If the 416 Hoffman is designed off the 375H&H. The 416 Remington Magnum is modified I think off the 8MM. The 416 Taylor is a shorter case then both and you can open up a Mauser 98 to 375 H&H. Is it possible to do a 416 yourself with the Mauser action and how hard do you think it would be.

Scale of 1-10.

Thanks for the input in advance.

For a Gunsmith easy, for you, who knows?
Skill will define how hard it is.

IMO other actions are better suited for the longer ones, while the Taylor fits nicely.

quote:

Is it possible to do a 416 yourself with the Mauser action and how hard do you think it would be.

Scale of 1-10.

"1" being easy and "10" being extremely difficult the answer is at least a "9"

It's no piece of cake just taking a '98 mauser to even a .30-06 and to then lengthen the magazine to the longer cartridge and getting it to feed in the narrower feed rails takes a lot of skill.

Frankly there's only a handful of smiths capable of doing this and it's just plain expensive and impractical. One can get a MRC 1999 action for about $450 or so and have an action that works for less than the cost of modifying the mauser.

There are those that insist on the use of the mausers however and those folks should just dig a little deeper in their pockets.

If one wants to attempt this on his own I strongly suggest he first just try to make a 7 X 57 on a '98 then go for a .300 win mag and then try the .416. I assure you the learning curve is long and the skills are not easily mastered. The education is also very expensive.

Folks that do this well are no longer in the class of craftsmen.....they're true artists in the purest sense of the word.

I'm not exactly which you asked about?

416 Hoffman/Rem on standard '98 = 8 or 9
416 Hoffman/Rem on 375 commercial '98 = 3-4
416 Taylor on std '98 = 5-7
416 Taylor on short magnum commercial '98 = 2-3

To build a mauser correctly on any cartridge you are on the 3-4 scale. The operative work is correctly, add a half a point to a point from a base Remington 700.

To convert to a similar lenght magnum ( 300 win mag, 338 Win mag, Taylor ) the bolt face needs opening up, the magazine follower changed or modified, and feed rail work. On your scale add a appropriate plus up for these modifications.

This is presuming a modern manufacture 98 action, if your going to a high pressure round on a older mauser this has its own problems that need to be addressed apply to both of the above categories.

Then to the last group, magnum length cartidges in the 98 action. I will seperate these into two groups medium pressure cartridges, and high pressure for purposes of discusssion.

First the action needs to be opened up, the standard mauser was designed for a cartridge lenth of 3.3 " given or take a tad. The magnums are 3.6 long, for simplicity sake lets call it 3/8". In my opinion there is only one correct way to do this modification, open the action up front and rear. Any action that has been opened up all in the front is done wrong in my opinion. Look at a magnum FN action they are opened both ways. Bad news is this requires more gunsmithing skills, good news is you can buy the afore mentioned FN action and its already done, plus the bolt face is opened up if you go that route, there is no increase in complexity. If you decide to start with a standard mauser action, a lot of work and steps are added just to get to square one. Another variable I didn't address is the body of the cartridges, its much more work to get a 404 jeff to work than a 375 H&H, depending on the cartridge choice it can add another layer of detail to be worked out.

The second group I didn't go into is high pressure long cartridges< AKA the 416 Remington. Reference above on opening the action, I wouldn't fire a 98 opened up only to the front with one of these. Its an accident waiting to happen in my mind. That magic 3/8" all from the front is just bad news with high pressure. Asuuming that the action is opened up properly front and rear, metal still needs to be removed from the front. When you mix high pressure and materail removal I get nervous. I think there are better choices of actions when long and high pressure are mixed up in a cocktail. I am sure is has been done, probably many times, but the 375H&H and a 416 Rem are very different beasts, the engineer in me says look to a better solution to the problem. In the case of fully opened up mauser actions mixed with high presuure I put this firmly in the 10 category. Are there some smiths I would trust with this, yes if Fred Wells or D' Arcy Echols looked this over and gave me the green light I would be in my comfort zone, if on the other hand they even coughed or hickuped while answering my question to do this I would take that as a caution flag.

