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Brad, I have always been told that WSM's were extremely hard to make properly cycle through a Mauser. If I may ask, how'd you get it to work? And would it be possible to get a couple photos? I am curious to see how this is done as I have never seen anyone attempt a short mag on a Mauser. I do like the 325 WSM if for not other reason than its an 8mm! Let us know how things turn out too please. Thanks, Jason

Grant. Wise, but ruthless.

Houston, TX (AP) - A seven-year-old boy was at the center of a Houston courtroom drama yesterday when he challenged a court ruling over who should have custody of him. The boy has a history of being beaten by his parents and the judge initially awarded custody to his aunt, in keeping with child custody law and regulations requiring that family unity be maintained to the degree possible. The boy surprised the court when he proclaimed that his aunt beat him more than his parents and he adamantly refused to live with her. When the judge then suggested that he live with his grandparents, the boy cried out that they also beat him. After considering the remainder of the immediate family and learning that domestic violencewas apparently a way of life among them, the judge took the unprecedented step of allowing the boy to propose who should have custody of him. After two recesses to check legal references and confer with child welfare officials, the judge granted temporary custody to the Houston Texans, whom the boy firmly believes are not capable of beating anyone.

Congrats Flaco! Feels good doesn't it? And I've got to admit, Z is one hell of a guy! I don't think I'd of gotten this far with my projects without his advice as well. If you want to solve that feeding problem, order a Swedish M38 follower and spring from Numrich. It costs like $16 delivered. My M48 wasn't fond of 6.5x55's either until I swapped in a Swedish follower. It was a drop in fit, but you'll have to adjust the rear of the follower to allow the bolt to slide over it. Lestwise, you'll have a last round bolt stop feature added in as well. Pretty easy stuff though. Congratulations on a sucessful finished product! Jason

Absolutely. The 30-378 is actually much longer and a good bit wider than a 300 Win Mag. As I say, its a monster. I've seen loaded cartridges and compared them side to side with a 300 Win Mag. The 30-378 is based on the 378 Weatherby cartridge, a cartridge that shares its case with the 460 Weatherby - all monsters! I don't think a 30-378 Weatherby is doable on a standard length Mauser and if it were, I doubt the cost would be justifiable. I really think you'd be better off looking at something else. There's no flies on the 300 Win Mag, although its still kinda hit or miss whether or not you'll be able to properly convert your Mauser over. If you've never try a magnum conversion, it can be a frustrating experience. I would encourage you to look around a little more. And if you have your heart set on a 30-378, look around for a used Weatherby rifle. I'll almost guarantee that you could pick up a good 30-378 that's probably not had two boxes of shells through for a lot less than you could convert a VZ-24 for if you look hard enough. Jason

Monte, One other thing you might check if the rifle is not feeding properly is the magazine follower. If after you've tried everything else you're still having a problem with feeding, try swapping around followers. It may help. Jason

Devo, The 30-378 is a monster. It's also overbore to the extreme. Short of a finding a true commercial magnum, it won't fit a Mauser action. You could use an Enfield, its a steep hill to climb to convert one over from military form. You can buy a 300 Weatherby at Wal-mart for $300-$500 and have all the 30 caliber power you need. I'd just forget about it.

Fritz, So are you saying that it takes an attorney to sort through the Texas Parks and Wildlife game law digest booklet? Funny; cause that's the same conclusion Dad and I came to a while ago. You aught to give the waterfowl suppliment a try sometime...and then go try to hunt ducks. Sheesh!

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Fritz, When the tax office screws up, I doubt it has anything to do with the volume of work they handle. And if it does, shame on them! If these people weren't working in a comfy government job and were in the private sector, I'll bet you a cold Shiner you'd of gotten both plates. And probably for less money. Say, there's an idea: Let's privatize the license plate business. Can't the private sector generally do it cheaper than government? I'll admit that I'm biased against football; I was in band and we had(?) the worst football team in the district. Still, I think we place too much emphasis on them and not enough on education. The Navy were the only people interested in any athletics I may have played. Everybody else is only interested in my academics.

Fritz, I'm sure that if we're going to one license plate, it was a tough fight as I'm pretty sure the DPS takes delight in busting everyone with a sporty front bumper or Confederate battle flag or other personalized plate up front. Especially the Confederate flag - that seems to draw the attention of lots of black cops and got a lot of us pulled over back in high school. I wonder what the income/savings ratio was for citations given for improper display of license vs no front plate in the future? Something doesn't seem right with all this. Who knows? (I doubt our legislators do... ) Futher, did they mail you your license plate? I've always gone up to the courthouse for a new set when I needed them. Are they mailing them now too? And since we need savings, I propose that we shitcan high school sports programs. Think of the money we'd save... Sports programs never did me much good, although better teachers might have. I know I speak heresy as Texas is a high school football state, but its unfair that the disproportionatley few students who do receive scholarships based on sports performance cost all the rest of us better teachers and more useful programs (like an ag or trades program). Think of the money we'd save there....

