hi all,

got to go out after whitetails today with a buddy of mine-- in WV it was youth and disabled hunt today-- and since he's in a wheelchair i'm allowed to tag along to help out. you're allowed to harvest one-- doe's are the order of the day-- no bucks-- antlerless is OK.

anyway he wasn't sporting his usual 30-30 lever gun-- no, today he pulls out this georgeous 8mm mauser. a war relic from his dad-- it had been restocked and re-blued a long time ago, but it stil was in wonderful shape and it had what i'm guessing were proofing marks on the bbl and action-- an eagle with spread wings over a swastika?

anyway, i didn't have my calipers on me and i don't know much about original mausers, so anyone care to enlighten me? were there different sizes or just the standard one for the 8x57? what were those "brevex" (sp?) ones you hear about going for $$$? and is there a good resource where i can learn more about them-- book, website, etc? i think i read once somewhere that the standard action could be opened up to 375H&H size. i guess what i'm really wondering is can we use it to build a big-bore?

in case anybody's wondering he did harvest a deer. it was getting near dark and we had seen some big does, but none he could get a shot at. so he took what we believed to be a small doe, but turned out to be a button buck. the season opens for everybody else next month so i did some scouting-- looks like a lot of big does, but not too many good size bucks. either way i've gotta get busy working up some loads for my 375-- hell if that Rigby vote gets any higher i might just have to give in and get a 416 and try that too!

cheers

[ 10-27-2002, 08:48: Message edited by: ppk1911 ]

The least problematic large bore that your mauser can accomodate is the 9.3x62. All it would need is a new barrel and a .30-06 length magazine.
The .375 length cartridges (.404 et al) would also require modification to the bolt face, the receiver and the feed rails. The latter two should only be attempted by a gunsmith with plenty of experience.

Mauser Bolt Rifles by Ludwig Olsen will tell you anything you want to know about mauser rifles.

Any of the belted mags can be made to fit with a little gunsmith massaging. You can even use the original Mauser mag box, with the help of a file, and fit three rounds in it (although some would say this is just wrong to do so ). I have a 416 Taylor built on a former 8mm Mauser; should you have any further / specific questions, let me know.

Good luck,
Todd