Mauser 93 custom

Currently in the process of building a small ring mauser based on the Swedish 96’. 51,000psi is the recommended max for small rings from what I’ve read (93-96’ mausers). The 6mm Remington at 65,000psi is way over for that action.

I’d make a diligent effort to load down if you’re set on keeping the chambering

I may be too cautious, but there’s no third safety lug on the small rings, and they do not handle gas well like a 98

Pressure for sammi is higher then I'd like . If hand loading I'd keep them low to mild range power . The 93 is fairly strong but does not deal good with escaping gas to well. Check t The bases are straight and on the same plane. There's a chance the rifle my not shoot 100 grainers good so try the 75 to 95 bullets. Get the head space checked to.

I am not a fan of the metallurgy of the early, say pre 1920 actions, and of course get into long debates with the fans who worship old things.

This is an example, some good data here:

Swedish Mauser Model 1896 Question

Mauser rifle identification, safe to shoot

Spanish Mauser

These actions were built for cartridges that operated at 43,000 psia with the case head of an 8mm Mauser. According to Wiki, the 6mm Remington is based on the 7 X 57 cartridge, so it has the same case head size as the 8mm.

But you have the rifle. What you need to monitor is headspace increase. If the lugs pound the receiver seats in, the cartridge headspace will increase. If the case head blows because the cartridge protrusion is excessive, you don't want to be near that receiver. Metal parts will be flying.

A bud of mine fired a 1895 rifle,my recollection is that it had been customized. Bud said he was offered the chance to shoot the thing. He checked to make sure the chamber was clear, and he looked at the load data for the reloads and claimed it was OK. One shot later, the receiver ring had flown to parts unknown. Bud was lucky. He did not indicate that the gun blew up, just the top receiver ring disappeared, so I assume the ring disappeared but the lugs stayed in engagement, keeping the case in the chamber.

The Spanish were building 1892 actions up to WW2, the Swedes M1896 actions through WW2. I am not as concerned about the later actions as the earlier ones. People do not understand how primitive things were around 1900, they project back today's technology. Process controls were very primitive .

I am certain some fan boys will chime in, demanding that I prove their favorite antique action is unsafe. Well, they can't, and won't, be able to prove that their actions are safe. Things have changed from the "prove it unsafe" days, now the standard for liability is prove it is safe. All the fan boys will have is ignorance. "They never heard", "no one has told them", "where are all the reports", etc, etc. They don't even know where to start, since all they have from beginning to end, is ignorance.

In so far as gunsmiths, there were a lot of gunsmiths post WW2. The guy who built Joe's 270 Win from a M1917 action, he stamped his name on the barrel. I have searched Gun Digests from the 1950's onward, and wrote the NRA, was unable to identify the guy. He was just one of thousands of guys who have disappeared from history, except for the guns they built. There were some master machinist's who made some really nice stuff.

I dont worry too much about firing my collection of small ring mausers, but I would recommend wearing safety glasses atleast, and check the headspace on your specimen. If you cant get access to a field gauge, get a cheap feeler gauge from any auto parts store and cut a small slice off a .006 strip to create a small shim. Insert the shim between a unfired factory round and the bolt face,(point muzzle in safe direction,) and close the bolt. If the bolt will close on a .006 shim, its borderline unsafe to fire. You can try it with an .008 shim next. I would not continously fire a rifle that closes on bigger than .007 or .008 shims. This isnt as exact as a gauge, but should give you a pretty good idea the condition of your rifle. I personally believe the actions are plenty strong for the cartridges they were designed for, but when incorrect headspace causes a case rupture or a pierced primer causes a gas blast, the small rings dont do much to protect your face. Not to mention being rechambered to a higher pressure cartridge. Heres a couple pictures of a 1895 mauser at a local range. For some unknown reason a bullet became lodged in the barrel. It was then fired again, and then one more time before the barrel burst. The action held up just fine. This was a failure that could easily have happened in even the most modern firearm. Pay attention and try to wear safety glasses whenever possible! Even Peter Paul Mauser lost an eyeball. Theres another pic of the 95 mauser Ive been sporterizing.

