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7Mm Mauser (7X57) "project"


Dr.Hess

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I'm gonna put all I know about the 7mm Mauser, and the Spanish one in particular in this thread.

 

I paid too much for a sporterized Spanish small ring 7mm Mauser. I did get a box of bullets and a Lee Loader set, but still, too much. It was an impulse buy. I'll get around to some pics, but I don't have any at the moment.

 

The rifle I bought, if it was a car, would be called a "20 footer." That is, it looks great from 20 feet. The closer you get, the worse it looks. Nothing on it is perfect. It has a Fajen stock that looks nice (from 20 feet) but is actually for a 98 mauser, not a small ring 93/95. It was bedded to fill the voids. Not perfect, but functional. The action is a scrubbed Spanish 1916 small ring, probably made sometime between 1916 and the mid 1930's, and reworked by scrubbing the crest off for the Spanish civil war. Numbers don't match. Military step barrel (more on that later.)


A bit of History (Hx) on the 7mm Mauser: The cartridge was designed by Mauser for the Mauser 1893 rifle, a revolutionary design and one that most bolt actions today can trace their roots to. I call the 7mm Mauser "The Cartridge of Lost Causes." I think it is an appropriate cartridge to shoot today.

 

Early adopters of the7mm Mauser were the southern African Boers (Dutch for "Farmers") who used it effectively against the British in the Boer Wars. Their superior range and accuracy tore up the Limeys. They would have won, too, if the British hadn't murdered their wives and children by the tens of thousands. You don't read about that part much. Facing the 7mm Mauser, the British realized they were out gunned and designed a new, improved cartridge for their Lee Enfield rifles after the war. The Boers got screwed.

 

Another adopter was the Spanish, who used it effectively against the U.S. in the Spanish-American war. I think the rifles used then were actually German made Mausers. The Americans realized they were out gunned and discarded the Krag-Jorgensen, enlarged the 7mm (0.284" dia) to 7.62mm (0.308 diameter,) made it a tad longer for more powder, copied pretty much everything else from the Mauser 93, so much so that they were forced to pay a fee to Mauser for violating their patent(s) until WWI, and came up with the 30-06 1903 Springfield. The Spanish were Screwed. Post Spanish American war, the Spanish started making their own rifles under license from Mauser, which is where this one came from.

During the Spanish Civil War, both sides used the 7mm Mauser. The NAZI side (how can you call a fascist /socialist v. communist war? NAZI v. Commie, I guess) used some 8MM Mausers, but both still had 7mm's. The rifles were re-worked by shortening the barrels and grinding the Spanish royal crest off the ring. The Spanish got Screwed again. No one wins in a civil war. We may yet learn that lesson again.

 

I recently read that someone or other in what is today the remains of Yugoslavia adopted the 7mm Mauser to use against the Turks (Ottoman Empire.) They actually had some mild success. Not that that part of the world ever didn't get screwed. They got screwed again 20 years ago. They are screwed today, just wait for it.

 

In general, I think one can say that everyone that went up against the 7mm Mauser in the early years learned that it was far superior to what they were using. Pretty much everyone that used it got their asses kicked because they were outnumbered/funded by a factor of hundreds. As a generalization, I think that is probably not that far out. Thus, I call it "The Cartridge of Lost Causes."

 

 

We can also say that the 7mm Mauser has killed everything that walks or crawls on this planet. I saw reference to an African big game hunter that killed over 1K elephants with one.

 

That's enough for tonight. I'll continue later with more on the journey of this sporterized Spanish 1916 7mm.

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I'd like to add a couple things to your commentary.

Yes the British were one of the most brutal powers in the history of the world. When they used to say "the sun never sets on the British empire" it was true, and that didn't happen because they were nice guys.

The US 30-03 (later to become the 30-06) was large scale model of the 7x57.

The US did in fact pay royalties to Germany up until ww1 and then after the war the Germans again sued and won. http://ww2.rediscov.com/spring/VFPCGI.exe?IDCFile=/spring/DETAILS.IDC,SPECIFIC=14177,DATABASE=objects

 

W.D.M. (Karamojo) Bell did kill over a thousand elephants with a .275 Rigby, which was the British designation for the 7x57 mauser.

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Yup, the .275 Rigby is the British designation for a 7mm Mauser. Apparently Rigby didn't think the UK people would deal with the metric system, so he called the round the .275 Rigby and sold rifles as that. 0.275" is the diameter of the barrel inside the lands, 0.284" on the grooves. Or let's just say "Supposed to be...."

