I just purchased an A.O. Neidner target rifle with a heavy barrel by William Sukalle. It was made before 1930, and seems to be chambered for the original wildcat .257 Roberts. I'd be interested in opinions on whether I should have the chambering modified to fit the post-1934 Remington commercial .257 Roberts cartridge or to the .257 Ackeley Improved.

I would do a chamber cast and have a set of dies made for the chamber it has now. Shouldn't be too expensive, likely the same $$ or less than having it rechambered, and you won't be screwing with a piece of history.

Very cool grab there! What action was it built on?

I would dearly love to see some pictures.

Large ring Mauser.

At the moment I only have the seller's pictures. I plan to photograph it myself soon.

http://zincavage.org/N-S1.jpg

http://zincavage.org/N-S2.jpg

http://zincavage.org/N-S3.jpg

http://zincavage.org/N-S4.jpg

http://zincavage.org/N-S5.jpg

Horn buttplate & pistol grip cap

http://zincavage.org/N-S7.jpg

Pre-1930 Niedner stamp:

http://zincavage.org/N-S9.jpg

Pre-1935 Sukalle stamp on underside of barrel:

http://zincavage.org/N-S13.jpg

Neat old rifle!

I vote with The Kid: Get some dies made for the chamber as-is. That's too nice an old, original rifle, and it will be easy to make cases to fit the chamber.

try the DeFlave technique- drop the pin on a 22-250 cartridge and see what happens.

Get the chamber cast before making any decisions. I vote also to leave it alone and conform to whatever it turns out to be. Mr. Niedner isn't around anymore to make you another one.

Another vote for doing a chamber cast and getting dies made.

The only way I would rechamber that grand old rifle would be if the cast showed it to be some unobtainable brass to make cases from.

I've got a chamber casting. (Just can't find my calipers, and am waiting for new ones from Amazon to arrive.) The casting looks exactly like the .257 Roberts drawing in Richard Lee's Modern Reloading, but the seller said that .257 Roberts wouldn't chamber.

What with one thing and another --the bullet part of the casting is miking approximately .257--, I think the inevitable conclusion is that the rifle is chambered for the old wildcat .257.

WOW! Thank you for the pictures, that rifle is OFF THE CHART for a cool factor.

I hope that you get some ammo made up and hunt with this great old rifle.

Do you know the rifleing twist rate yet? If 1 in 14, you will be slightly limited in your bullet choices, but there are still some good options out there.

If it happens to be 1 in 14 (I hope it is a 1 in 10) PM me and I will give you ideas as to some good deer bullets that will stabilize in that slow twist. I have had several 250/3000 Savage model 99's so twisted and lots of modern, high BC bullets just wont work.

Congratulations, and good hunting to the both of you!

Thanks for the kind words. Just the kind of comment that comes in handy for reading to the wife to convince her that buying another gun was really a good idea.

I ordered dies from CH4D. He had a set of .257 wildcat on the shelf. He had made dies, years ago, once before and when he makes a new die set, he always makes two. His notes said that the previous set was made for a guy who had a Neidner rifle made in the early 1930s.

I don't know the twist rate, I'm afraid, but Bill Sukalle was a very painstaking barrel-maker and a fanatical accuracy freak, so I suspect he used the right one.

So, you bought a set of .257 wildcat dies before micing your chamber casting? Let's hope the gods are smiling upon you!

1) Dave Davison at CH4D said he'd take the dies back if they weren't the right ones.

2) I did mike the bullet part of the casting. It mikes .257, and the casting looks just like the picture of the regular .257 Roberts in Richard Lee's Modern Reloading.

3) The rifle was made before 1930. Remington commercialized the cartridge and changed the taper of the neck from 15 degrees to 20 degrees in 1934. The seller said that regular .257 Roberts would not chamber and included a messed up .257 case which had not chambered.

I think the odds are pretty overwhelming that the chambering is going to be the old .257 Neidner wildcat.

I would have preferred to have just gotten the chambering modified so I could buy ammo, but I asked for opinions on several gun discussion boards and got about 20+ replies telling me that it would be sacrilege to change the chambering. Not one reply was in favor of modifying the chambering. Sigh.

Bullet and .257 load recommendations would be helpful.

