David Christman is putting the last few coats of whatever on my Lott and it will be checkered and finished in about a month. My next project will be a 7X57 on a 36 Mexican. I would like it to be a nice little rifle and not just a cleaned up Mauser. What do you think of square bridges, octagon or part octagun barrels. I think some of the ideas for the Silver-Lining Rifle would be good. I will go with Roger Vardy wood as he was much more generous in his offer for wood on the Silver-Lining than Denli. It will have custom bottom metal and a checkered bolt. I want subtle and tasteful engraving. What metal work will make it stand out? What iron sights? Any suggestions would be a great help.
Butch

I have a bunch of photos of Vardy wood. They are all under $500 though. I would be glad to forward them on to you.

Really pay attention to not making the little Mexican into a bulky rifle. I recently saw one in 338-06 that was too bulk and really the actions on those guns lend themselves to petite sporters.

Thanks for the offer, 333. I have some photos[actually quite a few] from Roger. I will be getting in touch with Mark Stratton on the barrel profile soon.
Butch

Butch,
i like the 1/2 oct, 1/2 round, with a "wedding ring" at the receiver, in a high grade quarter swan piece of wood...

would go a LIGHT weight as possible

jeffe

Lee Helgeland (sp?) had a really nice lightweight, blind-magazine Mauser at the ACGG show. Someone might have pictures of it. It was sweet!

If I were going whole hog with your action I would have:

-large sloping front sight ramp in lieu of the common banded ramp
-quarter rib with one standing and two folding rear sights
-half-octagonal/half round barrel with barrel band sling mount
-action surface ground and square bridges machined for low QD scope mounts
-gentry safety
-nicely contoured and checkered steel trapdoor buttplate
-in a nice piece of walnut with ebony forend tip and checkered, skeletonized gripcap
-with nice, but somewhat understated checkering

That said, I imagine this with no attention to how much you wish to spend. One can dream though...

I agree with watching your the ideas of putting a fully tricked out barrel on a 1936 Mexican. I went the octagon integral sling eye and quarter rib in 1979, in .257 Roberts. Didn't think it through and ended up with a HEAVY barreled action. This was a waste of a nice lightweight action. Finally had Sam May rebore it to 7mm and chambered for .284 Win. Completed the rifle was still not a light and sexy as I wanted it. Just my opinion, but if I am going with an octagon barrel, it will be on a standard length LR Mauser where I'm not fighting for every ounce. The lightest octagon barrel I every got was done by the late John Pell (Kogot) in Tinidad. On an 09 Mauser that was ground to small ring on the sides. A .280, it came in at 8 1/4# with a very slim stock.

Sounds like the same idea I had about a year or two ago.

Mark Stratton did the work. Sorry about the picture quality, they're all I have right now. It's a 1910 Mexican W/1936 cocking piece. I thought about iron sight's but decided against them on this project.

A picture is worth a thousand words so here goes.

Terry



Here is a picture of the blank I'm using. Everything is at Chic Worthing's right now. He has a beautiful little petite pattern for these Mexican M98's. After he get's done it goes to Roger Kehr for some scroll and a little french gray. Afterwards, back to Chic for the rust blue. This rifle is going to be a real head turner when finished. I've been on pins and needles since I sent it off

I love Mark's metalwork.
that's a nice looking barreled action. What does it weigh? As for the stock blank...well, my nipples just got hard.

Terry, you have a beautiful rifle! Ty, I also understand where you are coming from and this is why I need the help of guys like you, Glen, Tex21, 333, and Jeffe. You can spend all the money and still come out with a real piece of shi$t if you are not careful and don't have the right guidance and the right craftsmen.
Butch

Hey Ty, I'm not real sure about the weight. It's at Chic's now so.... The barrel is 22" long and it's .575" It's not a flyweight, but not heavy either.

Terry

quote:

Originally posted by butchlambert:
Terry, you have a beautiful rifle! Ty, I also understand where you are coming from and this is why I need the help of guys like you, Glen, Tex21, 333, and Jeffe. You can spend all the money and still come out with a real piece of shi$t if you are not careful and don't have the right guidance and the right craftsmen.
Butch

You'll do fine. My best advice is decide what level of rifle you're after and proceed in that direction and don't deviate from that plan. Most any time you try to save a few bucks, it's going to look like it in the end. Not that that's a huge concern if you weren't planning on a topflight rifle to begin with. Just don't spend a fortune on the metal work and look for bargan on the wood work and vice versa.