JR,
You might want to read Jerry Kuhnhausen's The Mauser Bolt Actions: A Shop Manual which goes through part by part how to determine proper function for the Mauser 91, 93, 95, 98 actions. He also deals with issues in sporterizing them. You can get it at Amazon.com or Midwayusa as well as other places. Do not pay too much as it is still in print and I have seen ridiculous prices from "other sellers" on Amazon or Ebay. Should be about $30-40 in new condition. With an unknown craftsman, it is possible that your receiver was re-heat treated which can improve the strength of the receiver.

That being said, Kuhnhausen remarks that on page 70-71 about the steel tests that he had conducted on Mauser receivers. M91-96 actions used the equivalent of 1020, 1025, and 1030 steels. M98 receivers were equivalent to 1035 and 1036 steels. One Spanish receiver tested as below as failing to meet 1020. It is also possible to encounter brittle receivers where the steel was overcarburized and these are ticking grenades with an uncertain fuse. While these have greater strength, by carburizing a significant amount of the normally soft center, it becomes brittle and can shatter unexpectedly under a force such as uneven force dispersion over the lug surfaces or even dropping the rifle.

The other issue is that Mausers receivers were carburized so that they have a thin harder layer over a soft interior and the carburized layer can be quite thin aka case hardening. Where to watch is whether or not someone lapped the receiver lug recesses as the thin hard layer can be partially or even totally removed which will result in lug setback in short order. You can also have issues with the bolt as the carburizing procedure is the same for them as well. Improper use of heat when welding on new bolt handles or bending existing ones can be an issue if the welder/reshaper was not careful using heat sinks when doing heat related operations to the bolt and too much enthusiasm in lapping the bolt lugs can also cut through the hard layers on these.

A few Spanish 93 Mausers were made in Germany but most were made in Spain at their Oviedo factory. What can be said about the Spanish Mausers is that they vary more in the quality of their heat treatment and since they were made for over thirty years, sometimes in desperate circumstances as during the Spanish Civil War, the quality of manufacture can vary. At least some posters indicate that the Spanish steel used had more sulfur and phosphorus than did German Mauser steel but that may be more speculative. The ones made by Republican forces in Barcelona are wall hangers only due to inferior construction during wartime and are best left to collectors.

After the Civil War, Spain was devastated and remained in poor financial shape for awhile even after WWII. Thus, the old Mausers were repurposed to their paramilitary/police forces called the Guardia, used as training rifles for recruits, and kept in war reserve. Some were converted to fire a 7.62 cartridge which controversy stems whether these conversions were for the 7.62 CETME cartridge (designed for initial models of the CETME rifle which fired a lower pressure and lighter bullet that eased pressures on the locking surfaces of the initial issued CETME rifles). It is clear that the FR7 training rifles using the old m93 receivers may have used the 7.62 CETME but evidence indicates that the Guardia manuals specify firing 7.62 NATO which has a higher pressure and heavier bullet in their converted m93 rifles. If you want to root around, there is a relatively large THR group of discussions regarding the m93 and firing 7.62 NATO if you search.

Here is a good photo collection of some of the problems with the later m95 Chilean Mausers which were made with "superior" German craftsmanship but were converted by the Chileans to fire 7.62 NATO. In his photo essay, he demonstrates what to look for in lug setback and how headspace gages may not always pick up lug setback because deformation of the receiver locking surfaces can generate ridges and lips creating false readings. http://castboolits.gunloads.com/sho...-Modelo-Chileno-1895-7-62x51-Nato-conversions

FWIW, I have examples of most Mausers and have worked on most of them including m93 Spanish Mausers except those converted to 7.62. Compared to something like a German or Czech m98 action, the m93 is softer and demonstrates less quality in workmanship. That is also true in comparison with the m95 and m94/96 models that I have. At least several of my samples passed through Samco Global and some of these actions are only going to be rebuilt into pistol cartridge conversions for fun guns when I get around to it. The receivers that I have run the gamut from Spanish American war era (the few German m93s were very likely used in the conflict but the Oviedo ones probably were not) to the late 1930's and I do not detect much differences between them.

