Thread: School me on the 7x57 mauser

Have been offered one for a decent price,know nothing about the calibre,I already have a 243,308 and 44 mag ..do I need a 7x57/as well?like it cause it looks classic and still has open sights which I like.

If its got open sights you're allowed to call it a 275 Rigby for a lot of extra cool points . . . .

Old school 7mm08. Goes bang, kills stuff. But then so do the other ones you have.

Yes you do! looking at that list you aint got nearly enough rifles, and a classic 7x57 would be a great addition. A 140gn SGK or a 150gn Corelokt doing a tad over 2700fps and most anything goes bang flop. Easy to load for, nice to shoot, great cartridge. Look forward to the pic's.

Old school 7x57 had quite a fast twist barrel and could use up to about 175gr bullets. Think that's what Bell used on the elephants.
So loaded like a 7mm08 it's a ripper.
Need to take something bigger go heavy.
Absolutely nothing wrong with it

Awesome calibre with lots of history. You havn't said what it is so loads will be dependent. An older military model, e.g. Sth American made small ring will be more pressure constrained than large ring M98s e.g an Interarms MkX with an OEM Zastava action or perhaps a new Tikka or a CZ 550 (did they do a 7x57mm?)

I shoot an Interarms Mk 10 with the Zastava sourced M98 action. I run it around 2500fps with 160gn Remington Interlokts -.cause that's what I have and I hunt for the pot so.not interested in blowing the front end of an animal to little bits. Your mileage may differ of course. My Interarms is capable of being loaded a lot faster, but why? I load for another guy with a pre 1900 Sth American small ring Mauser... ex military and rebarreled. Lovely rifle.and a tack driver. He sticks to 130gn SP doing around 2200fps. Never had trouble killing anything in them thar hills.

So horses for courses really. You can load a strong action to best a 7mm08 and you can hunt elephants with one. As to the latter I'm reliably told that it takes 3 bullets, two for each of the front knees then you walk around and put one in the back of the skull to the brain called "the elephant shot". Not my game but each to their own.

Have fun.

Originally Posted by Tentman

If its got open sights you're allowed to call it a 275 Rigby for a lot of extra cool points . . . .

it's a very good cartridge to have. With a good rifle design (like a Mauser 98 or any modern action type) with a 24 inch barrel you can load the 140 grain bullet up to 2950-3000 fps and the 160 grain up to 2700-2800fps. It leaves the 7mm08 for dead and treads on the heels of the .280 Remington.
I used the 139 grain Hornady interlock at 2950fps and its a great combination. (In the 7mm08 as well)

But - it was never actually known as the ".275 Rigby". The old writers called it a ".275 Rigby-Mauser", the Rigby-Mauser System being what Rigby called their Mauser rifle products, and .275 being the cartridge chambering. The cartridge was always referred to either just the .275, or the 7mm Mauser. (Rigby did sell a popular hi velocity load which people often referred to as the .275 Rigby, but that meant that particular load marketed by Rigby, it's not the name of the cartridge either. (Which was actually made by Roth or Kynoch. Rigby didnt make ammunition.)

Anyway. Calling the cartridge it the .275 Rigby irritates me mildly. It's a mistake American gunwriters made when they read the old English hunting books and now people read it on the internet and its become an alternative fact. The cartridge has nothing to do with Rigby, other than they sold Mauser rifles chambered in 7mm.

Years ago I picked up this 7x57 (top rifle in pic) and have done a few mods on it. It has not failed to knock over any deer that I have fired at (200m max). I have made numerous handloads but always seem to grab a box of PPU for a hunt. On the upside, although factory ammo is limited by comparison to other more popular calibres, it is still available and the Prvi 140gr SP do around 2800fps and give no reason to complain. You don't have to handload if you don't want to, but if you do, you have every choice from 120-175gr and powder aplenty. If I had to pick just once calibre to stick with in NZ it would be this one.

