While I was killing time at Wal-Mart while having the oil changed, I read your article in RIFLE about your pre-WW2 Winchester 70 in 257 Bob. I know that you've had several Bobs in a variety of rifles like the Remington 722 that you inherited and the Mexican Mauser that you put together, but could you list them all, talk about what you liked or didn't like each of them, and what you would look for if you were going to acquire another one?

Great question. Thanks for posting this.

I have owned the folliwing .257 Roberts rifles:

The Remington 722 that belonged to my grandmother.
The custom Mexican Mauser you have.
A Ruger No. 1B that was eventually was given a slimmer, shorter barrel--with a much shorter throat.
Two pre-'64 Winchester Model 70s, one pre-war and one early 50s.
A Kimber 84M Classic
An old custom rifle built on a K98 Mauser, with a Sukalle barrel and a Griffin & Howe detachable side-mount high enough for the scope to clear the military bolt handle.
A rifle I recently put together on an FN commercial 98 action, with a slim Custom Barrel & Gunworks cut-rifled barrel and a Bansner synthetic stock.

Then there's one I don't own, but do handload for, Eileen's NULA Model 24.

So far I like grandma's rifle best, with the NULA close second, but haven't had the FN/Bansner rifle long enough to mae up my mind on it.

never let the wife play with a rifle you might need to use again some day. just saying.

On the 722 257 Roberts I have one and my experience is exactly like MD's . Mine shoots 100 grain Sierra's into little knots. Killed 10+ Antelope with it. Mine is pillar bedded but it shot well from the getgo. Sadly, I don't hunt deer or lope any longer.

Which of my .257s would that be?

After I saw a picture of your 722 installed in a 700 Mountain Rifle stock, I put my 722 from 03/52 in a 700 BDL stock. I probably shoot the 700 CDL-SF parts gun more than any other, probably because it is bedded in my favorite style of McM stock, the McM Hunter.

What did you think.of the Kimber

Have had various stocks on my 722, including a custom stock made by a friend which had the wrong LOP and was very heabv, the walnut Mountain Rifle stock, a laminated from somewhere (can't remember now), the original factory stock--and another factory stock, because the original got severely damaged during a move in 1990.

Have not been able to tell any difference in accuracy between any of them, as long as they were bedded the same way--epoxy-bedded front end of the action, all behind the recoil lug, with no "support" bedding of the rear end of the barrel. Also, have never pillar-bedded any of them, which in my experience (and that of several "accuracy" rifle smiths) isn't all that helpful as long as the stock itself is made of heavy enough material in the action-screw areas.

The accuracy when I first started handloading for the rifle was around 1/2" for 5-shot shot groups with "varmint" style bullets from the 75-grain Sierra hollow-point to the 85-grain Nosler Ballistic Tip. With 100-120 grain big game bullets 5-shot groups went into an inch, or less. This included the 100-grain Partition loaded to around 3250 fps with IMR4350--the load I used when guiding pronghorn hunters in the late 1980s. Despite what would be considered a really suck ballistic coefficient these days, it worked fine for my own hunting out to 450 yards, and when finishing off client's wounded animals out to 550. This was long before laser rangefinders, when I used the reticle in my scope to estimate range.

Part of the reason 721/722s shot so well was the quality of the button-rifled barrels, pioneered and patented by Mike Walker during WWII. In fact, one of the articles on my schedule is on the 1903A3 Springfield--apparently the first rifle to feature button-rifled barrels.

I've got a Ruger Hawkeye, in a walnut stock i really like.

"What did you think.of the Kimber?"

Beautiful walnut-stocked rifle, especially for the price. Stock bedding was good, but there was a problem with misfires, due firing-pin mainspring adjustment. Tried to adjust it per instructions, but screw was frozen.

Accuracy did not approach the 722's--but then only the NULA's has matched the 722.