 

Which brings up an experience on Brownell's page. I bought a 7x57 "Go" headspace gauge and finishing reamer. (We'll get to why....) Maybe it's just my box or me, but darn if I can get Brownell's web site to really work well, and they listed nothing or were out of stock for one or the other for a 7x57. I think it was the Go Gauge. But they did list a Go Gauge for a 275 Rigby and had it in stock. I bought that one, which came labeled "7MM Mauser."

 

Besides Brownell's, Midway USA and Amazon have been doing great business off the consequences of my impulse buy.

 

My rifle came with no sights. The military sights had been removed (holes still there) and the receiver had been drilled and tapped for a one piece scope mount with 2 holes in the front ring and 1 at the back. Finding a one piece mount for a small ring Spanish Mauser is a bit of a chore. I bought one for a Swedish Mauser instead. It fit fine and the holes lined up perfectly with what I had already drilled and tapped, but I did have to move the "gap" for the charging hump back maybe a quarter inch or so. I also had to grind down the very back end to match the back of the receiver where the bolt handle rides. I tired the Birchwood Casey Aluminum Black metal touch up stuff. Jury is still out on that. I also got a Super Black Touchup Pen which I haven't tried yet. The mount is set up with 1913 style spacing, so that opens up the interchangeability of mounting stuff. Hey, I may want to pull the scope off and put a red dot or a coffee maker on instead, right? The mount I got is sold as "Sun Optics USA Collectible Military Base Pre Drilled Small Ring Scope Mount, Mauser 96" and is, of course, Chinese made. $19 on Amazon.


For the scope, I'm using one of my Hammers airgun scopes. 3-9x40, mil dot, and most important for why I bought the first one (for an air rifle): Parallax adjust from 5 yards to infinity. That means I can adjust the parallax down to the distance of my winter indoor shooting range, AKA "The Kitchen." $63 from Sportsman's Guide, SKU: WX2-232127. Note that an air rifle scope has to be built tougher/stronger than a high power rifle scope because the big spring piston guns recoil differently than a rifle does, and people were putting regular scopes on the big air rifles and destroying them. The manufacturers started making high power rifle scopes stronger to survive air rifles. I liked the first scope so much that I've bought 2 more. One for an old 22 that could use the mount that the scope came with (the skinny "air rifle" type mount) and this extra, which I was going to put on an AR, but I went with a IOR Valdada instead. I could have bought about 6 of these rifles (and should have been 12) for what the Valdada scope cost, but I finally have a "good" scope around here.

 

Rings I sourced from Walmart. They were a "name brand" and pretty cheap. I suspect the reason they were cheap is because they didn't fit. I had to take them apart by driving out the press fit screw and mill a bit off them with a file so they would close enough to grab the rail.

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Making Cases:

 

Lee reloading stuff has got to be the Harbor Freight of the reloading world. I like Harbor Freight, but, let's just say that some stuff is really good, most is useable and some is junk and most all a good value. I have found Lee stuff to be about the same. Most of my reloading dies are RCBS. I have a few other brands. I like the Lee Factory Crimp dies and I've bought some of those to use with the RCBS sets. I was going to do the same and I bought a whole 7mm Mauser Lee full length die set instead, my first Lee set. I think it is OK, and a good value.

 

Have you priced 7mm Mauser brass? Almost cheaper to just buy a box of ammo. However, you can make it yourself from 30-06 brass. Remember that the 30-06 has it's heritage in the 7mm Mauser. The heads are the same. Here's how I did it:

 

I started with some once fired mil-surplus 30-06 brass I had laying around, and also some fired 30-06 blanks that AzRedneck kindly gave me. I decapped them with a Lee decaper, which is a punch and a base to hold the shell. Some of the primers were seriously in there. Next, I swagged out the primer pockets with my RCBS primer pocket swagger set. You can use a pocket knife if you need to and just cut out the crimping ring.

 

Note that my non-progressive press is a RCBS Jr. that I bought 40 years ago at a sporting goods store. It was the display model and thus sold at a discount, which was good because I didn't have much money as a kid. The RCBS Jr. has a full ring, but is a lot more "Junior" than a Rockchucker. I think it is more for pistol caliber reloading, which is what I bought it for 40 years ago. This press got a serious workout from the 7mm.

