There is a rare bird up on gunbroker..


A super rare siamese 1904 in 7x57! Intermediate action.

First one I have ever seen on the gun auctions.

http://www.gunbroker.com/Aucti....aspx?Item=400840948

Very interesting. Never knew Oberndorf made 7x57 rifles for Siam. Learn something new every day.

It's been there for a while. The only Siamese markings are a Thai character carved on the stock and a chakra stamped on the rear of the receiver. But the numerals on the sight are not Thai numerals and the serial number is not Thai numerals. It was made by Oberndorf but I doubt it was "made for Siam". A similarly marked US M1903 rifle sold for $695 on gunauction a couple of years ago and I don't believe the Springfield ever made 1903s for Siam either. I believe the mauser is simply a test or representative rifle that Siam acquired. Perhaps it was ordered from Mauser as a sample.

Jon Speed reportedly commented on this very rifle (9592):

quote:

Last year I went through my Mauser sales records starting in 1898-1906 and only found a few small sales of up to 6 rifles in each for each of the years indicated for Siam. It would appear the Mauser firm had hopes of some contracts but by 1900 Siam had its own rifles copied to some extent from the Mausers sent in 1898. Mauser never made any type of deal with Siam on Patent rights or manufacturing agreements etc

Either way, the stamping makes it an interesting Mauser 1904 and nothing more.

I see that it is a large ring externally, but would you expect it to be threaded for a small ring barrel? Like the 03 Turks, perhaps?

It has a similar pear-shaped bolt knob...

Very rare, and nice condition. This one is not a Japanese built Siamese Mauser like those we all see; this one is an original Mauser, and will be a large ring, large thread. Turkey only used the small threads so they could use up all the small thread barrels they had because they had so many early Mausers; remember that the Ottoman Empire, then Turkey, was Mauser's biggest customer for many years.

dpcd,

You are probably right, and I respect your experience & expertise.

But this does look similar to the 1909 Peruvian (except for the clip charger hump), which is also an intermediate length LR ST, like the 03 Turk.

And isn't there a M-1910 that is this configuration, as well? Or is that one LR LT?