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View Full Version : "Ersatz load" for M1895 Chilean



Bob S
10-10-2005, 09:20 PM
As I was responding to a post about a Chilean/Boer 7mm Mausers, I was also getting ready to take a trip to the range at Dahlgren ... Columbus Day, Prince William County schools are open, and I am OFF! I took my Chilean M1895 off the wall (not the Boer one), and scratched around for something to shoot in it. Nothing. EXCEPT 20 rounds of a cast load that the label says was loaded in 1977 for a rolling block carbine that I bought at a show in Vallejo, CA that year. I also bought a Lee 130 grain mould, old Ideal .285 sizer, and Ideal nutcracker tool for it. Now these cases had been fired several times in that sloppy old rolling block, and loaded with the Ideal tool, neck sized only, so there was NO WAY they were gonna chamber in the M1895, which is nice and tight. No time to load anything up with the new components that I have stashed for the 1895. What to do, what to do??!!?

I took the expander plug/ decapping pin out of the newly-acquired Lee FL die, rubbed some Imperial wax on the cartridges, and ran the whole cartridges into the sizing die. How's THAT for precision reloading??? With the squashed bullets, I thought I might get a rough idea of an elevation zero, but I fully expected to see some evidence of tipped bullets on the target, if not outright sideways.

I set the rear sight at 800 meters, which is what usually works for my wimpy cast loads; got into the flim-flam sling, and laid down at 100 yards.

It took several shots to determine that 800 meters was WAY too high, so I lowered it to 600, and got one in the 8-ring; now I have the target "bracketed"! Set the elevation to 700, and got a 7 at 12:00 (just out of the picture below).

By this time, I had only 12 rounds left, so I took a bodacious line of white and "fired for effect". Here's the result. This is not a great target, but it shows how far you can deviate from "good reloading practice" and still get a "respectable" target. Or, in other words, "no amount of skill will ever replace dumb luck".

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v76/BobS1/Mausers/M1895Lee130.jpg

BTW, the load was the Lee 130 grain 7mm mould (the only 7mm mould they make, and this is one of the first ones made, it is held together with a spring clip), the label says sized to .285, but that's immaterial after the Draconian resizing; Hornady gas checks; the lube was most likely Javelina because that all I could get in Central CA at that time; 12.5 grains of Hercules 2400, R-P cases and Rem 9-1/2 primers.

Resp'y,
Bob S.