 

So, next I put a Lee 7mm full length resizing die in the press and the Lee shell holder (which fit the RCBS arm fine) and adjusted the die down to touch +1/2 turn. I removed the Lee decapper/neck sizing rod, took a 30-06 case and smeared some case lube on it, mostly just below the shoulder, and not too much. For case lube, I am using some pure lanolin i got on Amazon, "Now Foods Lanolin Pure, 7 Ounce" and less than ten bucks shipped. This is the best case lube I have ever used, and should last a lifetime. I doubt I could afford enough powder to ever reload more than this bucket will last. Put a dab on your fingers, smear on the cases. None at the neck so you don't get a hydraulic deformation. The Lee die has a hole at the neck to let case lube out, which is nice, but the hole had a burr and I had to get in there and clean it up. Like I said, the HF of reloading. Ram the case up into the die in stages. I had to reinforce my reloading bench to handle the leverage needed to do this, and I sometimes had to put a cheater bar on the end of the RCBS Jr. handle. About one in ten deformed the shoulder with a bad wrinkle as the shoulder was pushed back. I pitch these. Doing it in stages seems to minimize the wrinkles. Small wrinkles I don't worry about, just big deep ones. The once fired blanks were actually easier to resize/convert than the regular brass. I suspect that the blanks didn't expand out fully to the chamber size like the regular ammo did.

 

Now I had cases sized to 7mm Mauser, but with a neck that was, I dunno, close to a half inch too long. I took a HF "whiz wheel" or "muffler cut off tool" and eyeballed about how long the cases should be plus a tad for safety factor and cut the necks down by holding the case with one hand against the vice and cutting. Next, I set my caliper to about how long the case should be plus about 10 thousandths or so. I took the cut down cases (rough neck, just eyeballed and not even square) and pushed the necks against the (HF) belt sander, grinding them about square and stopping when they fit in my caliper. I did this to get them closer for the next stage, the Lee case trimmer. You put the trimmer die in the press, adjust it down, put a case in the ram and raise it up, then you put a hand crank thing on the top of the trimmer die and crank away. Be sure to put a little oil (I use Break Free) on the tool where it rides inside the die. I get them close on the belt sander because cranking away with the Lee trimmer is slow and work. Now you have 7mm Mauser cases the right shape and length. It is a good idea ("They Say") to chamfer the necks, so the Lee Neck Chamfer tool at about $4 (already had it) is next. After doing some by hand, I got lazy and grabbed the tool in the 3 jaw chuck on my lathe and turned it on. I just held a case up against the spinning tool and deburred/chamfered the necks. Much easier than twisting by hand. I suppose a drill press would work too, but once you own a lathe, everything looks like a problem in roundness. I then put the neck sizing/decapping rod back in the sizer die and ran the cases through one more time. Now the cases were fully finished 7mmx57 Mauser and cost me only time.

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I have mostly Lee dies and have found them satisfactory. I have 2 Lee presses, a Challenger which is a little on the weak side but serviceable and a rock solid Classic Cast, but I agree some of their stuff, scales in particular, are crap.

You're right on regarding the lathe. After getting one you don't know how you ever lived without it.

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Graf and Sons has PPU brass for $50 a hundred. It's supposed to be very good brass as I've heard good reviews about it.

 

Watch Midway for brass. I got 3 boxes on sale a few months ago for a decent price.

 

I usually form just about everything from 30-06. I'm trying to get out of that as it could be disastrous when dealing with 25-06, 30-06, 338-06, 8mm-06 and now the 35 Whelen. I may just be paranoid...

 

Thanks,

Brenden

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That is pretty much the same thing I did when I made 8mm from 3006.

One improvement:

My lee trimmer can be locked into a hand power drill and the drill can set in your vise.

You have to set the case in the holder with care but that trimmer will shorten that brass to the required size and that very quickly.

 

If it groups well, it is all worth it.

karl

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This mil-surp brass isn't marked 30-06 at all anyway. Just weird headstamps. Some LC some others. I don't have that many different rifle calibers, so it's not a problem for me. I actually only have 300 Blackout, 223, 30-06, 8mm Mauser, 7.62x39 and now 7x57.

 

Karl, the Lee trimmer I'm using is their "Lee Delux Quick Trim, which is not the one you are talking about that is a pin thing and a shell holder. I have one of those for 223. This one is a die that fits in the press and a crank handle. I got a die for 300BO and 7mm.

