I have been lusting for a rifle like this since I began gathering up German/Austrian firearms. I found it, captured it and can't wait for it to arrive. I usually don't get all that excited about a rifle but this one has me on pins and needles.

http://www.gunbroker.com/Aucti....aspx?Item=465571919

If you develop buyer's remorse I would save you the embarrassment of trying to return it and ask for a refund.



Rich

Rich, your generosity knows no bounds. Should such a situation arise you're the first person I'll contact. I pray you don't hear from me regarding this rifle.....lol!

Looks like a nice rifle.
Solid buy I would say.

Nice find. Fits in perfectly with your firearms motif. Good luck with your load development!

Thanks Huvius. I didn't steal it but I don't believe I over paid, by much anyway. I thought it was about right actually.

Steve, thank you sir! I checked yesterday after the auction and everything is available. No fancy forming or lathe work should be necessary. A chamber cast to confirm dimensions and a slug of the bore will be made before I order anything. There was only 5 different 9.3 X 72R's if one counts the Sauer necked version. Oughta be a fun project.

Well Rich...I regret, (not really), to inform you that the rifle will be residing at my residence.

It isn't a 9.3 X 72R and once again I have a rifle no one knows exactly what the cartridge is. Three guys on two continents haven't found it yet. The barrel is definitely 9.3, it slugged .365. The chamber cast revealed a head about .030 bigger than the X72R and the length in the neighborhood of 5mm shorter, give or take. Given the time period of the rifle one might fairly assume it could be Mr. Outschar's version but I don't know that.

Brass was easy to form. I started with 9.3 X 72R Norma brass, cut it off, trimmed it to 2.84 in. and fireformed it. The Norma brass worked wonderfully without annealing. First and fireforming loads were straight black powder and the accuracy was dismal at best...but that wasn't a surprise although I have had fireforming loads shoot very well. The second set I fireformed I duplexed with 3 grs. of SR-4759 under 54 grs. of Scheutzen Ffg. Group size shrank to just under 2 inches at 50 yards, leaning against a tree for a rest.

Here's the unfired cases ready to go, the 5 on each side of the 500 Jeffery in the middle. 45-120 Sharps on the left, 450/400 on right and 30-06 on the bottom.

My offer will stand, at least until I figure out my Gundermann O/U's 9,3 X ?? chambering.

They can make you pull your hair, Rich, and you may never know. Certainly something can be made to work but it's nice to give the red-headed step children a proper name.

Sounds like a 360BPE variant.
There was a 2-7/16" version.

Huvius, that could be. Do you know the head dimension? My chamber cast is probably 2 weeks old, (Cerrosafe), so has changed some. It measures .438-.440. At the cast's longest it is 2.5 and after fireforming they're 2.84-2.85 and the rim is .510. Come to think of it the cast hasn't changed much as that's exactly the rim diameter from before.

Check with Dave at CH dies. There was several cartridges in that same general area. There are 2 different 9.3X72R's one had a different taper that the normal one.

I want to see it. The guy over on 3000.

Dave is on my speed dial....lol! He's helped me a bunch over the years.

Actually there is at least 4 different 9.3 X 72R cartridges that were common enough at the peak of the cartridge's popularity. Three were straight or nearly a straight taper and the last was the Sauer & Sohn bottleneck case. Then there is the various cases based on the 9 X 360D as Huvius mentioned. There is also several 65m and 70mm case lengths, straight and bottlenecked, that are similar and difficult to find info on.

Awesome rifle! One of those is on my list some day. After you do all the hard work of figuring the chambering and working up a load it will be a boring safe queen, time to move it off to one of us. Pictures when you get it please.

I don't know why I didn't post the one picture I have....I guess blame it on this nasty head cold I've been dealing with for a week. I'm not a very good photographer and only took the one. As soon as I can get outside without coughing off my fool head I'll take some more.



I've had a few moments where I didn't feel as if I was afraid I was going to live and shot a couple groups. Best so far has been with the bullet loaded in the left cases of the previous pictures but seated way out. Kneeling, leaning on my shooting bench it grouped 3 into about 1 1/2 inches at 50 yards. Al...I actually don't have any safe queens. They all, on occasion, get taken along on my daily woods walk..weather and head colds permitting.