I would love to provide some help, but you really need to know for sure the rifling twist. A very accurate barrel can be made that has a very slow twist to it, that barrel will simply be accurate with a lighter (more accurately SHORTER) bullet than the barrel with a faster twist. So, despite the barrel maker being good at his craft, he well could have used either twist rate depending upon whether the rifle was going to be used for Varmints and Targets or medium game like deer. A 1 in 14 twist barrel will typically shoot well with bullets of 87grs and under, although some will stabilize some 100 grain pills. A 1 in 10 will stabilize about any .257 bullet up to and including those weighing 117-120 grains.

For reloading data, just start with the starting loads for any 257 Roberts and add powder until your chronograph tells you that you have hit the book max speeds for a plain 257 Roberts, assuming that you do not experience any obvious danger/overload signs along the way such as flattened or cratered primers, stiff bolt lift etc. When one sees such signs, he is usually way past normal and safe pressures.

To check the rifleing twist, run a tight, slightly lubed patch into the barrel. Make a mark on the top dead center of the cleaning rod near the back of it. Push the patch through the barrel until the top dead center mark comes back to it TDC spot and measure how many inches the rod travelled before it came to a full circle. If it took only 9 or 10 inches of travel to make a complete circle, then you have a fast enough twist to use any bullet. If the distance between the TDC marks is 14 inches, you will be limited to 87 grain bullets with possibly some shorter 100gr bullets stabilizing well enough to shoot and hunt with.

Another method would be to load some lower velocity or starting loads for a regular 257 Roberts with 120 grain bullets then try to shoot groups at 25, then 50 yards. A 1 in 14 twist barrel will have those long bullets hitting the target somewhat sideways with an oval shaped hole, if they even hit the target at all.

I hope this helps some.

Since the Sukalle barrel is a very heavy barrel, and the rifle once had a Unertl type scope on it, I think it is safe to identify it as a target/varmint rifle, rather than a deer rifle. I will try to measure the twist rate soon.

The CH4D dies arrived today. He labelled them as ".25 Roberts," which I thought was an interesting, though highly ambiguous, nomenclature

Oh man when do you see an original like that.. A re chamber would render that thing just another Mauser. The chambering is everything on this one. I would find a period correct scope and have some fun..

Yep. And if this rifle was twisted 1 in 14 just load up some light varmint bullets and start smacking down the rodents and coyotes with it.

If you get tired of it, please PM me.

JD_Zincavage-

Ned Roberts wrote many articles about his .25 caliber cartridges in The American Rifleman in the late 1920s and early 1930s. Unfortunately, the magazine was rarely indexed then, and digging out the material is tedious.

However, I found the following information in Sharpe's Complete Guide to Handloading, 3rd edition, 2nd printing, copyright 1953, on pages 358 and 359. It seems to be pertinent to your questions, including loading.



I have no idea whether Sharpe is correct in his statement regarding the relationship between loads for the .25 Roberts and the .257 Roberts. Once you have some cases fireformed for your rifle, you can check relative case volumes.

Use your rifle wisely.
--Bob

Thanks, that's just the kind of information I'm looking for.

My first thought was to try necking down 7x57 cases, but I've gotten replies telling me that neck sizing regular .257 Roberts cases should work. I'm not sure what case could be fire formed.

I find the highlighted section to be suspect. If there are pressure differences, volume differences will account for them.

Charlie Sisk did an experiment with a single barrel first chambered to 300 H&H, then to 300 WSM. The results were similar capacity + similar loads = similar pressure. And those two cartridges were dissimilar in shape to a greater degree than the 25's discussed here.

Have a gunsmith check it for headspace. If the standard 257 checks out you are good to go.
If not..you can fire form a case by seating a bullet into the lands for headspace..and send that fire formed case to have dies made..

But what cartridge case would I fire form?

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Good information on the .25 Roberts:

http://iaaforum.org/forum3/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=7464

JD_Zincavage-

Your link to the IAA information supplies most of the necessary background for working with your rifle. I can add that the article by Ned Roberts describing much of the development is found in the January 1925 issue of The American Rifleman. Below I've linked to one of his photos included in that article.