My personal take is that you need to check for lug setback in the receiver and do not be fooled if the rifle is currently in headspace as there are some tricks such as a new or different bolt could have been substituted. Given the high relative SAAMI pressures of the .260 Remington, firing a load close to that ceiling would be a proof load in the original m93 compared with its very modest 7x57 pressure level. If you think of the bolt as a slide hammer and the receiver lug surfaces as the hammering surface, the more force back on the bolt from the cartridge hammers the lug receiver surfaces with greater force. Thus, headspace begins to increase bit by bit as the hard surfaces of the lug recesses and bolt are thin and the softer material below deforms just like a nail head hit by a hammer. At some point cartridge separations occur which introduces hot gas into the action and the m93 as Jesseky notes does not handle hot gas nearly as well as the m98 actions. In addition, the rear of the cartridge is not supported that well in typical Mauser fashion so excess headspace in a Mauser firing a rimless cartridge is significant safety issue.

Can they be polish up, look great externally as a sporter, etc.? Definitely yes. Would a particular rifle be safe to fire with newer high pressure cartridges? That would require testing key surfaces and careful examination of the receiver out of the rifle. I would suggest having a gunsmith look over the rifle that is experienced with older military rifles and what to look for or if you feel competent, the Kuhnhausen book describes each of the parts and how to evaluate them with copious pictures and notes. Because he is covering a broad number of Mauser actions though, the organization of this book suffers a bit in comparison with his other shop manuals.

Granted your rifle checks out for headspace, no setback, etc., a starting load for 6mm Rem is close to a full charge 7mm Mauser load.
The first question is, would you be happy with a 100 gr 6mm at 2800 fps?
The second question is, do you have the willpower to stay there and not increase the load if it doesn't show "pressure signs?" Which it won't.

I've got a Turkish 1888/ (whatever), 1889 Argentines and Belgians, an 1893 Spanish, 93/38 Turk, 1894 Swedish, 1895 Chilean long and short, several 1896 Swedes, a number of 1898s from all over the world, 1916 Spanish in 7mm and 7.62mm CETME, 98/22 Czech, 1938 Turk Ankara and K.Kale, 1943 Spanish, a Geha and a number of others.

Of all of these, only three of these need special ammo and special care, IMHO.
The 1888 Commission rifle gets hard-cast lead and moderate loads, the 1916 CETME gets CETME-level loads and the Geha usually gets mini-shells.

I have no problem in firing any factory Mauser in its original loading if the gun is in good shape... .

The Turks rebarreled 1893 Mausers to 8x57 in the 1930s and the Spanish to 7.62x51 in the 1950s. The OP's rifle - gorgeous and congratulations by the way! - has been rebarrled, sometime after 1955 with modern steel. So, all this talk of no small ring Mauser being able to withstand the pressures of the 6mm Remington wafts of old wives' tales and is a little panicky.

OP, the SAAMI MAP for 6mm Rem is 65,000 PSI. The CIP MAP (more relevant than the anemic MAP set by SAAMI) for the 7x57 in which that rifle was originally chambered is 56,500 PSI. If you imagine that the receiver was proofed to only 56,500 PSI and will blow up at 57,000 PSI, then it may be unwise to use it. The 1893 Mauser also lacks the gas handling systems of later Mauser designs, another consideration.

Gorgeous looking rifle that I would not hesitate to use in its current chambering. Enjoy it!

boom boom said:

JR,
You might want to read Jerry Kuhnhausen's The Mauser Bolt Actions: A Shop Manual which goes through part by part how to determine proper function for the Mauser 91, 93, 95, 98 actions. He also deals with issues in sporterizing them. You can get it at Amazon.com or Midwayusa as well as other places. Do not pay too much as it is still in print and I have seen ridiculous prices from "other sellers" on Amazon or Ebay. Should be about $30-40 in new condition. With an unknown craftsman, it is possible that your receiver was re-heat treated which can improve the strength of the receiver.

That being said, Kuhnhausen remarks that on page 70-71 about the steel tests that he had conducted on Mauser receivers. M91-96 actions used the equivalent of 1020, 1025, and 1030 steels. M98 receivers were equivalent to 1035 and 1036 steels. One Spanish receiver tested as below as failing to meet 1020. It is also possible to encounter brittle receivers where the steel was overcarburized and these are ticking grenades with an uncertain fuse. While these have greater strength, by carburizing a significant amount of the normally soft center, it becomes brittle and can shatter unexpectedly under a force such as uneven force dispersion over the lug surfaces or even dropping the rifle.

