Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 257 Roberts +P vs Standard

In like vein, some manuals list data for the 6.5x57 which would give you another valuable data point in researching load data for your 257.

John, any follow on with this. I’m interested in the original source writing from Mr Roberts that got the spark lit on the 257R.

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It's from Ned Robert's book Big Game Hunting, published in 1947. He developed the cartridge in the 1920s by necking down the 7x57--but a more sloping shoulder, which back then was considered better than a sharper shoulder. When Remington adopted it as a factory round in the 1930s, they used the 7x57's shoulder angle.

Back then the slowest-burning powder available was probably IMR 4064. By the time Roberts published his book IMR 4350 had been around for seven years, and he decided to see what it would do in Remington's version of his round. Here's the quote from his book:

"We can hand-load the cartridge with 48 grains weight of DuPont I.M.R. #4350 powder and the 100-grain O.P. [open-point] bullet to give 3400 ft. sec. muzzle velocity... The cartridge hand-loaded with 47 grains of I.M.R. #4350 and 117-grin O.P. or S.P. [soft-point] bullet gives 3000 ft. sec. muzzle velocity; by using 45 grains weight I.M.R. #4350 powder and the 125 grains Barnes S.P. bullet we get 2,900 ft. dec, muzzle velocity."

Now, pressure-tested data from that era, such as that found in Phil Sharpe's book Complete Guide to Handloading does not show charges anywhere near those for similar bullets, no doubt due to using the SAAMI pressure for the .257 Roberts, which is pretty mild. So obviously Ned Roberts was still doing a little "wildcatting' with his handloads. And Sharpe's data is very similar to today's non-+P data, so I doubt IMR 4350 changed significantly.

Years ago I pushed beyond the standard .257 Roberts data for IMR 4350 with couple of 100-grain bullets, working up to 47.5 grains for around 3250 from the 24" barrel of the Remington 722 inherited from my paternal grandmother. There were none of the traditional indications of high pressure, such as hard bolt lift, ejector-hole marks on the case head, etc.--but Sharpe reported 3400 fps from a very similar load. So I wonder about the barrel length of Roberts' rifle, which he doesn't mention.

I have seen notes that say Ned wrote for Magazines of the day. It would be interesting to read the writers take in that time frame. Thanks for the follow up. Probably need to get on the WWW and find a copy of his book to start.

"Reading" copies, as opposed to "collectible" copies can be found for very reasonable prices. Can't remember where I got mine--it was a while ago--but it's an interesting book. Roberts hunted mostly for deer and black bear, because he was from New Hampshire and mostly hunted in that region--but also hunted caribou.

I’ve heard that there New Hampshire actually has a type of elk. A friend of mine gets invited to a very exclusive preserve up there and apparently there are elk there.

Am sure it's a fenced "preserve," with stocked Rocky Mountain elk. Those didn't exist in Ned Roberts' day.

I've seen that "preserve" in New Hampshire. Looks like a group of dairy cows around a feed trough except they were elk. No thanks.