I do to. But when one starts adding on aftermarket parts like the Chapman safety I just put together, it becomes helpful not to have to fight the cocking piece while trying to remove the firing pin assembly from the bolt. By using the penny, all you have to do is screw the firing pin assembly in till it clicks to a stop and then either pull the cocking piece up or just yank the penny out. The penny also makes removing the firing pin assembly easy by using the reverse of what I just wrote. I suppose you could use a washer just as easily, but I had a great many more pennies around the house than washers. One other use for a penny I'll add is as a spacer for reloading. I have used a penny with a hole drilled through the center of it as a spacer to adjust my full length sizing die to neck size only with pretty good success. It needs a hole drilled through the center to clear the decapping pin. I simply put the penny between the die and the ram with the ram at TDC and adjust the die like its supposed to be adjusted without the spacer. Art Alphin describes something similar in Any Shot You Want, only he used washers. Again, I don't have many unused washers so I substituted a penny. Has worked like a champ for several hundred rounds now. Its amazing what you can do with a little creativity. And that's just my $.02! Jason

Perhaps I'm bored? I think we got a load of new mosquitos blown up from the coast during Hurricane Rita. I say this as I've lived in this area for almost 23 years and I'm used to seeing little black/white stripped mosquitos buzzing around me while I'm outside. There are bigger skeeters that inhabit the marshes I teal hunt in, but ever they are not all that big. So today was nice day and I had all the doors and windows open to take advantage of the pleasant October weather. Apparently I let some visitors in. A little while ago I noticed what looked like a mosquito hawk by the kitchen sink light. It wasn't a skeeter hawk, it was a huge mosquito! I'm seeing more an more of these lately. I didn't see them prior to Rita. Comparatively speaking, this mosquito is the size of a condor compared to our standard insect fair. Could this be a salt marsh mosquito of some kind? I'm hoping that if we've had an infusion of mosquitos from down south, they didn't bring the diseases with them that they're know to carry. Any entomologists in the house tonight? Jason

Here's the best use of a penny this side of exact change: This is a trick that I'm sure is known to most here, but I wanted to share it just in case someone found it useful. My gunsmith showed me this and it's sure saved me some pinched hands and aggravation during bolt assembly/disassembly! Jason

Here's my thoughts: I have always been a "hands-on" type of guy. I do all my own auto maintenance and home repairs. Hell, I'm even a stained glass artist by trade - it doesn't get much more hands on than that! Furthermore, I've always tried to build my own if I thought I could. So, back in 2001 when I was looking to purchase my own rifle for deer hunting, a friend and local gunstore owner convinced me to take a look at Turkish Mausers as a means for a college student to have his own rifle. Since I'd have to build it, this appealed to me greatly. I found Steve Wagner's site around this time and once I ordered my M48, I was off the races. Along the way, I found this site and got firmly infected with Mauseritis. Four years later, I've aquired a bunch of Mauser actions, books, tools, and knowledge and here in a couple months, I'll actually have two finished products to show for all my expeditures and questions. The M48 has been redone three times now and had the caliber changed. I've also converted a Turk to 30-06. I have at least seven more projects planned! Plus, they don't make rifles like Mausers anymore at prices we can afford. All the Winchesters, Remingtons, Savages, Weatherbys, etc all feel cheap to me. There's something reassuring about the feel of a Mauser. And you get a particular feeling of pride while standing over a deer you shot with a rifle you made, shot with ammunition you loaded. You can't buy that feeling - but you can make it! And what's more, with the crap shoot quality of mass production rifles today, I can achieve great accuracy, feeding, and reliability for around the same money as I can buy something off the shelf that probably needs tuned. Therefore, in my mind, the economics of building a Mauser make sense as after I've spent $700 on a new Winchester and paid a gunsmith $100 or more to go through it, bed it, and tune it, I could have built a damn fine Mauser that was done up right from the start. Done my way! With my hands! How can you beat that? That's why I sporterize. Jason