To make ammunition for a rifle chambered for the Niedner .25 Roberts, I would do as Ned Roberts did and start with 7x57mm brass. The 7x57 cases should be sized in your full-length .25 Roberts die, using a really good case lube like Redding's Imperial Case Sizing Wax. Depending on the resistance you encounter, proceed gently. You are going to have to move the case shoulder back, and increase the taper of the whole case body, as well as reduce the diameter of the neck.

The cases that emerge from the FL sizing process should fit the chamber of your rifle. If not, check the cases against your chamber casting.

The problem you may face is determining the overall case length. When you scrunch the 7x57 case to the .25 Roberts form, you will be moving a fair amount of brass, and it is likely to make your cases longer than they should be. In the 1935 article, Roberts wrote that one of the reasons Griffin & Howe proposed their version of the .25 Roberts was that it decreased the amount of neck trimming required on the formed cases. Since you evidently have the shorter-necked Niedner version, you will probably have to trim the formed cases to avoid the problems of a too-long neck. You might contact the maker of your dies to find out what are his recommendations. Hopefully he will have the length dimension of the .25 Roberts Niedner version, and not the .25 Roberts G&H version. (Roberts wrote that the G&H case is about 1/16-inch longer than the Niedner case.) If he does not have a max cartridge length measurement in his files, you might contact one of the knowledgeable IAA persons.

It's possible and even likely that the cases produced by FL sizing of 7x57 cases may not require fire-forming of any kind. After trimming, the cases may be ready to load, just like factory brass. However, until you're sure of this, some initial trials using the cream-of-wheat forming technique may be advisable. If you happen to make and fire a case with a too-long neck, the c-o-w method doesn't produce the possibly dangerous pressures that may occur with a bullet in place.

There's also the question of whether the headspace of cases formed by the FL die is correct. (I recently worked through a problem of a FL die headspace mismatch to the chamber, which produced case head separations.) Some c-o-w firings may reveal any difficulties here.

Good luck.
--Bob
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Great, many thanks. This is exactly the how-to-proceed kind of information I've been looking for.

One other interesting bit of data from http://www.jouster.com/forums/showthread.php?41802-25-Griffin-amp-Howe-built-by-Niedner-on-o3-action:

"Many of the Niedner chambered rifles have what is called a Mann-Niedner chamber which is a very tight chamber so you must use a little caution when loading for it if that is a the case. Most Mann-Niedner chambers are so tight that the case never needs resizing."


But my rifle was barreled by Sukalle, so it shouldn't have the Mann-Niedner chamber, I think.

Bob, you obviously are an expert loader. I haven't been loading in decades. I'm buying 87 and 100 grain spitzer-point bullets. Could you recommend a powder or two?

JD-Zincavage-

Two powders with which to start reloading your .25 Roberts? IMR-4064 made the original users of the .25 Roberts happy in the early 1930s and 80 years later, current loading manuals show it still to be still very useful in the standard .257. Alternatives to 4064 are Alliant RL-15 or Accurate 4064. Another useful starting powder would be H4350. If it should be unavailable, IMR-4350 or Accurate 4350 would be OK too.

It's evident and commendable that you're doing pretty thorough homework in preparation for shooting your piece of history.

--Bob

Thanks for the powder recommendations, Bob. It will take about two weeks for all the rest of the necessary reloading crap to arrive.

Ken Waters' "Pet Loads" (1990) came in last night. He has an article on the .257 Roberts which appeared originally in Handloader, November 1966. It says, in part:

"N.H. Roberts was one of the bright stars in the company of notable American riflemen. One of the relatively few in that select group to bridge the entire span of years from muzzleloaders to autoloaders, Ned was a man of diverseskills: rifleman, professor, writer, student of ballistics, and of course, cartridge designer.

Many of our readers are familiar with the historical fact that Ned Roberts, assisted by his friends F.J. Sage and A.O. Neidner, designed the .25 Roberts cartridge, later to become the .257 Roberts. Perhaps fewer of you know about the original cartridge without the "7" in its headstamp, but how many of you know that there were three different .25 Roberts cartridges? Most present day sources will tell you there were two, but shooters contemporary to the years 1930 to 1935 may remember the story as it actually happened.