 

 

Bullets (Boolits):

 

My goal was (is) to have a cheap shooting center fire rifle. That means cast bullets, as "store bought's" are about $0.30 each. Gas checks today are $0.03 each, and I have some wheel weights around, so add in a penny for lube and it's under a nickel if you roll your own. I bought a Lee 7mm boolit mold (mould). Now, I have a bunch of Lee cast bullet molds, and I have probably cast close to 10K bullets through them. When I was a kid, I used to cast 45 ACP SWC's and sell them to gun shops, etc. in cans of 500, and I cast all of them in a 2 cavity Lee mold, which I still have. So I thought the Lee 7mm mold would be OK. The one I got turned out to be on the "not good" list. I fired up my melting pots and got to casting, getting into the rhythm. When I went to size them, things didn't look right. Turns out the mold was not closing properly and the bullets were misformed. I could use about a quarter of them and the rest went back into the pot. Looking at the mold, the locator pins had worked back into the mold, so it wouldn't line up on closing. Some emails to Lee for warranty returned an email of: You need to stake the receiver pin sleeve or send it back to us if you don't want to do that.... So I staked the pins and the receiver thingies and tried again. The pins completely fell out of the mold when it got hot. I put it all back in the box and sent it to them. They sent me a new one.

 

Meanwhile, I took the good casts and sized them with a gas check and tried the rifle. That didn't work well, as in not on the paper at 50 yards, despite being bore sighted. Eventually, I walked about 30' from the target and tried and found the bullets were keyholeing. I suspected the bullet, so I bought a Lyman mold and tried with that. Also keyholeing. Next, I bought some store bought jacketed soft points. ALso keyholeing. So I tried 3 of the box of 20 store bought ammo that came with the rifle. Still not good. Now I knew I had a problem with the rifle.

 

I also experimented with hardening my cast boolits. I tried heating them in the oven to 450F (by HF infrared pyrometer) and quenching, but by my built in hardness tester (thumbnail), I didn't really see any difference. Next I tried what I call "water casting" them. I put some water in a bucket,then took a piece of cardboard and cut about a 2" hole in the middle and folded/bent it so that it sits in the top of the bucket. When casting, I knock the bullets free from the mold over the cardboard, where they fall down to the hole and into the water. I made a basket from "hardware cloth" to sit in the water and catch the bullets so I just have to pick up the basket full of bullets when done. My built in hardness tester shows the bullets cast this way to be much harder than regular cast bullets. Note that this is not without risks. Any water getting into the molten lead is instant hot lead explosion, so I consider this an "advanced technique" in boolit casting.

 

Crowning the muzzle:

"Teh Intr4w3bz, y0" said that keyholeing could be from a damaged crown. So I recrowned the muzzle. I took a pipe cutter and scored a line around the barrel about 2" back from the muzzle, then cut it off there with a hack saw. I dug a carriage bolt out of my bucket of nuts and bolts and smeared some automotive valve grinding compound on it. I stuffed some patches into the barrel a couple inches down from the muzzle and chucked the bolt up in a hand drill, and with the barrel pointing up in the vice, started grinding away until the end looked "crowned." Back to the test: Still keyholeing with the store bought bullets and the Lyman cast. I should take some pics of the target. Perfect sideways bullet profile, shot at 30'. OK, barrel must be junk. Driving a bullet into the end of the barrel and driving it out to kinda "slug" it showed not too much rifling in there. The caliper inside the end of the barrel wasn't near .275, that's for sure. Not too far from 284. I looked through the barrel before I bought it. It is bright and you can see rifling. I just didn't realize that the rifling is just a hint of rifling, or where the rifling "used to be." What must it take to shoot out a 7mm Mauser barrel? 10K rounds? More? Mind boggling what this action must have gone through in the last 90-ish years.

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I got a little ahead of myself with the boolits and the barrel problems.

The Bolt Handle.

After I got the scope mount done and my scope in, I had to use a high set of rings to clear the bolt handle. This Spanish Mauser came with a turned down handle. I think most of the 1916's did. It still doesn't clear a scope very well.

The bolt handle comes off the bolt in a square section where it interfaces with the receiver, then transitions to round, turns down and ends in a ball. I cut the handle off right where it transitions from square to round. Next I took the cut off handle and heated it up to cherry red and pounded out most of the curve and pounded the cut end somewhat flat. When it cooled, I flipped it over and put it up against the square stub on the bolt point down, so that instead of curving down, the handle now goes straight down off the square part and curves gently outward. I ground a channel into the handle on 3 sides (top, bottom, front) to fill with weld, put it back in the rifle and tacked it in place to the bolt in the right spot with my HF MIG. Note that the bolt is a carbon steel, near as I can tell. I used flux core wire with Argon shielding (AKA "Double shielded") because that's all I have for MIG'ing carbon steel.