The other issue is that Mausers receivers were carburized so that they have a thin harder layer over a soft interior and the carburized layer can be quite thin aka case hardening. Where to watch is whether or not someone lapped the receiver lug recesses as the thin hard layer can be partially or even totally removed which will result in lug setback in short order. You can also have issues with the bolt as the carburizing procedure is the same for them as well. Improper use of heat when welding on new bolt handles or bending existing ones can be an issue if the welder/reshaper was not careful using heat sinks when doing heat related operations to the bolt and too much enthusiasm in lapping the bolt lugs can also cut through the hard layers on these.

A few Spanish 93 Mausers were made in Germany but most were made in Spain at their Oviedo factory. What can be said about the Spanish Mausers is that they vary more in the quality of their heat treatment and since they were made for over thirty years, sometimes in desperate circumstances as during the Spanish Civil War, the quality of manufacture can vary. At least some posters indicate that the Spanish steel used had more sulfur and phosphorus than did German Mauser steel but that may be more speculative. The ones made by Republican forces in Barcelona are wall hangers only due to inferior construction during wartime and are best left to collectors.

After the Civil War, Spain was devastated and remained in poor financial shape for awhile even after WWII. Thus, the old Mausers were repurposed to their paramilitary/police forces called the Guardia, used as training rifles for recruits, and kept in war reserve. Some were converted to fire a 7.62 cartridge which controversy stems whether these conversions were for the 7.62 CETME cartridge (designed for initial models of the CETME rifle which fired a lower pressure and lighter bullet that eased pressures on the locking surfaces of the initial issued CETME rifles). It is clear that the FR7 training rifles using the old m93 receivers may have used the 7.62 CETME but evidence indicates that the Guardia manuals specify firing 7.62 NATO which has a higher pressure and heavier bullet in their converted m93 rifles. If you want to root around, there is a relatively large THR group of discussions regarding the m93 and firing 7.62 NATO if you search.

Here is a good photo collection of some of the problems with the later m95 Chilean Mausers which were made with "superior" German craftsmanship but were converted by the Chileans to fire 7.62 NATO. In his photo essay, he demonstrates what to look for in lug setback and how headspace gages may not always pick up lug setback because deformation of the receiver locking surfaces can generate ridges and lips creating false readings. http://castboolits.gunloads.com/sho...-Modelo-Chileno-1895-7-62x51-Nato-conversions

FWIW, I have examples of most Mausers and have worked on most of them including m93 Spanish Mausers except those converted to 7.62. Compared to something like a German or Czech m98 action, the m93 is softer and demonstrates less quality in workmanship. That is also true in comparison with the m95 and m94/96 models that I have. At least several of my samples passed through Samco Global and some of these actions are only going to be rebuilt into pistol cartridge conversions for fun guns when I get around to it. The receivers that I have run the gamut from Spanish American war era (the few German m93s were very likely used in the conflict but the Oviedo ones probably were not) to the late 1930's and I do not detect much differences between them.

My personal take is that you need to check for lug setback in the receiver and do not be fooled if the rifle is currently in headspace as there are some tricks such as a new or different bolt could have been substituted. Given the high relative SAAMI pressures of the .260 Remington, firing a load close to that ceiling would be a proof load in the original m93 compared with its very modest 7x57 pressure level. If you think of the bolt as a slide hammer and the receiver lug surfaces as the hammering surface, the more force back on the bolt from the cartridge hammers the lug receiver surfaces with greater force. Thus, headspace begins to increase bit by bit as the hard surfaces of the lug recesses and bolt are thin and the softer material below deforms just like a nail head hit by a hammer. At some point cartridge separations occur which introduces hot gas into the action and the m93 as Jesseky notes does not handle hot gas nearly as well as the m98 actions. In addition, the rear of the cartridge is not supported that well in typical Mauser fashion so excess headspace in a Mauser firing a rimless cartridge is significant safety issue.

