Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Combination Guns and Drillings New life for and old drilling

This has been posted on some other sites but thought some might enjoy it here.

I've been working on a derelict drilling in an abomination of a caliber that I wanted to turn into a coyote hunting machine. The extractor legs were bent and damageged to the point the gun wouldn't close, little hidden #4 screws had their slots stripped, the safety didn't work and the stock was loose. After a few months of a little bedding work, drilling out and rethreading the holes, welding the extractor legs to add material and reshaping the legs, everything started to work again. This old girl isn't ever going to the prom so I committed a sacrilege and tapped the rib between the existing claw bases for Weaver bases( I could never get a scope low enough using the existing claw mounts). The original Claw mounts and 4x Hensoldt scope still works just fine but is way too high for this kind of hunting.



I ordered a set of C&H dies for this 6.5x58R Sauer and preceded to make brass from 9.3x72R, a chore in itself. I have 20 rounds of Bertram brass but it isn't as good a fit as the sized 9.3x72 brass.

L to R .243 Win, 6.5x58R Sauer, 9.3x72R



Slugging the bore showed a groove diameter of .260 too small for .264 and too large for .257? I ordered a sizing die and proceeded to make .264's into .260's. The I received some German reloading data suggesting Hornady .257 117gr RN for it. I'm looking for a 200yard coyote load and the 117 sure wasn't going to be it so I began experimenting. The resized 6.5 Speer 90gr TNT bullets are hovering around 3" groups at 200 yards, not bad, I could live with that. 75 gr Sierra .257 HP were doing 4" and I could live with that in a pinch. I had just received a big batch of 75gr .257 V-max seconds for my 25-204 wildcat being the degenerate gun nut that I am what could I lose.

Nothing, I have a sub MOA coyote hunting machine with 2.5" 1oz load of BB's patterning well enough at 40 yards to spoil a coyotes day.



Not too bad for a 90 year old that has absolutely nothing going for it. Ask a young pup about it and they'd say " no 40 degree shoulder, hell no shoulder at all, break action, bullet too small and sure not enough scope, most likely I couldn't hit a cardboard box if I was standing in it".

This is, without a doubt, the coolest thing I�ve seen posted on The Fire in a long time!

Great work!

Well done!

What source for the bullet sizing die?

The reloading dies and bullet sizing die are from C&H4D and surprisingly he had them on the shelf. My 9.3x72R dies are from there also. They've had a few changes on ownership over the years but since the 1970's I've had nothing but great service from C&H. There aren't many cartridges that aren't on their die list. They have some really great presses and I use one of their trimmers also.

What gage are the shotgun barrels?

I really like drillings. When woods roaming you are ready as any rifleman yet can blast away at small game with the shot.

Very nice result for your hard work. It certainly should drop the hammer on those varmints!

16ga.

My Sauer drilling is also 16 ga with the short chambers. I have fired regular bird shot in it without a problem, as far as I see.

Then I found some shorter shells made in New Hampshire so that's what I am using now.

http://www.rstshells.com/

Yours has a very cool, interesting rifle cartridge!

Mine is the 8x57JR which I load for.

I have a MEC 600 set up to load 2.5" loads for all my clay bird shooting and roll crimp all my heavier 1oz hunting loads. I have a couple of other 16's with short and long chambers. To not have to deal with two different length shells I just load all my 16's to 2.5".

I have used my drilling for about 50 years!

I find it most useful as a shotgun/rifle in the forest. I have taken birds with it and deer along with other pests.

The drilling is most useful and all around without a scope on it. The pop up rear open sight is just fine for woods ranges with the rifle.

It's one of the best shotguns for grouse type hunting ever. In particular when bears are open.

Consider using the rear open sight!

That drilling and tapping you did could be filled with finish screws.

This drilling mounts and shoots just fine with it's 4X claw mounted scope.

My eyes don't focus close enough to use open sights any more, wish I could use them.

When calling coyotes sometimes the work is in close and fast and furious. I keep scopes on 1x most of the time and trying to line up on a scope without a good cheek weld is an effort in futility when your game is in close and or moving. I've been at this a long time and know what works for me. I do miss being able to use open sights I was a firm advocate and most of my guns were so equipped or with receiver sights. My sight started to go about fifteen years ago after cataract surgery.

I did control work in the 1960's on packs of feral dogs and used a drilling for the first time it was ideal with the rifle and BKS in the shotgun barrels. It wasn't mine but I wanted one ever after I've been shooting combo guns for about 15 years on predators and finally bought my first drilling about 6 years ago.

I agree with your reasoning erich. I put a 1.5 - 6 scope on my own drilling when I bought it a couple of years ago, the same magnification as I had on the BBF I'd owned for some years previously. It replaced the 6x Hensoldt which came fitted to the rifle (which I now have as a spare). At 1.5x I can easily use the shotgun barrels to their full potential for running or flying game - I even shot some clays with it - while having the ability to add magnification for longer shots with the rifle.

Mind you, I had the new scope fitted to the claw bases, so I do still have the ability to remove and replace it at will.

All in all they are a tremendously versatile piece of equipment.

I fitted a low mounted low power scope to my JP Sauer in the claw mounts and the 6x Nickle is still useable only much higher.



With the original scope. Very awkward to use quickly, fine if your just in a stand.

I've also found that a 1.5X scope works well with the shotgun barrel, in this case a 1.5X Burris "shotgun" scope on a Savage/Valmet M2400 combination 12 ga. over .308. Would have just used the open sights, but as mentioned above, my old eyes won't give me a crisp front sight picture (unless the barrels were 48" long....).

I like simple, fixed low power straight-tube scopes with WIDE fields of vision, and use a variety of them now, including a Weaver K1.5X w/dot reticle and a Redfield 2.75X "Widefield."

At the ranges I shoot, they work fine. Just need to see the critter's engine room, not his individual hairs....

Well Done, Erich!

I wish I owned it and you had a better one. I love to see these fine guns brought back to life and the light of day in the field. I wish I had your know-how and talent.

Have you tried using the .257 bullets without resizing? You might be surprised. I'm curious as to where you found loading data with American powders.

I'm resizing the .264's down to .260, the .257 I'm shooting as is but I'm concerned about blow by on the smaller round eroding the barrel.

I found one load for a 127gr RWS bullet and 3031 in COW and kind of compared the data for the 25-35 Win with the same powder and then made Calculated WAG using the relationship between the 25-35 with lighter bullets and applied it to the 6.5x58R. I developed a couple of wildcats on the 204 Ruger case, 22-204, 6mm-204 and 25-204 and there was no load data for them and I had to do the same with them. I will say it is easier with the high power cases as when you venture into excessive pressure with them you will get signs on the brass and know when to back off. You have to really exceed 29,000psi by a lot to get pressure signs so it is start really low and compare to what a 25-35 is doing with proportional loads. It might drive me to drink, but it keeps me out of the bars.

That is sooo classy!!

Origin of the term drilling?

Drilling is derived from German Drei which means 3 as in three barrels, a Vierling is a rifle with four barrels, 4 in German is Vier.

Thanks, erich.