rifle had to have a box magazine and a different cartridge.

If you notice, the Ordnance Department decided to keep the low number 03's in service, even though they knew that 33% of the things would blow up in over pressure conditions. That was a time of poverty too, but the Chief of Staffs could have then, as they could have post Civil, gone to Congress and made a case for why they needed something other than a Trap door, or, why they needed the money to scrap 1,000,000 M1903's and replace them with new 03's. The latter would have been embarrassing as the Army made all those rifles, so they decided to leave the things in service, until they wore out, or blew up! As for the Trapdoor, it is obvious they wanted the Trapdoor, as they could have built, from ground up, any other single shot design on the market, and there were a lot of better ones in existence. I don't have the records, but without a doubt, the Ordnance Department plead poverty if pressed, which would have been a smoke screen for their natural intransigence to change.

This is true, and has always been true for the US Army: They like what the have, they want something better but only a little different, and they totally reject revolutionary change.

Just change the color of their berets and listen to the howling!! I remember when the BDU cap was changed over to the beret, and the BDU to the ACU. You never met such an unhappy group as the guys in uniform.