Can they be polish up, look great externally as a sporter, etc.? Definitely yes. Would a particular rifle be safe to fire with newer high pressure cartridges? That would require testing key surfaces and careful examination of the receiver out of the rifle. I would suggest having a gunsmith look over the rifle that is experienced with older military rifles and what to look for or if you feel competent, the Kuhnhausen book describes each of the parts and how to evaluate them with copious pictures and notes. Because he is covering a broad number of Mauser actions though, the organization of this book suffers a bit in comparison with his other shop manuals.

Click to expand...

This ought to be a sticky!

JRWhit said:

It is stamped with the Spanish crown encircled in Fabrica De Armas, with Oviedo 1925 under it. It does at least have the gas port.

Click to expand...

That is not encouraging based on the date and the country.

If headspace is too far out, then I suppose it will serve as a cheap education.

Click to expand...

When you have increasing head space in a rifle, what is actually happening is the amount of case head sticking out of the chamber increases:

this is a 30-06 case in a Mauser barrel



everyone ought to read Vol IV of Chinn's Machine Gun series. He spends a lot of time explaining how the only thing between a big gas release and you is the case head. Case sidewalls can't hold the pressure.

The dimensions are based on 20mm cartridges, not 7mm:



residual pressure is around 650 psia, not 65,000 psia.



I can't prove it, but I believe that this M96 was chambered in 308 Win and pounded the receiver seats back and blew the receiver ring:






This is one of those Spanish small rings that was rechambered to 308 Win, and blew up. I cannot prove this, but it is reasonable to assume that who ever got this thing fired standard pressure 308 Win rounds, which were operating at the proof pressures of the original action, and once enough sidewall stuck out of the chamber, the case ruptured.

JRWhit said:

I need to get at least one stupid question squeezed in on this. Would it be wise to use a one piece base over the two piece weavers and would it offer any rigidity to the receiver and possibly a more contained failure is one were to occur. I ask not in terms of keeping one from having a failure but better controlling the little pieces of one if it were to occur.
My disclaimer here is that I don't plan to get into proof territory but it's never a bad idea to plan for worst case scenario.

Click to expand...

JR,
If you were doing such, you would probably want to use the toughest steel one piece base that you could find and it would be better than nothing--you definitely do not want potmetal type bases as those might fragment even more.

One consideration though for ease of mind if there is no lug setback is to think about perhaps rebarreling into the .257 Roberts. With handloading it will get you more than a 6mm loaded at the low end while basically keeping the same pressure envelope as the original 7x57 issued ammo. More than good enough for deer or varmints at decent ranges. I have a couple of Spanish Mauser actions that are in decent shape and I am thinking about the .257 Bob for one of them for exactly that. Brass, bullets, and even factory loaded ammo is available.

BTW,
If you have a borescope or a small dental mirror combined with a bore light, you may be able to get a look at the receiver locking surfaces for the bolt. Even a relatively cheap Chinese borescope available from Amazon should have enough resolution to pick up gross problems. Depending on your hand size, you can sometimes determine ridges, etc. on the lugs by feel. You will also usually have a sticky bolt upon firing a cartridge. Or, for the cost, you can have a gunsmith take a quick look at it in a shop as far as lug setback.

Psst, boom boom, it is a 6mm Remington, not a .260. And keeping the loads down is a lot more economical than a new barrel.

I don't know if a scope base held on by three little screws is going to reinforce much. In early days of benchrest shooting, there were Mausers with "strongback" reinforcements added but they were more substantial than a scope mount.

Slamfire said:

I can't prove it, but I believe that this M96 was chambered in 308 Win and pounded the receiver seats back and blew the receiver ring:

Click to expand...

That appears to be a CG80. A pretty rare Swedish FSR and 300m match rifle here in the states. It was the next iteration of the CG63. I don’t believe any were chambered in 308.

That's worse. If somebody contrived to wreck a 6.5 in its native caliber.

Beautiful rifle. I love old mausers and have a few 93s. They are still in 7x57 and I don't load them hot. I would probably keep your loads light as 6 Rem is kinda hot for a 93 action. Of course you could simply re barrel it to a more suitable cartridge. Check out what Chuck Hawks has to say about small rings here https://www.chuckhawks.com/small_ring_mausers.htm.
You can find pictures of all kinds of blown up rifles on the internet but unless the cause is known it is pure speculation as to what really happened.

