Tried out my Bobbed Bob Today!
Its a 722 Remington, Bobbed at 21 inches. I think it is going to be good. But i wanted to tell you of a load that has worked for me now in three .257 Roberts Rifles. Its a 100 grain Barnes triple shock over H-414. I shot it 1st from a fussy Ruger 77 MK2 Ultra light, and it did 3107, and very tight groups 20 inch barrel.
From my custom Springfield it shot about 1.25
and 3165, from the 24 inch barrel.
I shot it today, From my new Bobbed Bob, and i got 3149 and what looked like a great group but so much debris bounced back off the stump the hole was to jagged to bother measuring.. but its a great combo...tj3006

Great!! although not unexpected; I've never met a 257 Robts that didn't do well both in accuracy and velocity.

I've had 3 .257s. Only one would not group better than 1". That was a browning A bolt.?? The other 2 were Ruger tang safe. They both would put 10 shots at 100 yds. that could be covered by a quarter out of the box.
I don't, however, believe there is any magic to the .257 but it is a dandy little cartridge.
I firmly believe that you choice of a 21" barrel makes it a good carry all day rifle.
roger

I've seen some godawful 25's shoot pretty good.
I have an Arisaka that was re-lined and kind of chambered to 257.
I say kind of,, you'd have to imagine a double radius weatherby shoulder on a 257 case to get the idea.
it's in a chopped off mil-surp stock with some sea-shells inlaid in the wood at random places.

after firing the first groups with it at 100yds I went and had it drilled and tapped and added a nice little leupold scope to it.
then re-contoured and faced off the extractor so it would not lock up against the barrel when the round was fired.

Lora shoots a .257 Robert's Ruger Ultra-Lite and she has had good results for close to 20 years now with that little gun.

I like it well enough i think i will get rid of my .243

quote:

Originally posted by tjroberts:
I like it well enough i think i will get rid of my .243

The 257 is a nice cartridge, but don't do anything drastic.

for my purposes, i can't think of anything the Roberts cant do better than the .243, I just bought the .243 cause it was a good deal, and my grand kisd could shoot it.
They can shoot the Roberts too...

Can someone explain this to me? The Lyman manual lists pressure. The .257 Roberts and it's dad the 7x55 operate on pressures in the 40,000 range. 30-06 offspring operate in the 50,000 range but the cases look very similar to me.

I have mine in AI. Parker thought that the two best performers were the 257 + 7X57. So I have them both,he forgot more than I'll ever know ,so why reinvent the wheel?

Carpet man, the 7X57 came out in 1892, And so in deference to the Pre 98 Mausers, the companies Load down for the the 7X57. And because people used to Re barrel those same Mauser,s to .257 the same is true.
If you have a modern rifle you can do some pretty impressive things. but be careful...tj3006

It is redundency I agree,but then again that is why we have Fords + Chevys (FOR NOW- current politics non with standing)

tj--I feel the same way about the 25-06 and the .270. Not a thing the 25-06 does that the .270 doesn't do better. I don't have either one of those two.

Carpetman: my take is that, for deer you get the same results with either a 270 or 25/06. I lean toward the 25/06 because the recoil in mine is just light enough to allow seeing the bullet hit the deer. Now for elk, etc., I’m with you on the 270.

olarmy--A well placed shot on deer, you are overgunned with either. A .270 with 130 grain and 25-06 with 120 grain will have about the same recoil. Not a knock on the 25-06. I did see a one shot kill on a moose with a 25-06 back when it was still a wildcat.

quote:

Originally posted by carpetman1:
Can someone explain this to me? The Lyman manual lists pressure. The .257 Roberts and it's dad the 7x55 operate on pressures in the 40,000 range. 30-06 offspring operate in the 50,000 range but the cases look very similar to me.

Because before Remington took the Bob from wildcat to factory there were so many of them made on the weaker Mauser small ring actions that accommodated the case perfectly. Same with the 7x57. Tons of small ring Mausers in it still.

After enough of them were made on stronger factory actions the 257 +p was released in the 80's and that stepped the pressure up some, but mostly because of thicker brass. A 257 on an M-98 with +p brass can be loaded even faster, up to typical pressures for a stronger action. Because of all this variation and its age reloading manuals are all over the map.

From what I have read, when Ned Roberts was developing the round he found that the cartridge would not shoot well at faster velocities with the powder and bullet types of the day.

The .257 Roberts was initially intended as a varminting cartridge and so accuracy was it's main point. Remington kept the SAAMI pressure low for that reason. Nobody ever revised it upwards until the +P loadings, which are still not what a .257 Roberts can do if pushed. a .257 in a any normal rifle and with standard brass is capable of 60K pressure same as other standard cartridges.
The .257 performance just got left behind in the 1930's performance-wise.

I have my rifle shooting well with H4350, up to 3100fps with 100 grain bullets and 2900 with 117 grainers. With this powder these loads do not go over max in this rifle, and I have been informed by a reliable chap who has pressure tested H4350 in this cartridge, that these velocities will not take the pressures over 60K.
I also have a load with Varget that will take an 80grain TTSX up to 3400fps.

I would like to try H414 now that you have recommended it - also Hodgdon Superformance powder needs to be tested, I have heard good thing indeed with that powder.