The Sears/JC Higgins Mauser 98's are great rifles. Commercial Post WW2 Belgian FN 98 actions. I believe the bbls were High Standard mfgr and that they were chrome plated bores.
The chrome plated bores were a great thing at the time when so much corrosive 30-06 Milsurp ammo was around at cheap prices. But I believe the idea was just a marketing thing to sell the guns at the time more than anything else.
They were avail in 270WCF as well. Not much corrosive stuff in that cal around..
H/S assembled the rifles for Sears at the time. The stocks were probably a finished Bishop or Fajen product that HS simply bought and assembled onto the bbl'd action.
I'm sure there was some fitting required but I doubt there was much tweaking done to each rifle as far as bedding and accuracy checks.
The actions were FN drilled and tapped for scope mts. The bolt handle for low scope mount is also factory. Lo-Scope/Sweeped Back style,,FN even had a number for that style.
Not an uncommon assemblage of parts at the time. Many of the Retailers and Mfg'rs put a rifle onto the market like these. Marlin, Colt, H&R...Later some used a Sako action as well.
Many have been bought up over the yrs and the FN actions alone used for building custom rifles.
But they are great hunting rifles just as they are.
They did come with the Military 2 stage trigger which seems to bother a great number of shooters these days. But they are certainly not that bad.
Replacing with any number of aftermarket adj triggers is pretty simple. Some have a side-safety/scope safety built in to the trigger mechanism so you don't have to use the Mauser 'Flag' bolt safety if you don't want to. The orig safety sure is a secure and simple mechanism though.
Most scope mounting will require one of the 'Lo-Scope' safeties to be put in place of the Mauser Flag Safety on the bolt if you choose to keep it in operation and use.