I ordered a Mauser bolt heat sink and some Brownell's heat stop paste. The bolt heat sink is actually for a 98 Mauser, not a 93, but the thread pitch is the same. It doesn't screw all the way in, but I figured it was better than not using it. I could have turned it down and made it fit perfect, but this was good enough. With the heat stop paste applied and the heat sink screwed in, I put the bolt in the vice and covered everything except the part being welded with aluminum foil to catch the splatter. I welded the handle back on the bolt on 3 sides, leaving the back alone, as that was getting close to screwing up the back of the bolt with the welder. I figured 3 sides is probably enough weld to hold it on. I'm not a professional welder, I don't have a TIG and I have to use the tools available. After welding, I ground it back down to where it would work in the receiver again. I put the scope in a lower set of rings (the ones I had to modify.) The scope now sits just over the barrel, which is about as low as it can go. The newly welded handle still wouldn't quite clear the scope, so I did some grinding to the handle and scooped out a bit, then polished it. It turned out pretty nice, I think. In test firing, I had a case get stuck and had to take a mallet to the handle. It held up, so I'm calling that good enough. If it ever breaks off, I'll sub it out to a professional TIG welder. The handle isn't perfect, but then nothing on this rifle is perfect, so it fits the motif.

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My 1917 enfield (Boris) had that same key holing problem.

I called Sierra bullets and a fellow named Earl gave me this advise.

When that happens, it often means that that Throat is worn, Boris was designed for 150 gr 308 USG 3006.

Over the years it has fired thousands of rounds. I know that I put a about a thousand through him my self. since 87 when I got him and he had been counter-bored then.

Any way, Earl told me that I could do one of two things: Get a new barrel or use 168 grain and heavier bullets.

Wanting to keep the original barrel, it had been there since 6/1918, I loaded the heavier bullets...problem solved.

Another path might be to cast your bullets a bit over sized..308?

Of course, if you have the tools and can find a new barrel for a good price, you can just change it out.

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Yeah, I suspect the throat is totally gone as well. I think that the original barrel is a barrel "only in the academic sense: It is round and has a hole on each end..." to paraphrase A Christmas Story.

 

Here's some pics of the bolt. Two pics show the modified bolt next to an unmodified Spanish Mauser bent bolt. I think it turned out nice. I may do the other one the same way. Also, using the MIG, the heat of welding stayed pretty much in the stick out part of the bolt. The lugs never even got warm.

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post-38-0-02765100-1403467711_thumb.jpg

 

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post-38-0-70122300-1403467353_thumb.jpg

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Low Profile Safety:

 

With the scope mounted low, now that the bolt handle cleared it, the safety doesn't work as the scope interferes. I bought (ebay) a Timney Triggers Low Profile Safety for Mausers M-95-6 LPS Item #1002, UPC 081950010028. It works on a Spanish 93 just fine. You have to grind a bit on the hammer where the safety first engages, as it is in a different spot than the factory safety. No big deal. This arrived after I took the whole rifle apart. I have it installed on the bolt and working, but I didn't have the scope on it at the time. Holding the scope/mount up, I think it will clear OK, but I might have to bend the "wing" down a little bit. We'll see once it's all back together.

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Doc a good way to water drop cast bullets is to dump in a bunch of styrofoam pellets into the water bucket. You will booger up a few slugs that catch the pellet just right. Ending up with melted Styrofoam stuck on it. Beats trying to sneak them through a hole to catch the splashing water.

 

Years ago I had a nice 7MM Spanish Oveido Mauser that unknown to me at the time I bought it, was a collector's piece. Franco sent a bunch of worn and shot out rifles to Germany after the revolution. Franco's buddy Hitler had them rebuilt and re-lined the bores. The rebuild was finished up with a Nazi eagle and swastika proof mark. I had gunshow Nazi collectors admiring it following me around the show and making offers. I finally got a straight across swap for a US M-1 Carbine for it. If I remember right I think I traded a lawn mower with my neighbor for the Spanish rifle. His original yard sale price of $35.00 about 1976 or 77 was to high. I love trading with Nazi collectors, you can stick it to them and they always think they got the better end of the deal.