The Bob? I have an idea...let's just for the hell of it, call it the .257 Roberts or the Roberts if you will. Whether he alone or with his collaborators, it would be nice to honor a pioneer of his stature.
In the 1920's he publicly fired a sub moa 10 shot group with it...if you think about the components that had to made back then, the primitive (by our standards now) telescope sights, it was a huge achievement in it's day. The rooster crowing and chest pounding here on the 'fire when a member posts a three shot group with state of the art equipment...makes me yawn.

"The Bob" is the commonly used nomenclature for the 257 Roberts on 24-HCF, just a nickname or acronym, not intended to be dismissive, disrespectful, or to denigrate his magnum opus. I'm a fan of the 257 Roberts, have owned a pile of them, currently have 11 of them, plus 2 AIs, and signed copies of his hunting and caplock books.

I am chastised, the "Bob" it shall be.
In the vein of that line of reasoning I shall henceforth refer to the Medal of Honor as the "AL", for Sgt Alvin York? Or, the "Jake" for Pvt. Jacob Parrot? I think the "Wheel" will suffice for the .35 Whelen as well.

Luv the Bob, my go to Pronghorn getter....

LOL, sounds like "the wife" has good taste in rifles.

I fondly named mine "Little Ned". My favorite resident of the gun safe, by far. Do you think Mr. Roberts would have approved?

I think that the "Whelly" might be an doable acronym for any cartridge associated with Townsend Whelen.

The MOH is interchangeably referred to as the CMH. All people awarded the MOH are equal, so elevating one above another might be seen as a sign of disrespect toward the others who have received the highest of all U.S. military awards.

I have drooled over Eileen’s NULA for a lot of years. Seems just about perfect in every way...

Yeah, she really likes it--but when she ordered it from Melvin Forbes 18 years ago, she wanted a 22" Douglas #1 contour barrel, because she wanted it as light as possible. At the time NULA had an "office manager" who wasn't too efficient, and didn't put in the right order. As a result, it got a 24" #2 contour.

It's still pretty light, but not as light as the NULA .270 she already had. However, a few years later Eileen started developing recoil headaches, and had to start using long guns with less recoil. We eventually determined the heaviest possible recoil she could take was around 15 foot-pounds, and it turned out the heavier barrel just about results in about 14.5 foot-pounds with the handload she started using a few years later, the 100-grain Barnes TTSX at 3150 fps. She likes the rifle even more now!

I have two of them, one matt blued and the other gloss. Both put three shots under an inch. I've owned five Roberts rifles and it's the only cartridge that I own multiple rifles for. I passed up a blued/walnut Remington Mountain Rifle years ago and have regretted it ever since. I have never seen another one in 20 years.

Mule Deer,
Could you tell us about some of the larger animals that Eileen has killed with that load? Does she, or has she used it as her elk rifle?

She has used it on one elk, an average-size cow, around 400 pounds live weight, calculated from the weight of what we packed out.. It was quartering away across a draw at 123 yards (I lasered it afterward!), and at the shot it dropped right there, flopped it's head 2-3 times, and then didn't. She aimed for the far shoulder, and the 100 TTSX entered the middle of the ribcage on the right side, then went through both lungs, on the way taking about an inch off the underside of the spinal column, which is probably the reason it instantly dropped. We found the bullet under the hide of the left shoulder, having lost one petal, weighing 78.6 grains.

Probably the second-largest animal she's killed with the rifle and that load was a a mature mule deer buck, which would have had about a 25" spread if his antlers hadn't been somewhat busted-up by rut-fighting. He weighed about 180 pounds field-dressed, which translates to 250 on the hoof. He was broadside at 99 yards, again ranged after the shot, and like some TTSX-shot animals, went about 100 yard before keeling over., despite the bullet going through both lungs and the top of the heart.

Oddly enough, the next animal she took after the cow elk, the same fall, was an average pronghorn doe, almost facing her at 163 yards. That bullet was also recovered, trom under the hide at the rear of the right ham, retaining 99.4% of its weight--no doubt due to the loss of just the plastic tip. It's unusual (but not exactly rare, in our experience) to recover TTSXs, and that was the only time we've recovered them on two consecutive animals.