The old .30-40 Krag case having already proven to be about the right capacity for necking down to .25 caliber, Ned selected the 7X57mm Mauser as a rimless case having about the same capacity. Perfectionist that he was, there followed years of trial-and-error testing which involved the making up of literally dozens of barrels for his .25-caliber wildcat, with different chambers, groove dimansions and rifling twists. Colonel Whelen once told the writer that he doubted if any man ever spent so much time perfecting a cartridge as Ned Roberts did with his .257 (or .25 Roberts, as he originally called it).

Early in the experiments, Roberts and Adolph Neidner were advised by Colonel Whelen and Mr. L. C. Weldin, ballistic engineer of the Hercules Powder Company, to specify a shoulder slope of 15 degrees for their new cartridge in order to hold down pressures with the rather fast-burning powders of those days (late 1920s). This suggestion was adopted and the 7mm vase necked down, formed to the new long-sloping shoulder, and trimmed approximately 1/16". A.O. Neidner then proceeded to make up barrels for the new cartridge with his usual close chambering.

These barrels, along with their hand-formed brass cases, were known as the ".25 Roberts" and were all that was available for the first couple years."

Then Griffin & Howe advocated leaving the case untrimmed, and you got version number 2.

Then along came Remington in 1934.

The Neidner stamp on my rifle is the stamp used 1920-1929. So it's clear that it has to be the original .25 Roberts.

You are discovering part of the fun of playing with the older Wildcats. I have had a few old odd balls myself including 30 Belted Newton, 348AI, 22 Kilbourn Hornet, and often hunt with a superfast 338 Wildcat of my own making.

To answer a question you asked, you can form cases rather easily from 6mm Remington, 257 Roberts or 7x57 Mauser. Any will form down and be useable with just one pass through the correct 25 Roberts Die.

It is fun watching you go through the learning and understanding phases of this cartridge like I have done with a few rounds in the past. Enjoy the whole ride, sir. These kinds of rifles and experiences do not come along so often these days.

You should have to wear a hair shirt as penance for even thinking about that!

Thanks for the powder recommendations, Bob

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My penance consists of having to buy a few hundred bucks worth of loading books, a few hundred more worth of loading tools, and then! discovering that, not only is there a nationwide ammo shortage, there is also a nationwide powder shortage and a primer shortage, and to buy a $21 container of 4064, you have to pay $14 shipping and a $26 hazard fee. Arghhh! I was right to quit loading.

I've found two out of three powders I wanted. Now, if I can only find some primers...

<mutter>

I find it interesting this Niedner rifle has a W.A. Sukalle barrel, since both Orville & Carlyn Behrmann made exceptional barrels for Niedner rifles in his Dowagiac, MI shop.

"One rifle I know about has a barrel marked A.O. Neidner Dowagiac Mich. On top and W.A. Sukalle Tucson Ariz. On the bottom without a Niedner or Sukalle barrel number. You figure that out."

-Michael Petrov, Custom Gunmakers of the 20th Century, 2005, p. 84.

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Did Petrov possibly know about my rifle, or is there another (pre-1930) Neidner-Sukalle? Who knows?

If a standard Bob case will chamber tightly run those. Using a Lee Collet Neck Sizer you won't need to worry bout a FLS.

A standard .257 Roberts cartridge will not chamber in this rifle. I'm planning to resize 7x57 Mauser cases. Presumably, once the new .25 Roberts rounds have been fired, only neck sizing will be necessary.

You are correct. Glad to see that you are going to load for and shoot this fine old rifle! I am very interested to know how the old girl shoots! Best of luck to you!

My FFL dealer who is a gunsmith & target gun builder looked at the bore and said it was pristine.

I have sent roughly $100 orders to Midway, Graf, MidSouth, & Cabella's. On Monday or Tuesday, I will be driving to a gun store in search of powder & primers. I'm starting to think of arbor presses & benchrest matches. It's a disease.

YEP! But a HAPPY one! Best of luck with this rifle, I will be anxious to hear more about it!

Did you ever calculate the twist rate so that you will know which bullets to try first?

Not yet, but I did buy the traditional 100 gr. and 87 gr. bullets. I'm buried currently in sleet and snow, so I'm not yet driving 1 hr. to buy smokeless powder.

Icy roads here, too and no bucks for studded tires so rifle testing is months away here, as well.