Hello all you fellow shooters and tinkerers.

I am in the process of building a wildcat on the .458W case. It will be necked down to take a .408 400grain bullet. I will turn the belt and rim off making it .513 Head and .493 shoulder. the neck will be .400 long and it will have a 30 degree shoulder. Cartridge O.A.L will be 3.3" to fit in the magazine of the M98 (8x57 Obendorf 1937 ) action.
Woodleigh Bullets Make two projectiles in .408 a solid and a softnose/roundnose both 400g. The solid is 1.42" long and will require a 16" twist barrel.
I have bored out an old .308 bbl and have yet to ream it and cut the rifling. It will have 8 grooves.
If anybody is interested I will post updates as I progress with the project.
Cheers
Tony.

It would easier and faster to base your new cartridge on the 9.3X64 Brenneke.

You can easily neck up to accommodate .408 bullets, and preserve the sharp shoulder.

Internal capacity of the case would be almost identical.

Reloading dies can be made from standard 9.3X64 dies.

I have experimented with something similar with .411 bullets

Garrett

Garrett, Thanks for your reply. Availability of components is one of the reasons I went for a modified 458 case. I have never seen a 9.3 Breneke case here, even in a collection. I just looked it up in Cartridges of the World and notice it has a rebated rim, not good on a Dangerous Game Rifle, I think.
How did your experiment go with the .411 bullet?
What did you base it on? The 9.3 Breneke case?
Cheers
Tony.

Tony,

I haven't finished the .411 version yet.

I have another one (same case) in .375 that I have shot extensivley. Feeds flawlessly. I typically use it for moose.

I have never heard of feeding problems with this round, and the Germans use it extensively in Africa. The amount of rebating of the rim is so minimal that it is negligble.

You shouldn't have any trouble getting brass in Australia....Bertram Brass makes cases, and my understanding is RWS (who makes cases) imports into your country.

I started to turn the belt off 338 Winchester Mag brass to make the wildcat at first, then realized that the 9.3X64 brass was better.

Garrett

Garrett,

Sounds good, Why did you use .375 bullets instead of the original .366 ones? More choice or availability? or just because you could?

How far do you have to travel from your home to hunt Moose? I hunt feral Pigs, Goats, Fallow Deer, Foxes and Rabbits, near where i live in northern New South Wales. I want to go up to the Northern Territory and Hunt Water Buffalo, hence the Heavy Game Rifle. My mate has just bought a Winchester Mod. 70 Super grade in .458 w mag and we have been having fun shooting it.
Cheers
Tony
I suppose that is why I am making the one I am making, because I can and it will be different.
I made the reamer today and cleaned the bore to size, then fitted the cutter to the Rifling head and started cutting the rifling in the barrel. I am about halfway there with the grooves, taking .0005" out at a time. The grooves are .100 wide and the lands .060 wide.

Tony,

I chose to neck up to .375 because bullets in that caliber are so abundant.

9.3 bullets are easy enough to order, but the advantage for me was the abilty to use cheap .375 to experiment with.

This was a cartidge that I did the most experimentation with to date; trying new bullets, new powders, different primers.
It will put 270 grain bullets into a hole measuring .75 (strings of 3) at 100 yards all day long.

I go to British Columbia (in Canada) to hunt moose, and love it up there. It's about 2,000 miles from where I live (Tennessee), and lightyears from where I work. Glaciers, unspoiled forest, and lots of rain.
I still haven't found that 60 inch moose, so it may be the Yukon territory next time.

Garrett

Up there in B.C sounds really nice. I have always wanted to take a hunting trip in Canada. Oh well, need to win Lotto first.

.408 barrell Mk1 turned out shit, too many marks and I outsmarted myself making the rifling head out of the wrong material. No matter, I can always make it into a .416 or bigger. The main thing is that my rifling machine works just fine, it just need for me to make the tools better. This will be the 3rd time I have rifled a barrell, the first was a .52 cal muzzleloader I built from scratch back in '82. I reamed and rifled it the old way, by hand, using a twisted square rod to guide the cutter. It still shoots very accurately, shooting a 200g round ball.
Cheers
Tony

Hello again, have been having 'puter problems lately so I couldn't post any reports.
I have put the .408 together, barrel Mk.2 works just fine. I ended up cutting Pope style rifling in it. The chamber is nice and tight and I had to seat the projectiles back in the case to the canelure to get them to feed smoothly. OAL is now 3.2" but it doesn't interfere with case capacity as the load I have arrived at is 60g of ADI 2208. The primers are just starting to flatten but extraction is easy.
I polished the feed guides and they just feed beautifully.
I fitted a blade front sight and a peep on the rear to test it for accuracy. I tried it at 40m to start with and got a nice little group but 8" low. I am in the process of fitting a lower front sight.
It is still in the military stock and recoil is a bit stiff, rifle weighs 8 3/4 lb. It feels like shooting my mates 10 lb. .458 Wm.
Cheers
Tony.