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With the one exception noted above, every Spanish 7MM rifle I've had over the years and there have been plenty. The bore was shot out. I would run a heavily oiled patch down the bore, get one good shot sometimes a second but nearly always by the third it would print sideways. Doc wish I read your post in detail before sending the parcel. Watch your mail I'll send you a chunk to add to your lead pot. It should significantly harden about 10 lbs of lead. BTW the lanolin makes a good lube/sealant for your cast bullets although it is a bit expensive compared to the conventional commercial wax based or the Lee brand goo lubes.

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Thanks, Az.


When I'm "water casting," the cardboard piece I use with the hole in the middle is bent into a funnel shape and stuffed down into the bucket. That way, I can release the boolits on the side of the cardboard walls of the funnel and they just tumble down into the water. The small hole prevents the water from splashing back up, a serious safety hazard around molten lead. Rarely will one get hung up in the cardboard and need a nudge with the stick.

 

Now that you mention it, the first 1 or 2 rounds after cleaning wouldn't keyhole. I didn't realize the Spanish Mausers were all shot out. Oh well. As I said, it was an impulse buy. And, at this point, I'm in the mind set of "I don't care what it takes, I'm going to get this thing to work..." I'll keep that in mind if I ever foolishly start another one.

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The Cheek Piece:

 

After the scope was mounted, I wanted a better cheek weld, so on a rainy afternoon, I dug out the leftover scraps from re-upholstering my Esprit (RIP) seats and my Grandmother's hand crank Singer and made this:


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I started out with a piece of leather wrapped around the stock and oversized fore/aft. Then I folded all the edges over and ran a seam with the sewing machine (nylon thread.) I took some foam that came as packing for something or other and laid it on the base piece and cut out another to go over it. I stuffed as much foam as I could up at the top and sewed the cover piece down. Next I cut some strips and made the bullet loops on the right side. I punched some holes in the bottom with a lacing punch and ran leather laces through them (left over from a saddle bag project from circa-1986.) I think it turned out OK. Cost: Time.

 

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GREAT job with the leather!!

 

Upholstery was a skill I learned in a high school upholstery class. I avoided home furniture projects. Being a typical teenager it was for cars.I preferred to make what was named Tuck N Roll and Diamond Tuck seat covers and door panels with the then new material named Naugahyde. Naugahyde became named vinyl after the patent expired. l can vividly remember botching a Tuck N Roll headliner for my 57 Chevy. Going the summer break with no headliner later installing a commercial pre-cut. The high school shop had a leather shoe repair sewing machine that was converted from hand crank to electricity. I never used it much as I shied away from leather preferring to work with Naugahyde that could be sewed up on a commercial grade machine. I did some door panel arm rests with thick leather for a teacher's 49 Chrysler Limo. After that project I don't recall ever working with leather again. I never fooled with upholstery after high school but the sewing skills I learned all came back 30+ years later when I started my uniform business. Couldn't afford to put a seamstress on the payroll when I started it up. I spent plenty of late night hours learning how to do alterations.

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Thanks, guys. With the leather work, I just take my time on Oma's Singer.

 

Removing the Barrel:

When I realized the barrel was shot out, and not wanting to give up on this rifle (having added 7x57 to my limited caliber collection, etc.,) I decided to put a new barrel on. I didn't have a barrel vice or action wrench. I should have bought one 20 years ago for that Turk 30-06 rebarrel job, but then it would have just sat. There are several tools out there, but I went with the Wheeler brand, 808-771 Action Wrench and 465-185 Barrel Vice. I clamped the barrel vice down to my work bench with some giant C ("G" if you're English) clamps, put the barrel in, cranked the nuts down with a cheater bar on my ratched wrench, put the action wrench on the receiver with a rag over the top (they sell lead plates to use, but I just used a rag), tightened the action wrench, put a cheater bar on it and the receiver came loose with a good tug. That Wheeler action wrench will work on any receiver with a flat bottom, according to the documentation. Not a Remington 700, but all the Mauser family.

 

I bought an A&B Barrel off of Brownells. It was the only 7mm small ring I could find in stock, so that's the one I went with.

 

Fitting the Lugs to the receiver:

I'm sure there is a proper name for it, but "They Say" that having a good solid contact between the bolt locking lugs and the receiver is good for accuracy. Here's how I did it (inspired by the gunsmithing columns in SGN):

 

With the barrel off, take the bolt and put some Dykem on the back of the bolt lugs, where they rub against the receiver. Put the bolt in the receiver and with your thumb, push in against the bolt and turn the bolt a few times with the lugs fully engaged. Take the bolt out and look for where the Dykem was rubbed off. On my rifle, one lug had good engagement and one lug just barely touched at the outer edge.