Terry

As an amateur, I suppose I am rather humbled to be in on this discussion. Guess I'm the right age and have an appropriate number of blunders behind me. One thing for sure, Clayton Nelson told me years ago that if your planning a light sporter (8 or so #), regardless of action, the barrel must be light. Jim Carmicheal has said in print that he would prefer going with a longer, lighter contour barrel on a lightweight sporter than a shorter stubbier one. This being a mountain rifle that will be carried a lot on foot. J. Olt pointed out that simply sending a suitable action off for a lightweight 22" barrel will probably be heavy every time. The standard used to be, for a lightweight sporter a muzzle diameter of .500-.525 in .30 and under calibers. A lighweight barrel reinforce (shank)helps that much more. My lightest barrels have followed that recipe, usually with an M70 Feitherweight contour and a .500 muzzle. No particular problems with hunting accuracy. Just don't expect to fire 10 shot roups at a quick pace. The first three bullets have always been right in there.

I didn't realize a featherweight was what he was after, didn't read it in the original post. If so I wouldn't use an octagon barrel. Just install a Kreiger featherweight and call it good to go. I'm not a huge fan of featherweights, I need a little weight to hold the cross hairs steady.

Terry

I think in one of Bob Hagel's books he shows a featherweight 7x57, that looks very good.
To keep it light go with the lightest 22" bbl and a stock with a minimal amount of wood. I do not know why American bolt rifles have to use a cord of wood in the stock.

I agree TC1. I got carried away with the weight issue. Just seems like the SR Mausers go hand in hand with light barrels. The beauty of all this is that a guy can get whatever he wants. I just get a queazy feeling when I see a nice G33/40 with a big barrel and a heavy monte carlo stock. The guy was pleased with what he had, so who am I to say? It's just hard finding good SR mausers like we used to be able to.

What's a matter with a Monte carlo stock anyway? as long as it has the white line spacers it's fine.....


Just kidding.

Terry

TC1. Hee hee. There's nothing wrong with an extreme monte carlo stock as long as it's made from something other than walnut. Actually, and this may be a can of worms, but some shooters actually can benefit from a slight monte carlo comb. I got this straight from Dale Goens, at his house, and I about fell off my chair. Al Bieson has always offered a classically styles stock with a slight monte carlo also, tho I don't know how well they sold.

Butch,
On one barrel Ralf Martini made for me he used NECG banded hardware but he narrowed the width of the front ramp a bit. He also thinned the bands to about 60% of their original thickness after he soldered them on. The result is really elegant and would look perfect on a trim small ring rifle.

Just one idea for you.
FB

quote:

Originally posted by butchlambert:
David Christman is putting the last few coats of whatever on my Lott and it will be checkered and finished in about a month. My next project will be a 7X57 on a 36 Mexican. I would like it to be a nice little rifle and not just a cleaned up Mauser. What do you think of square bridges, octagon or part octagun barrels. I think some of the ideas for the Silver-Lining Rifle would be good. I will go with Roger Vardy wood as he was much more generous in his offer for wood on the Silver-Lining than Denli. It will have custom bottom metal and a checkered bolt. I want subtle and tasteful engraving. What metal work will make it stand out? What iron sights? Any suggestions would be a great help.
Butch

Why not have the military notches welded up
making it into a nice "commercial" style. Have the bolt stop modified by Ross Billingsly, and fitted with a Dakota 3 position safety. Jim Kobe or Dennis Olson would do a bang-up job
welding on the new bolt handle.

Mark Stratton could make a up a nice custom set of scope mounts similar in style to the Winchester 70 dual dovetails by Leupold only made to take the projectionless rings from S&K or Dave Gentry.

Have a Pac-Nor barrel installed using the
Winchester model 70 featherweight contour and
beg, borrow or steal a no longer produced
Dave Talley skeleton gripcap.

Ted Blackburn bottom metal, of course.Trigger too.

Sweet talk Chic Worthing into making one of his graceful oval cheekpieced stocks with a full
wrap around multi-point checkering both fore and aft. If that doesn't work, have Gary Goudy
make one of his Winchester featherweight clones
for you. Quite nice on a small-ring Mauser!

Forget the open sights as they aren't really
used anymore anyway, except on big bores, maybe?

We all know who will do the engraving, right?...Roger that.

Scope? Why a Leupold 1.5 X 6 VariX III!

Thanks friends! What a wealth of ideas. I need to ponder some of these and make a decision. I sure would like to see more photos of some of these different ideas. As a longtime friend with the Shilen family, the barrel will be a Shilen, David Christman will be my stockmaker, and Roger Vardy will provide my wood. These are set in stone. The other things will be considered before going further.
Butch