Jim Watson said:

Psst, boom boom, it is a 6mm Remington, not a .260. And keeping the loads down is a lot more economical than a new barrel.

I don't know if a scope base held on by three little screws is going to reinforce much. In early days of benchrest shooting, there were Mausers with "strongback" reinforcements added but they were more substantial than a scope mount.

Click to expand...

My short term memory stack is purt near gone. Thanks for catching that. I'll do an edit.

Jim Watson said:

Psst, boom boom, it is a 6mm Remington, not a .260. And keeping the loads down is a lot more economical than a new barrel.

I don't know if a scope base held on by three little screws is going to reinforce much. In early days of benchrest shooting, there were Mausers with "strongback" reinforcements added but they were more substantial than a scope mount.

Click to expand...

I totally agree that keeping the pressures down to starting levels are cheaper than a new barrel. I simply meant that if he was worried but wanted a varminter with some selection of factory ammo and bullets that the .257 Roberts fits.

I look at the design is more of a debris shield from a head separation rather than reinforcement. There are screws that even if they are dinky are probably as strong as the receiver if properly hardened. That is not true of most the Chinese garbage that passes for screws these days but you can buy rated ones from Amazon, Fleabay, or some industrial warehouses.

To me the cartridge separation or blowing out due to lug setback is more of an issue due to Mausers not supporting the cartridge other than the head. Hot gas is unpredictable in its effects as is the directionality. The O/P may have something different in mind.

boom boom said:

wanted a varminter with some selection of factory ammo

Click to expand...

I guess, but availability of factory centerfire rifle ammo is not even on my radar. If I can get brass and bullets, I am good and assume any other serious shooter is, too.

Slamfire said:

That is not encouraging based on the date and the country.



When you have increasing head space in a rifle, what is actually happening is the amount of case head sticking out of the chamber increases:

this is a 30-06 case in a Mauser barrel

View attachment 866288

everyone ought to read Vol IV of Chinn's Machine Gun series. He spends a lot of time explaining how the only thing between a big gas release and you is the case head. Case sidewalls can't hold the pressure.

The dimensions are based on 20mm cartridges, not 7mm:

View attachment 866289

residual pressure is around 650 psia, not 65,000 psia.

View attachment 866290

I can't prove it, but I believe that this M96 was chambered in 308 Win and pounded the receiver seats back and blew the receiver ring:

View attachment 866291

View attachment 866292


This is one of those Spanish small rings that was rechambered to 308 Win, and blew up. I cannot prove this, but it is reasonable to assume that who ever got this thing fired standard pressure 308 Win rounds, which were operating at the proof pressures of the original action, and once enough sidewall stuck out of the chamber, the case ruptured.

View attachment 866293


View attachment 866294


View attachment 866295

View attachment 866296

Click to expand...

Pretty scary pictures. I had a 1916 Spanish Mauser years ago that I purchased from Century Arms for 79.95. It was chambered in 7.62 NATO. All the gun rags at the time were screaming about how dangerous these were. Century had the same concerns and bought two test samples before they purchased a quantity of these. Sent them to HP White Laboratories for testing. Century gave me a copy of the report from HP White. The report stated that they ran the pressure up to 98,000 psi ( roughly twice the standard working pressure of the 7.62 NATO round ) without any ill effects. Returned both rifles to Century in serviceable condition. Mine shot so well that I fitted it with a Timney trigger and an intermediate eye-relief scope in a B-Square mount that took the place of the rear sight. Loved it when a guy sat down at the bench next to me with a Mark V Weatherby and proceeded to make all kinds of disparaging remarks about my rifle...putting lipstick on a pig etc. He shut his trap when we went down to the 100 yard line to put up new targets. The Weatherby was shooting 1.5” 3 shot groups and my “pig with the lipstick” was consistently shooting 5 shot groups under an inch. When I asked him if he would like to put up a $100 wager on which rifle would shoot the better groups in the next round he had nothing to say all of a sudden! Always regretted trading that rifle away. Would sure like to have the full details...load, bullet weight etc on what blew the Spanish Mauser apart.

whatnickname said:

Pretty scary pictures. I had a 1916 Spanish Mauser years ago that I purchased from Century Arms for 79.95. It was chambered in 7.62 NATO. All the gun rags at the time were screaming about how dangerous these were. Century had the same concerns and bought two test samples before they purchased a quantity of these. Sent them to HP White Laboratories for testing. Century gave me a copy of the report from HP White. The report stated that they ran the pressure up to 98,000 psi ( roughly twice the standard working pressure of the 7.62 NATO round ) without any ill effects. Returned both rifles to Century in serviceable condition. Mine shot so well that I fitted it with a Timney trigger and an intermediate eye-relief scope in a B-Square mount that took the place of the rear sight. Loved it when a guy sat down at the bench next to me with a Mark V Weatherby and proceeded to make all kinds of disparaging remarks about my rifle...putting lipstick on a pig etc. He shut his trap when we went down to the 100 yard line to put up new targets. The Weatherby was shooting 1.5” 3 shot groups and my “pig with the lipstick” was consistently shooting 5 shot groups under an inch. When I asked him if he would like to put up a $100 wager on which rifle would shoot the better groups in the next round he had nothing to say all of a sudden! Always regretted trading that rifle away. Would sure like to have the full details...load, bullet weight etc on what blew the Spanish Mauser apart.

Click to expand...

In so far as the strength of that Mark V and your 1916 Mauser, the Mark V was far stronger:

Proof testing of the Mark V action

Weatherby had intended that the new action would be the safest and strongest bolt action available. The rifle was marketed as "The World's Strongest Bolt Action". The Mark V action has been tested to be able to contain up to 200,000 CUP (Copper Units of Pressure).[6]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weatherby_Mark_V

Ackley and his ilk consider blow up pressures the primary measure of a weapon. They are sort of like jubilant kids blowing up stuffed animals. It blowed up good! The Weatherby Mark V was designed in that era and had to cater to the group think of the times. However, I think it is far more important that a weapon reliably feed, extract, and fire. I don't want mis feeds, I don't want failures to eject, and reliability over the long term is very important. And these were higher concerns for military designers than the amount of pressure it took to blow the action. Military design bureaus wanted a safe and reliable rifle with issue ammunition, and considerations for protecting the user from gas release became more important, particularly after WW2. The Mauser 1892/1895 receivers were particularly bad in gas venting, but they were not the worst! I can say, it would be hard to say which was worse, the M1892/96 Mausers or the M1903 Springfield. However, given modern alloy steels, that 2X safety margin of those Spanish actions would have gone up maybe to 3X or 4X for the exact same design. Of course gas venting would be the same. Always wear your shooting glasses!

This data is from the early 1920's comparing the nickle steel used in the nickle steel M1903's against a 0.40 percent plain carbon steel. The single and double heat receivers were made from WD1325 which has .20-.30 carbon, so it would have been slightly less strong than the 0.40 carbon data. Yield is the important number, once the steel starts to deform the part should be junked.




Period, plain carbon steels were as crappy and inconsistent as all 19th century technology. Rail road rails had an unfortunate habit of snapping at the time. I have looked at the material specifications for rail road ties, and they are similar in composition to the receiver steels used at the time



I try not to stuff mini nucs in the chamber, for match ammunition at long range I purposely tried to find the maximum loads, and found I had a lot of pressure problems. Since then, I have decided the extra feet per second is only important in hole punching games. Yes, a high ballistic, high speed bullet, may stay in the ten ring during a 5 mph gust, when a slower bullet will move to the nine, and in F Class tournaments where the top three shooters are all shooting perfect scores, that makes a difference. But you know, I am not competing in F Class, nor am I changing barrels out in 1500 rounds.

No country builds rifles with the express desire to have them blow up in the faces of their users, and Militaries do know the structural limits of their weapons, and the good ones issue ammunition tailored to the weapon.