Little Canoe, I got burned by the original barrel on my first sporter because I bought on in Good-Very Good condition from SOG. I don't blame them for the shootability or lack thereof from the M48 I purchased from them - they sold me what they advertised and I have done a good bit of business with them since - rather I got a bad taste in my mouth from buying a Good-Very Good and trying to will it into being something it wasn't. I understand your concerns about trying to keep costs down by keeping the original barrel. They are valid, but I want to warn you that its highly possible to spend a lot more than what you really think you'd want to to finish the rifle out the way you'd like. Believe me... That said, if I were you and was looking to retain the original barrel, here's what I'd do. I'd set about $300 bucks back and start looking for a NIB, Never Issued, or Excellent condition Mauser. Specifically, I'd look for a barreled Mauser action as it is possible that you'd get a price break for buying the barreled action alone. The Persian Mausers come to mind as I have read many glowing reports about them. Also look at the M48's from Mitchell's Mausers (though I question their WWII authenticity, I have heard good things about them as shooters). I would also start making the pawnshop/gun store/gunshow/auction circuit as I know just about everyone here has run across great finds by simply shopping around. Sometimes, if you shop around enough you'll find something that's already sporterized for cheap that'll make a great hunting rifle and is ready to go right then. Whichever road you choose, whether you buy something from a dealer/catalog or over-the-counter, you're going to have to look real hard and be patient to find a Mauser who's barrel isn't worn out. The point I really want to stress here is you're going to want to take the least amount of risk by buying the best condition available. Though you're most likely going to pay more up front for the action, you're more than likely going to come out ahead in the long run. Therefore, avoid the Good-Very Good specials unless you can physically look down the bore to check for that rare diamond in the rough. Another tip I'll add is to get your hands on a GO and No-Go gauge for an 8x57JS. They're pretty inexpensive and it'll allow you to check the headspace on the rifle you're looking at before you purchase it. Also, take your common sense and eye for detail along and don't compromise. You want something that will headspace properly and has a bright shiny bore with lots of good rifling. Nothing less. I'm sure the more experienced members with add some additional comments, but I just wanted to share some of my experience and hopefully try and keep you from re-inventing the wheel (3x) like I did. Good luck with your search and congrats on choosing a very practical and worthwhile cartridge as a basis for a sporter. And as always, feel free to ask lots of questions! Jason

911rat, Have you tried contacting a reamer manufacturer? When I bought my 8x68s reamer, I bought a go-gauge to go along with it. I can't remember exactly how much it cost, but it wasn't all that expensive for the gauge direct from the maker. Jason

After the discussion we had last week about what we've learned about women, I thought this might be worth a giggle. I'm also kind of curious to see what emul8 and/or T Lynn has to say. Enjoy! -------------------------------------- WORDS WOMEN USE FINE This is the word women use to end an argument when they are right and you need to shut up. FIVE MINUTES If she is getting dressed, this is half an hour. Five minutes is only five minutes if you have just been given 5 more minutes to watch the game before helping around the house. NOTHING This is the calm before the storm. This means "something," and you should be on your toes. Arguments that begin with 'Nothing' usually end in "Fine" GO AHEAD This is a dare, not permission. Don't do it. LOUD SIGH This is not actually a word, but is a nonverbal statement often misunderstood by men. A "Loud Sigh" means she thinks you are an idiot and wonders why she is wasting her time standing here and arguing with you over "Nothing" THAT'S OKAY This is one of the most dangerous statements that a woman can make to a man. "That's Okay" means that she wants to think long and hard before deciding how and when you will pay for your mistake. THANKS A woman is thanking you. Do not question it or faint. Just say "You're Welcome." Send this to the men you know to warn them about future arguments they can avoid if they remember the terminology!

I aught to have a couple finished products I can post in "Sporterizing" soon. My problem is now as it's always been - time, and how busy I can get doing everything but what I want to do. But I'll try and get something up online soon; something that will include some pictures and stuff. Also, I've held off making some posts as I sometimes feel I'm making noise rather than helping. And since I hate it when people do that, I sometimes restrain myself. It may be time for a good gunsmithing or caliber debate. Hmmm....

Another good idea maybe to rehash some long forgotten topics like "how do I convert to 458 win mag" etc. I figure we've got to resurrect some topics, if not just for the sake of discussion, but also to refill the archives. I'll admit it; discussion in the gunsmithing section has gotten stale. Perhaps its time we put out thinking caps on and got creative... Jason

Thanks Fritz! Hey man, mail us some rain too! It's so dry here the pine trees are starting to wilt... Jason

Karl, I though Marines always had a plan?

I would buy a new receiver and start over again. M48 Receiver You can use the buggered up one to pratice your polishing or something.

If you like futuristic TV space series and don't mind a cartoon, try Cowboy Bebop. My ex got me hooked on this series and I ended up buying the boxed DVD set. I rate this as a more adult oriented cartoon do to violence and profanity. It's probably on par with a PG-13 movie. For an anime series, there is a lot of character development and a whole host of things you won't catch or pick up on until you've seen each episode a few times. You can catch it sometimes late at night on the Cartoon Network though I will submit that you may not understand it as you'll be seeing a mere snapshot of the entire series and it will most likely be out of order. Still, it may be worth a try if you're bored and have 30 minutes. Though its a little different, you may want to give it a try if you like regular TV series that follow this type of story line. Sorry, I don't mean to hijack this thread. I did want to offer my $.02 though. Jason

Tony said Tye got bent out of shape over some discussion a while back concerning the Army and left. I miss his wit too and wish he'd come back. Ole Tye always had something to say! Jason