Old 7mm J-bullets

[fatelk]

I know it may be a little heretical to ask about these here but I wasn't sure where else to ask.

I have an old 1916 Spanish carbine in 7x57, and picked up a few old bullets to see if it will shoot at all. The bore is pretty rough, with pitting and wear.

There are two different types of bullets I found, and I'm just curious about them. The one kind are what I assume to be old pulled surplus bullets, .285", 174gr. RN. I would guess they're the better part of a century old, almost a shame to shoot them.

The others are 163gr FMJ-BT, but .287" diameter. I assume they are commercial bullets and not surplus, but I've never seen .287" 7mm bullets before. I assume they'll be OK to shoot in this old rifle, keeping loads on the light side?

I don't have molds in 7mm. I have doubts about it shooting any kind of projectile with much accuracy due to the condition of the bore.

[frnkeore]

You can resize them just like cast bullets. I do that for my GEW 88 barrels.

Frank

[Larry Gibson]

No doubt your Spanish Mauser has a groove diameter closer to .287/.288 than to the now standard American .284 size. The european standard for 7mm is .286 - .288 BTW. The English standard was .284 which is what we adopted.

I would load both and shoot them not expecting great accuracy from either but atypical 3-4 moa if your carbine has at least deep rifling. I'd use 50 gr of H4831SC with both bullets as that is my load with the Hornady 175 gr RN. I have pressure tested it in my M95 and it is under the psi MAP for the 7x57 and is at or less than numerous milsurp 7x57 cartridges i have also tested. Suggest you work up to that in the usual course of reloading new loads.

Larry Gibson

[fatelk]

Thank you! I will give that a try. I still have quite a bit of old 4831 surplus. I'll work up a load and see what it does.

Digging through my stuff, I found a box of Hornady 175gr spire points, and some Sierra 160 SP-BTs.

I've had this old rifle laying around for a while. I bought it for $20; missing parts, rusty bore and chamber, damaged firing pin hole in the bolt. I finally got around to buying another $37 worth of parts for it from Springfield Sporters (seems like a good guy- fast shipping, good parts).

I cleaned it up as best as I could and it looks OK. I lucked out and the new bolt body I bought headspaces very good. I fired a few surplus rounds (FN36) offhand and it seemed to do OK. I'll be curious to see how it does from sandbags at 100 yards. If I get 3 or 4 moa out of it I'll definitely be happy. That would be very acceptable for a $50 beater like this.

Kind of funny, I've never had a 7mm before, mag or mauser, but I already had dies, bullets, and some brass. The stuff we accumulate...

[Piedmont]

Slug your barrel. I have slugged some sort of a Spanish 1916 and it had a .2845" groove diameter, which surprised me. I'd bet those boat tails are milsurp bullets and the whitish ones are cupronickel of the original round nose style that everyone used before switching to spitzers. It is the old round nose ball that gave the milsurp calibers a good reputation in Africa because they would penetrate in a straight line through huge beasts.

[mooman76]

I have 2 old Spanish mausers, not sure of the models but one slugs at .286 and the other at .287. The latter won't shoot worth a hoot even with jacketed.

[Multigunner]

Slug your barrel. I have slugged some sort of a Spanish 1916 and it had a .2845" groove diameter, which surprised me. I'd bet those boat tails are milsurp bullets and the whitish ones are cupronickel of the original round nose style that everyone used before switching to spitzers. It is the old round nose ball that gave the milsurp calibers a good reputation in Africa because they would penetrate in a straight line through huge beasts.

Theres a journal of an American who served with Cuban rebels during the Spanish American War , its online at the Internet Archive Texts.
He described wounds made by the 7mm Mausers used by the Spanish, and the round nose FMJ proved rather ineffective on humans.
He described several instances where Cubans took solid hits to the torso, the bullets zipping through without doing significant dame, even if vital organs were hit.
I don't doubt that the hardy nature of the peasants had a great deal to do with their swift recovery with little or no medical care. The bullets did not carry any noticable amount of debris into the wounds, so infection didn't set in.
If taken to any hospital of the era they'd have likely died from infections they'd have contracted there instead of from the direct effects of their wounds.

I would suspect that the .283 bullets commonly available for handloading of the 7mm Mauser are undersized according to the standards of the day when the 7mm first came into use.

My 1895 Oviedo shot with extremely good accuracy with old Remington cupro-nickel jacket 7mm Milspec ammo, not so well with modern commercial ammo.