I have had two Pre 64 M70's, both shot well but were heavy about 10 lbs with scope, rings, and bases IIRC. One I bought to flip which I did. My current Bob is a full custom build (I have a weakness for custom rifles) on a 1909 Argentine Mauser action and a Douglas premium barrel. It will put three 110gr Accubonds into a ragged hole with IMR 4350 at 100 yards. I have taken several white tails with it and none have ever taken more than a step or three..

When I got my 722 .257 Roberts I think one of the reason I got such a good deal on it was because the original stock had ben cut back to a very short LOP, and there was just a speckling of rust on the outside (only!) of the barrel.
I found an old M700 ADL short actioned beechwood stock on eBay for peanuts and it fit very well. But, I glass bedded it the same way I did all the Mausers and Springfields I'd had prior to that - neutral bedding on the action and a couple inches of barrel forward of the receiver, then floated forward of that. I've since been learning from JB about how rifles with the action screw behind the recoil lug don't need (and it may be a negative) any of the barrel bedded - just free float it all.
I've yet to get around to scraping back that portion of my 722's barrel bedding, to free float the entire barrel, but this post was a nice reminder I need to do so and see how it shoots afterward. Thanks for the reminder, John.

Cheers,
Rex

I have three Bobs, all custom. The first is Big Bob on a commercial Mauser action with 26" #3 contour Shaw barrel and Timney trigger in an old school walnut stock with rollover cheek piece. Strictly a groundhog gun with its 10x M8 Leupold. Little Bob is on a '95 Chilean Mauser with a cock-on-opening kit, 98 style bolt shroud, Timney trigger and 23" Shaw 1 1/2 contour barrel in a walnut stock I bought from a patient, with Schnabel forend and a nice open grip. A Weaver 6x scope tops it. People think it's heavy until they bring it up. Points like a shotgun. New Bob was bought at a gunshow for less than half the money that was put into it, as I found out when I showed it to my smiths, and it turned out they had built it. A Montana action with Douglas barrel set in a Winchester synthetic stock (which I hope to eventually replace) with a Burris 2-7 scope. I dearly love all three rifles. The critters don't share my enthusiasm.

I have one of those Kimbers in 30-06 I've been pleased with mine so far

Good to hear!

Got mine in 2008, when apparently quality could vary somewhat.

My first and only 257 Roberts is a Kimber Classic Select. It’s back at Kimber getting the barrel replaced right now because it had awful tool marks in the chamber and deformed threading where the barrel shank screws into the action. I bought that rifle new in 2016 and never really shot it much. Just this summer finally decided to send it in.Looking forward to getting that one back soon.

The "best" I have ever owned began life as a Remington 700 LVSF in .22-250. I rebarreled it to .257 with a Lilja 1-10" twist 3 land and groove barrel in his "REMMAG28" contour fluted to finish 3/4ths of an inch from a 22.5 inch muzzle. The barrel was a touch heavier than the LVSF contour and I had to open up the barrel channel a bit for clearance. Kevin Wyatt from Wyatt's Outdoors did the gunsmithing and he installed one of his long mag boxes so I could load to 2.95 to 2.97 inch OAL. I put a Jewell HVR trigger set around 6 ounces in it with the B spring. Optics .. Leupold 4.5-14X AO. It would put 5 100 grain ballistic tips into just under a quarter inch with 48 grains of H4831, WW +P brass, and Fed 210M primers. It shot under half inch with the same load just exchanging the bullet for 100 grain partitions and also with the same brass, Fed 215s, and 43 grains of H414 under 120 grain partitions.

I spent 4-5 years with a Kimber Montana and just never could get it right. Had the barrel set back and new chambers cut twice .. there was always 1 more thing wrong.

I've pretty much put .25 caliber behind me, sold all my brass, dies, and bullets. After 4-5 .257s and about the same number of .25-'06s and 1 .257W, and not an unlimited number of seasons left, it's time to do something different. I'm not immune to the temptation of Kimber Classic in .257 but I don't think I'll give in.