Friends-

I am piecing together a couple of Model 98 Actions. Are cocking pieces all created equal, or are there significant differences between military cocking pieces and commercial cocking pieces like a Mark X?

Thanks in advance.

The military normally has a notch on the bottom the MarkX is smooth. Depending on your trigger the notch MIGHT cause an issue. On some triggers the notch allows the sear to engage in the notch instead of in front of the cocking piece.

Some of the later MarkX pieces were Speedlock. They were designed to give a shorter pin fall.
They would not work correctly with a normal bolt. Speedlock on the right.

Not all of them work on all firing pins due to mfg tolerances, but in theory, they are all interchangeable from all manufacturers. There are long ones and short ones too.

quote:

opposed to the Mark X which is a VERY hard casting...i've seen them break

I've never seen one break but have probably seen far fewer than Duane. I've never seen an accuracy gain from the speedlock and it makes it a royal pain if you want to add a 3 position safety.

I had to replace one on a rifle and they had put in one of the speed springs in it.
Almost didn't have enough in me to get it compressed enough to get it out.

It now resides in my parts drawer and works good.