I've had them on and off for the last 27 years. Presently have an R version in a K4. I tend to think of them as the German .308W. Do everything without fuss or fanfare.
I will make a few points relative to handloading. Most 7mm Mauser rifles have very long throats designed around 175 grain projectiles. So having a magazine to seat a pill long in a case is beneficial. You will almost never load 20 thou off. It's (140 - 160 gns) going to jump to the lands.

With respect to JD " With a good rifle design (like a Mauser 98 or any modern action type) with a 24 inch barrel you can load the 140 grain bullet up to 2950-3000 fps and the 160 grain up to 2700-2800fps."
It is not easy to get these velocities handloading and they (his loads) are hot!
He is about 150fps above where most reloaders would say quick and accurate and stop. His results are what you aim for with a 7x64 or .280rem. If you like the challenge of wearing an extractor then WW760 is the best powder for this case. Yes 2209 works but 760 is better, more velocity with less pressure.
However the beauty of the 7 mm is a 140 - 160 works well at safer speeds. (2600 - 2800 fps).

In my experience it is easier to get top velocity (2850 fps) with a 140 in the 7mm08 because the smaller chamber, shorter throat etc.

I don't know what crap sources JD bases his opinions (or load data either for that matter) but it was called 275 Rigby as a marketing term nearly from the get go (or is this picture "fake news" too)



Dicko is a lot closer to the mark on safe and sane reloading expectations for it, it simply isn't designed to run at 65,000psi, and promoting loads running it at this level will eventually cause some poor bugger to have a disaster.

mate of mine had a 7x57 mannlicher schoanuer with spoon bolt handle,rotary mag and pecar 4x81 glassware on top twin trigger jobby-rear makes it hair!

absolute honey it was and bloody deadly in his hands as i witnessed more than once.I salivate still thinking about it!!!!!!

Originally Posted by kotuku

mate of mine had a 7x57 mannlicher schoanuer with spoon bolt handle,rotary mag and pecar 4x81 glassware on top twin trigger jobby-rear makes it hair!

absolute honey it was and bloody deadly in his hands as i witnessed more than once.I salivate still thinking about it!!!!!!

yes good old mate in Gisborne has identical rifle ( except for scope) buts its in 6.5 MS and of course no ammo available - buts its a treasure - for sure I will never get my hands on it - just a pity it was not in 6.5x55 or 7x57 built like a swiss watch - there was one bad point - they were weak in the pistol grip as many an old hunter found in a fall

Originally Posted by Tentman

I don't know what crap sources JD bases his opinions (or load data either for that matter) but it was called 275 Rigby as a marketing term nearly from the get go (or is this picture "fake news" too)

Attachment 271445

Dicko is a lot closer to the mark on safe and sane reloading expectations for it, it simply isn't designed to run at 65,000psi, and promoting loads running it at this level will eventually cause some poor bugger to have a disaster.

An aggressive response. Fairly normal on this forum lately. My opinions are my own, but I have a large library of old books and catalogues. Please Look at your picture and what it's telling you. Im not sure you've fully understood my point. My point is that Rigby has nothing to do with the name of the .275. It was just called the .275. The same way we might call a .303 a .303.

The 7x57 wasn't called the .275 Rigby as a marketing term. It was never called that at all. It's not called that on those ammunition packets in your photo either.

Those are Rigby brand ammunition packets. They are packets of Rigby ammo for what the company describe as ".275 cartridges." Of course Rigby sold ammunition for the .275 - and for other cartridges too. (originally repackaged ammo made by German maker Roth. Later repackaged Kynoch.) But the cartridge is not called the ".275 Rigby". And my sources are not crap, they include Rigby themselves, those packets are branded Rigby, but the cartridge is the ".275 Bore" or the .275 High velocity (loading) The rifles were never marked ".275 Rigby", they were marked .275 Bore, which was the common name for the 7mm Mauser, and the ledgers the company kept for sales referred to .275 only as .275 "high velocity sporting" for the rifles sighted in for 140 grain load, and just .275 for the standard load

(If you have the cartridges that are in those Rigby packets and didnt steal the photo off the internet, you can easily have a look and see what the cartridges cases are headstamped. Ten dollars say they all say 7mm Kynoch.)