I am have not conducted serious research into Spanish conversions or their ammunition. But it is known that the Spanish had a less pressure version of the 7.62 Nato cartrige, the 7.62 X 51 CEMTE. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/7.62×51mm_CETME

Google translated this text from this web page:

http://www.municion.org/762x51/762x51Esp.htm

Spain, isolated from the international community, continues to use 7.92x57. Beginning in 1953, prototypes of cartridges began at 7'62 x 51. In 1955 this caliber was adopted and shortly after it began to be mass produced for the new CETME. It should be noted that this cartridge does not meet NATO standards and is called 7'62x51 Spanish. In the '60s, they improve quality and are renamed 7'62x51 NATO-SPANISH. CETME assault rifles models A and B could only fire these cartridges. Used with 7.62x51 standard NATOs deteriorated rapidly. Version C solved this incompatibility, and any weapon prepared for the NATO cartridge can be used in Spanish without problems. Only since 1988 the cartridges produced in Spain are referred to as NATO-ORDINARY and meet the specifications of this body.

The velocity of the 113 grain, plastic core bullet was 2600 fps is referenced here:

https://ipfs.io/ipfs/QmXoypizjW3WknFiJnKLwHCnL72vedxjQkDDP1mXWo6uco/wiki/7.62×51mm_CETME.html

Needless to say, you don't need much pressure to push a 308 caliber 113 grain bullet to 2600 fps. Someone with a ballistic program could come up with pressure estimates.

I am going to claim that these 308 conversions were built to use the 308 CEMTE cartridge. The Spanish military would have known this and I am of the opinion this is the ammunition that was issued for these 1916 Mauser conversions. And yet, once they reach our shores, who is exactly telling buyers not to use 65,000 psia commercial cartridges in the things? Why, no body, it would have cut into sales.

Is your face worth the price of a cheap rifle? These old rifles, they were made in a period when work deaths and injuries were just taken as normal. I watched a program on Harland and Wolf, the ship builders of the Titanic, they experienced one death per ten thousand tons of ship built. A ten thousand ton ship was a big ship in the Edwardian era, Battleships of the era were around 24,000 tons. The US Army built one million M1903's with suspect receivers. Both Rock Island and Springfield Armory were deficient in having temperature gauges and workers were judging temperatures by the eye. There is no evidence they even used pyrometric cones to adjust temperatures in the forge shop or the heat treat ovens. Metals were regularly over heated and burnt any time heat was applied. The Army's own tests, in 1927, indicated that 1/3 of their receivers would come apart in a high pressure situation, and yet, they kept all of these rifles in service. The known defective rifles were kept in service until 1) the barrel wore out and the receiver was scrapped, or 2) the weapon blew up in the hands of a service man, with potential lifetime permanent crippling injuries. Every single heat treat fan ignores the second part. If the American Army thought the life and health of a Doughboy was worth less than a $40.00 rifle, what price do you think very poor countries put on of the lives of their service men?

Or for that matter, what about the NCAA? For student athletes, who exactly picks up the bill for the lifetime injuries student athletes incur during NCAA basket ball and football games? The school will patch them up, and once they are off campus, long care disability costs are on the athletes. The NCAA and the schools are not obligated to chip in a penny of those billions of advertising revenue they get from College sports.

These old rifles have been through many hands, and if they blow, your recovery costs are all on you. This was an interesting comment on a M98 Mauser incident:

https://www.longrangehunting.com/articles/pressures-case-strength-and-back-thrust.396/

I have the remains of a Mauser M98 action that was totally destroyed with a standard loaded .22-250 cartridge when the headspace became too long, allowing the case to separate. The brass cartridge head was welded into the ejector slot in the locking lug and part of the case body at the end of the web area expanded and formed between the bolt face and the butt of the barrel in a tight manner, looking a lot like it had been melted and poured into the gap. I had to remove the barrel in order to open the action. Incidentally, the shooter ended up in the hospital emergency room for removal of metal and carbon fragments, his eyes being saved by the glasses he was wearing. All of this was brought about by the failure of the brass case when the soft M98 locking lug seats finally pounded back far enough to make the headspace too long. Perhaps I should add here that Mauser actions are not heat treated like our modern factory actions. They are made from relatively soft carbon steel and then only surface hardened, case hardened, for a very thin, hard surface. When these M98s are reconditioned many shops will lap the locking lugs and often will cut the thin, hard surface completely away, leaving only the soft carbon steel underneath to hold the pounding of the bolt locking lugs in the future. They will pound back over a period of time resulting in too much headspace and a wrecked rifle...or worse.