Harry,
the "strongest" was the japanese action, but iirc, he said it was because it was soft.. the barrel was harder, and took off, leaving it there...

then again, the unheat treated one, the barrel took off at a fairly low pressure, warped/bent the action... testign ended early.....

i was about 8 when my dad presented me a 8x57 he did a chop and channel on (wish I still had it... stepmonster #2 hated guns), a enfield 303, and a ariska.... he told me about it being soft, and to not shoot it....

funny thing, the dang mauser was, iirc, a 44, which, today, you couldn't GIVE me one, unless it was perfect mil... and you didn't mind if I plugged the chamber... as late war mausers have a rep of being soft to UNTREATED

jeffe

The same "gas path" occurs with the Springfield 03, and the Mod 70.

If you're interested, Jack Belk had sent me a number of files on this subject when he used to come here regularly.

I have preserved them in one of my mailboxes and could send them to you if you want them.

Best wishes,

Mehul.

I was reading some time ago of a guy who used to test strength of various actions . He used to test them to destruction ( not till leakage of the brass ). He found the rear locking enfield to be physically stronger than most other military actions due to the actual amount of steel that must be stressed past its yeild point before failure. I remember him saying that the mauser system is strong but failures resulted in actual parts flying wheras the enfield just kept stretching( they were still unusable but not auto disassebbled under pressure). This ,of course, has no bearing on the real world uses of these actions as we (hopefully) never get near the pressures he was at, but I found it interesting just the same.
I have been trying to find out more about this , but have drawn blanks everywhere I've tried. Anybody here know anything about these sort of tests?
They were done in the '60s from what I remember about the article.

Find a copy of P.O. Ackley's book. He is the person in question. If I recall the strongest of all was the early Arisakas. He was never able to seriously damage the action, only blow barrels off the front ring. He chalked it up to very elaborate heat treating techniques.

Arisakas are still '93 Mauser clones.

Here are some words I transcribed:







P.O. Ackley 'Handbook for Shooters and Reloaders Vol. 2', 1966, page 2,

actions to be tested:



6. Eddystone-Enfield Number 952302

62 gr 3031 140 gr .270 Ackley magnum

102,000 psi



7. Remington-Enfield Number 673777

68 gr 3031, 180 gr .270 Ackley magnum

197,000 psi



13. British Lee Enfield, Mark III caliber .303, Number 41469

50 gr 2400, 150 gr .30-40 Improved [.303 Epps]

159,000 psi







1962, Volume 1 , page 447:

"Any rifle chambered for the 303 British can be rechambered for the Epps

version but the SMLE type rifle will not accept the heavy charges as the

P14 Enfield rifle"



1966 Volume 2, page 10:

The Enfield action [Remington and Eddystone] proved somewhat of a

disappointment in these tests. It was expected that it would be the

strongest one, and further tests will be run with this particular action

to see if the two used were representative. However, the two which have

been tested so far are widely different in physical characteristics.

That is, the heat treatment given the two actions varied a great deal.

One action [Eddystone] was extremely hard and blew up rather easily.

When the blowup occurred, the action was nearly disintegrated and is one

of the few blowups which would have perhaps proven fatal to the shooter.

The other Enfield action [Remington] was extremely soft. It was

practically impossible to break the action but after the loads reached a

high pressure level, excessive setback was indicated on each successive

shot, resulting in a dangerous headspace condition."



1966 Volume 2, page 13:

The British Enfield gave us an example of the rear locking lug system.

The strength of this action seemed to be good; probably a little better

than the Krag. [page 15: "The Krag actions tested showed surprising

strength."] However the locking lugs are over four inches back from the

face of the bolt. When this action gave way, the receiver itself went

down at the rear, allowing the front end of the bolt to come up out of

the receiver ring, thus allowing the bolt to be bent and to be broken.

The locking lugs themselves did not give way. The whole action appeared

to have plenty of strength except for this one characteristic, which

allows too much spring in the bolt and receiver. This action is not of

prime consideration, however, because it des not have the appearance or

another feature which make it desirable for sporting use. It also must

be noted that regular .30 caliber bullets were used in this rifle

instead of the oversized .303 British bullets. This, doubtless, gave

slightly lower pressure than the standard bullet would have given."