I don't know your machining/gunsmithing capabilities, so I can only use myself as a guide, I would tackle the Taylor conversion without much concern, I would also tackle the mag length conversion on low pressure round. The only way I would consider the high pressure and mag length would be to start with a Mag FN or similar, and I would still have grave concerns, and I don't think I could be convinced to tackle it, my personal knowledge base isn't extensive enough. I am a fair gunsmith but I am an excellent engineer, this has too many missing data points and from my professional project management and engineering experience that is a recipe for unsatisfactory results. I am pretty certain as soon as I post this I am going to get stomped on by somebody that has a similar conversion done, maybe so but its still above my skill level to perform properly.

Vaopodog is right on this, if this is what your planning to build look to other actions, a new model 70, or the Montana are certainly the path of least resistance.

A Mauser is the best of the custom rifles IMO, but its also the most expensive...I figure my metal work in all, including barrel and action costs me $2000 or more, then I stock it, and the sky is the limit, depending on what you want.....

The inexpensive route, and a good one, is a M-70 classic or pre 64 blued and stocked..

I am just toying with the idea right now. I have a lot of work to do prior to even starting this project. I would lean to the Taylor or Hoffman if I do it. I could just buy a Model 700 action and make my life easy but there is something special about the Mauser action in my book. I will be doing a lot of work first building 4 Mausers into 280 Remington then 2 into 338-06. If I can do those and they turn out ok I will revisit this and see if I can do it.

quote:

I am pretty certain as soon as I post this I am going to get stomped on by somebody that has a similar conversion done, maybe so but its still above my skill level to perform properly.

Certainly not by me.....

I have a mint VZ-24 made in 1938 that is so smooth it almost works it's own action. It's still in the original service rifle condition and is untouched as far as customizing goes. I bought it to make a truly big bore and it still sits in the corner and winks at me.

The more I look at it the more it says .280 Remington even though I was saying .404 when I bought it.

Since I bought it I built a .404 on a MRC 1999 and am happy I did. It was the right thing to do. If someone wanted to put the cash into it and turn it into a truly big bore I'd sell it as that's what it should be used for.....but not with my cash. If I win the lottery then it's a go...until then it's an 8 X 57 and staying that way.

quote:

Originally posted by tiggertate:
I'm not exactly which you asked about?

416 Hoffman/Rem on standard '98 = 8 or 9
416 Hoffman/Rem on 375 commercial '98 = 3-4
416 Taylor on std '98 = 5-7
416 Taylor on short magnum commercial '98 = 2-3

Harry nailed it...
if you have a mauser already done (right) for the 7rem, 338, 264, etc, it's on of the easiest jobs to make it a taylor...

and you save about 1/3 to 1/2 the cost of building a remington OR a 404

jeffe

FWIW anyone that wants a serious bigbore and isn't too concerned about the cost needs to look to the P-17 action by Remington or Winchester as this is a superb action for cartridges up to the 416 Rigby.

It's better than the Mauser IMO.

Just to put this .416 on a 98 Mauser in perspective, take a look at this website.

http://www.sabirifles.co.za/500j.htm

When they state; Action: Mauser........ They really mean 98 Mauser. I was there about a year and a half ago and they do some beautiful work using a 98 military Mauser. They do, however, heavily modify the bottom of the receiver, lengtening the magazine cutout and fabricating a stainless steel magazine box attached to the receiver itself. Beautiful work.

All my dangerous game rifles are on std. m-98 actions..I wouldn't have anything else and its an easy job to opt for a 416 Remington, don't go with the wildcats, its the same action and you have the advantage of factory ammo in a pinch....plus the Taylor comes close but at much higher pressure, that just makes since, the Remington case is BIGGER....

My 416 Rem is on a FN Mauser action, has LW barrel, quarter rib, drop box from Wisner, Blackburn trigger and Turkish walnut stock.

Ray,
you ever do a taylor? Might try one.. far easier than ANY 3.65 length round.

jeffe

i guess i must be living right because i built a 300winmag on a vz-24 and got it right the 1st time w/o any problems at all. didn't seem like the kinda thing that only a handful of people could do. cut the front out of the mag box and welded a pc of .1" thick sheet to the front of it, effectively lengthening the inside by the former thickness of the front wall, rmvd accordingly from back of ramp, re-ground out ramp contour to smooth transition. opened the feed rails a little and rmvd the shoulder underneath the rails which were there for the shorter 8x57. paid to have the bolt face modified of course. and used the EXISTING vz-24 follower with no mods at all which works just fine. took me all of one afternoon for everything and it fed right 1st time and ever since. didn't seem all that difficult to me.

roger