 

Take some automotive valve grinding compound (I used the Fine) and put a dab on the back of both lugs on the bolt. Put the bolt back in the receiver and close it. With your thumb, push against the front of the bolt, pushing the bolt lugs against the receiver and turn the bolt handle repeatedly in the "closed" part of the cycle (not the extracting part or closing part.) That's, I dunno, 20 degrees of rotation? Just the part where the lugs are fully engaged, not the part where the bolt is being pulled into the receiver. Keep pressure on the face of the bolt with your thumb. Periodically remove the bolt, clean it all out with Brake Cleaner spray, re-Dykem and check for engagement. It doesn't really take all that much to get good engagement. 10-20 minutes total time was about it.

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On my rifle, one lug had good engagement and one lug just barely touched at the outer edge.

 

That is nearly the same Shaw told me on a commercial Mauser action I sent them for a barrel. "One lug touching the other barely touching". If I remember right you saved about $45.00 doing it yourself. Mine is a 338 Win mag and the Shaw rep named Chris told me accuracy would be all over the target if I didn't spend the extra bucks. A few years prior Harry McGowen on a 35 Whelen project on a 98/22 mil-surp Mauser. Told me he didn't want the job if he couldn't do it right, insisting I have the lugs and action trued. Claimed his reputation could be hurt putting one of his barrels into a less than perfect action. I can't remember McGowen's price for labor but it was considerably more than Shaw but I think the truing involved more than working on the lugs.

 

Both rifles are remarkably accurate especially McGowen's 35 Whelen.

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Mounting and headspacing the new barrel:


I put the new barrel in the barrel vice clamped down to my bench, and put the action on the barrel, then tightened it down with the action wrench. Next came headspacing.


I had bought a finish reamer and go gauge made by the same manufacturer from Brownells. I figured that there shouldn't be a compatibility issue between manufacturers of reamers and go gauges, but if I bought them from the same maker, that was one less variable.

Putting the barrel in the (regular) vice with some rags to prevent marring and the barrel pointing straight down, I started the reaming. Put the go gauge in. Put the stripped bolt in. Hopefully it won't close. Measure from some repeatable point on the bolt (like the very back end) to some repeatable point on the receiver (like the back of the back bridge/ring) with a caliper. Remove the go gauge, put the bolt back in, pull it back against the lugs and measure again. That's roughly how far you have to go and where the bolt needs to be when you are done reaming. Take the reamer and put a bunch of cutting oil on it. I used Tap Magic, because I really like that stuff. Great for taps in stainless steel. Note that you do not want to get that stuff on concrete, as it will eat the concrete. I took a 3/8" socket extension and put the female end over the tap and grabbed the male end with a (HF) tap wrench. Put some more cutting fluid on the flutes of the tap. Let the weight of the tools do the downward force. Turn the tap wrench a few times and take the whole thing out. I lifted up the reamer with my fingers as I turned it to extract it out of the barrel. Always turn it clockwise. Examine the reamer for shavings. Blow out the chamber, brake clean, run a patch through, etc., to get it clean. Put the go gauge back in followed by the stripped bolt and measure the same way as previously to see where you are at now. I found that very roughly, I was removing about .001" per turn of the reamer. I had a total of about 75 thousandths to take out to get it headspaced. Don't get in a hurry. Sometimes it might be .001" per turn, sometimes more, sometimes less, depending on where it's being cut, I suppose. Remember that it is very difficult to put metal back after you cut it off. Nothing is impossible, but you REALLY don't want to go there (think remove barrel, chuck up in a lathe, take .010 off the shoulder, start over, or buy a new barrel...) Use a lot of cutting fluid. Keep it clean. Check often. When done, the bolt should just barely close on the go gauge.