Kynoch themselves who made ammunition for the entire British market for decades never called the cartridge the ".275 Rigby" it was called the 7mm Mauser - on their packages and on their catalogues. In fact I challenge you, and this is a good way to think about it - to find a headstamp saying .275 Rigby on a cartridge case made before the year 2000.

The Rigby company had nothing to do with the cartridge or its name other than they sold rifle and ammunition in the chambering. IT was never a proprietary cartridge, they never named it after themselves. No one including them called the cartridge the ".275 Rigby", not WDM Bell, or Jim Corbett, to mention two of the most famous users. The rifles that Rigby sold were marketed as the "Rigby-Mauser system." So if one purchased a rifle from Rigby in 7mm, one might all it a .275 Rigby-Mauser, and the rifles were commonly referred to that way. .275 was the cartridge name, and Rigby-Mauser was the rifle. Same as WDM Bell referred to his 6.5x54 as a "6.5 Gibbs Mauser", not because the 6.5x54 was named the 6.5 Gibs - but because his rifle was sold to him by Gibbs and was a Mauser action.

You could call your rifle a .275 Rigby, and that would mean that you had a Rigby made rifle chambered in .275. But it's not the name of the cartridge.

Originally Posted by Dicko

I've had them on and off for the last 27 years. Presently have an R version in a K4. I tend to think of them as the German .308W. Do everything without fuss or fanfare.
I will make a few points relative to handloading. Most 7mm Mauser rifles have very long throats designed around 175 grain projectiles. So having a magazine to seat a pill long in a case is beneficial. You will almost never load 20 thou off. It's (140 - 160 gns) going to jump to the lands.

With respect to JD " With a good rifle design (like a Mauser 98 or any modern action type) with a 24 inch barrel you can load the 140 grain bullet up to 2950-3000 fps and the 160 grain up to 2700-2800fps."
It is not easy to get these velocities handloading and they (his loads) are hot!
He is about 150fps above where most reloaders would say quick and accurate and stop. His results are what you aim for with a 7x64 or .280rem. If you like the challenge of wearing an extractor then WW760 is the best powder for this case. Yes 2209 works but 760 is better, more velocity with less pressure.
However the beauty of the 7 mm is a 140 - 160 works well at safer speeds. (2600 - 2800 fps).

In my experience it is easier to get top velocity (2850 fps) with a 140 in the 7mm08 because the smaller chamber, shorter throat etc.

As for the loads I have quoted, this is not new information! I have a great deal of experience with the 7x57, and have had several rifles in the chambering (and also 7mm08) but most users will know that the cartridge has a pressure rating of 45K CUP for the sake of any old Rolling Block rifle still out there. With 60k PSI loads in a modern rifle it is easy to exceed the 7mm08 (which has a smaller case capacity.) 50- 54 grains of 2209 will get you 2950 - 3000 fps with a 139 or 140 grain bullet out of a 24 inch barrel. This depends on the rifle because they all have different length throats, some very long, (like the Ruger 77's). Out of a 22 inch barrel 2900-2950 fps is a good load.

Basically the 7mm08 data is where to start with the 7x57 Mauser. For example, if you use a max load for the 7x57 from 7mm08 data you will get lessor velocity than what you get with the 7mm08, simply because the 7mm08 has less case capacity (hence lower pressures resulting in the 7x57 with the same load,) plus on top of that a great many of the 7x57 rifles have longer throats to handle longer 175 grain bullets., so you get lower results again. With some rifles I can get 2900 with a 22 inch barrel from 50 grains of 2209, and others will take up to 54 grains to get that result.

I have not loaded Win 760 in the cartridge.

Absolutely you need it. It is the bestest cartridge of them all. Sweet to shoot fast or slow. Buy it man buy it.