Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Who likes the 7 x 57?

Actually in battle the recoil is a non issue. The extra weight of the rounds is. All of the extra size and weight for the grunt to carry would have more impact.

As an aside, when has high command ever had their pulse on the needs of the enlisted?

Randy

medicman,

I have to respectfully disagree. The "high command" isn't happy when field grade Officers. Platoon, Company, and Battalion Commanders report that their Soldiers can't qualify on the Ranges.

That the Germans Army switched to lighter pointed bullets for their standard cartridge was the official reason for the 30/06 with it's 150 grain spitzer bullet.

It was also an excuse for solving a problem of the U.S. Army Ordinance Corp creating a cartridge with more recoil than a Soldier can tolerate enough to be able to qualify with at the firing Ranges.

idahoguy101. Thanks for that post. I knew the 30-03 was a scaled up 7x57 and the 03 action was "copied" from the 98,(actually it was more the magazine configuration patents that were infringed from my understanding) after the outing to Cuba's San Juan Hill, but hadn't seen that reason before. I had understood that part of the reason was that the 30-40 had only been in production for a few years and there was all the tooling for the 30 cal barrels, with the 220gn bullet being a carry-over from the Krag as well.

Von Gruff.

Use to carry a 60 in each hand and went for broke.

I like the 7x57 a lot! Seem to have accumulated more than I actually need, but each rifle is "special". It has become my primary do-anything cartridge of choice. Last season I took my first wolf with one.
I have a Brno 22f carbine, a couple of Ruger #1's, and a couple of German combination guns in the rimmed version, a Merkel BBF and a Krieghoff Drilling. The shotgun barrels in the German guns are also chambered for a classic and capable round, the 16 ga. Like the 7x57, the 16 ga. is no longer popular, but is "just right" for many hunting tasks.

VonGruff,

World War One changed nearly everything about modern warfare. After the war the Army Ordinance Corp wisely concieved of a semiautomatic Infantry rifle that shot a lighter cartridge with enough taper in the case for it to be reliable under trench warfare filth.

That was the original Garand rifle in .276 Pederson cartridge. The 276 Pederson was ballistically a 7mm Mauser with a bullet in the 120-140 grain range.

Army Chief of Staff Douglas McArthur vetoed the Army adopting the 276 Pederson cartridge and sent Garand back to redesign the rifle to use the in service 30/06.

VonGruff,

If you want to take it enough further... After WWII the British begged us to adopt their new .280 British cartridge. Which the U.S.Army Ordinance refused to do insisting instead on the more powerful 7.62 NATO cartridge.

Decades later the U.S. Special Operations Command orders a new cartridge, the 6.8 SPC, due to their dissatisfaction with the performance of the weak standard 5.56 NATO cartridge.

The connection is that the 276 Pederson, the .280 British, and the 6.8 SPC cartridges are all ballistically alike. So the original modern smokeless army cartridge may still be the best. And the U.S. Army has been running circles around the obvious ballistic choice since 1898!

Jim Wilson wrote an article for the American Rifleman. No date listed.

Found it - American Riflman November 2009

Thanks

http://www.americanrifleman.org/ArticlePage.aspx?id=1944&cid=2

Finn also wrote 2 articles I can remember. The first was an historcal piece that features a pic of his father with a couple of Kenyan lions he took, in a Petersens special publication and the 2nd was a deer hunt in Texas with a new version (US) Rigby .275 which he reviewed.

JW

Anybody out there that can help with copying that Jobson article?
I suppose I could just re-type it.

Hey Whoop, PM me your email address and I'll send the pdf's to you. roundoak obviously has them too.

Here's a reference for the two American Rifleman articles that Finn Aagaard wrote:

American Rifleman Nov, 1986
American Rifleman April, 1990

Here is part of what he wrote about the 7x57 in the 3rd Nosler Reloading Manual:

"After encountering it in war, both the United States and Great Britain conceded its superiority over their service cartridges at the time. As a result, the U.S.A. developed the .30-06, which is in effect the 7x57 enlarged to .30 caliber..."

So O'Connor, Aagaard and Carmichael all credit the 7x57 for inspiring the .30-06. And of course the courts decided that the Mauser inspired the Springfield rifle, since they awarded royalty duties to the Mauser company for patent infringement.

Interesting thing my graddad told me was when his dad was a commando during the Anglo-Boer war, the English could not figure out why so many troops get shot in the noggin...

The reason was great-grandad and the commando's aimed at the top little bit (knobby part) of the english pith-helmets, At any range that they would shoot pommies at the 7x57 bullet would drop not more than a few inches so you are always going to score a hit

Another reference: Ross Seyfried in Guns & Ammo, Nov. 1991

His article begins thusly:

"Riflemen should be able to take advantage of this age of modern miracles, and we can. You can have a rifle and cartridge that was the choice of one of the most successful elephant hunters of all time. The same combination is lightweight, doesn't recoil or make much noise. It's also perfect for deer in the woods or sheep on the high mountain. If you act right now you can get one and 100 shells for less than $200.

This of course sounds like the work of a perverted used car salesman, but it happens to be the real truth. By buying a military 7mm Mauser rifle and the surplus ammo that is available for it you can have the foundation of W.D.M. Bell's Rigby elephant rifle...and almost eveything else."

Hmmm... I had a Ruger 77MkII in 7x57 once upon a time, and gave it up for a Sako 75 in 7-08. Now, the 7-08 works, no mistake about that..... and I'd never say anything against it...... but..... I am having a Tikka 695 put together with a 275 Rigby nomination in a LW 1:9 CM twist barrel and a McWoody stock etc. It may be a bit of a 'Tart' of a rifle but the calibre will be spot on.

Just something about the 7x57( 275 Rigby) that works in my head, and works on anything that it gets pointed at.

Best

Hello shootem,

I will be very grateful if you can send me the .pdf archives of the Jobson and O�Connor articles! I send you a PM with my e-mail address.
I have 2 7x57, an Original Sporting one made by DWM on a 1893 action. It is, as I said, an original sporting rifle, not a military reworked. Bought by my Greatgrandfather. It has commercial Proof Marks of the period. Still going strong! The other is an M98 Mauser (1935) with a Steyr Chilean contract military barrel, I bought mint with another twin barrel. It is now my main 7x57. I use and reload for them since 1974...

Probably one of my most foolish ideas was to take a perfectly good m98 mauser, and have a custom 308 target rifle built. My oldest daughter has laid claim on it so all is not lost, but I wish I would have kept it original. Too late we get smart...
Randy

Anyone shoot the 120gr TSX in their 7mm Mauser? Thoughts/comments?

I just had an FN JC Higgins (270Win) rebarelled by Bevan King in BC to 7x57 with one of his stainless bbls.

.

Not the tsx but the 120gn GS Custom HV and get 3235fps over 51gn BL-C2. Superb accuracy and the GS bullet is a beauty. That and the 160gn Woodleigh PP should see all situations covered for those that dont cast thier own and for that a cast 160gn with 65gn of soft cast onto the nose at 2415 is similar to the origional loading and works a treat.



Took this one at 145yds and three more of his friends out to 185yds with the cast softnose. All I need now inside 250yds


Von Gruff.