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Stock Work:

The Fajen stock this came with, as I mentioned, looks to have been for a large ring 98. A previous owner bedded it to fit the 93 action and original stepped barrel. The new A&B barrel looks to be a large ring OD at the chamber, but a small ring thread. That means the stock/bedding didn't fit anymore. When I bought the official Dykem, I also bought some official inletting black. Please tell me I didn't spend $9 on 1 oz of gear oil with black pigment. Anyway, the stuff certainly does work. You put it on the action with a little (HF) shop brush, put the action in the wood, take it out and take off anywhere there's black. I did this for about 2 days until I realized that the stock was cut out originally for a large ring, and probably the same profile as the A&B barrel. After carefully cutting away about half the bedding (running all the way out to the end of the stock), I said screw it and just pulled out all the bedding in the barrel channel to start over. Putting the action in the stock showed a slight touching at the far end of the stock, which I took out. Next, I put 2 layers of automotive wax ('cause that's what I have around here) on the bottom of the barrel, smeared some oil on it and mixed up some (HF) 5 minute epoxy, poured it in the barrel channel near the chamber end with the stock about level in the vice, put the action in, tightened the bottom action screws up and let it sit for 10 minutes. The action came right out with the epoxy now supporting the chamber area. The rest of the barrel is free floated. I put some Minwax on the parts of the stock in the barrel channel that were now bare wood sealed it.

 

Trigger sear pin:

A problem I had noticed before is that the pin that holds the trigger/sear assembly up against the receiver was walking out on me. The two times I had previously pulled the stock apart, prior to this rebuild, the pin was half way out, to the point of "gee, glad I didn't have a A-D." The pin was just too loose in there. The trigger looks to be aftermarket, but not fancy. Just not 80+ years old. Maybe the sear is. The pin in question looks to need to be a tad under 0.120", give or take, or around a #31 drill bit size. I didn't want to sacrifice a #31 drill bit from my index. Sanding down a 1/8" bit was taking a LONG time. Digging through my drill bits turned up some seriously cheap bits that came with something or other a decade or two ago. Probably a "dollar days" item. The 1/8" bit measured just under 0.120'. Perfect. I cut it to length fairly easy with my bimetal hacksaw blade. I then flattened out one end of the bit (now pin) so that it would kinda press into the trigger piece and stick there. I flattened it by grabbing it with some vice grips and squeezing hard. It was that or super glue it in place, and I'd rather not do that.


Trigger:

I'm leaving the trigger as a 2 stage military style. That means no grinding of the back hump on the trigger. I did polish the humps with some red jeweler's rouge, along with the sear, bolt part that touches the sear and the bottom of the receiver that the trigger rotates on. That's a "good enough" trigger job for today. My goal is a "general purpose" rifle, not a target rifle, so that gets a "general purpose" trigger.

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Here is every bit of reloading data I can find on teh intr4w3bz, y0, on the 7 x 57, all in one table. YOU SHOULD BE CAREFUL USING THIS DATA, AS YOU ARE ON YOUR OWN!!! GUNS ARE DANGEROUS!! RELOADING IS DANGEROUS!!! START BELOW THESE LOADS AND WORK UP, WATCHING FOR PRESSURE SIGNS. Research these loads yourself. Go to the powder manufacturer's web site and pull their data. Uh, you're dealing with a 100-ish year old rifle. BE CAREFUL.

 

7mmLoads.zip

 

 

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Bluing:

 

I was trying to decide between painting and cold blue. I figured I could try the cold blue and if I didn't like it, paint over it. So I went with some cold blue I had laying around from prior projects and repairs. I degreased the barrel and receiver with brake cleaner and put the cold blue on about 3 or 4 times, washing it off in between coats and occasionally steel wooling it.. Then I put a layer of automotive wax on, rubbed it a bunch and added some Browning gun oil I've had for the last 40 years or so. I think it looks OK. Not a "wow look at that bluing" job but OK and fitting with the "not perfect" theme. It's uniform and without streaks, so better than my last cold bluing attempt.


Here's the finished rifle:

 

 


post-38-0-89912700-1404692631_thumb.jpg

 

 

Here's a couple pics of the bolt and Timney Safety. It cleared the scope, so I didn't have to bend it. I did have to rework the hammer, as after I fixed the lugs, it moved the bolt back a bit. I made a ramp where the safety engages the hammer so it would work its way in.

Safety off:

post-38-0-83220400-1404692746_thumb.jpg

 

Safety on:

post-38-0-17510300-1404692849_thumb.jpg

 

All in all, I think the rifle turned out OK. Test firing it, I'm calling it 2 MOA-ish. And half that error is mine, I'm sure, as my porch rail isn't exactly the best shooting platform. I broke the barrel in with the same method that the instructions for the Lilja barrel I put on that AR came with. Shoot a shot, wet patch of Butch's Bore Shine, 5 strokes of a brush, wet patches until clean, dry patch, shoot again until the Butch's patches don't come out green after shooting. About 15 shots.

 

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