11MM Mauser

[RenoDave]

I had a friend give these to me awhile back, Mauser 71/84, other than a little frosting on the lead I would shot them

202212
202213

[Der Gebirgsjager]

That's an unusual find for now days. The brass is probably Berdan primed, but just about worth is weight in gold. Take a look and see what Bertram gets for new cases.

[TNsailorman]

Not necessarily berdan primed. I bought some several years ago made by CIL of Canada(if my memory is correct) and it was boxer primed. I gave it to a friend who had a old 11mm mauser and needed the ammo for it. I was told by a vendor at a gun show that it would fit my .43 Spanish which he said was the same caliber and would chamber the 11 mauser. He was wrong. my experience anyway, james

[RenoDave]

Large Berdan, I assume, that a 50 AE with large primer202227

[Eldon]

Betram brass (Midway) is cheap considering it will last FOREVER !

[ascast]

that looks to be real surplus stuff. as such it is mixed headstamp,date. All Berdan primed. I don't know where to get those these day. Not hard to reload. Sometimes those will coorode through from the inside out. Most will fire, a few will split in the body. cool stuff

[ascast]

oh yeah, I'm with Eldon on this one

[RenoDave]

All 84 dated head stamps and the box 1888

[mazo kid]

I have had these for a while now. The top box contains 12 loaded rounds, the bottom is full of once fired brass (i am assuming here). The boxes both state 385 grain boolits.
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4400/36568093112_ba74c020cf_z.jpg

[mazo kid]

These are some empties that I have primed but not loaded.
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4416/36568091112_800ffb91da_z.jpg

[mazo kid]

The brass on the left half of the box is some I have made from 45-2.6 brass. Other than test firing the rifle remotely, I have not shot it using the brass I made.
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4426/36341980350_3f43c7a7c5_z.jpg

[RenoDave]

Paper patched202697

[uscra112]

Those old ones are surely original black powder and Berdan primed, probably mercuric, too. I have about 100 loose rounds like that myself. Won't shoot 'em. Too valuable to collectors. Never even tried one to see if it would fire.

CIL was decent hunting ammo. A lot of unissued 71/84 Mausers got into Canada just before or just after WW2, and hunters cut 'em down to use on moose and deer. At least that's the legend. That's why CIL loaded 11mm ammo.

Huntington's had a batch of cases made a couple of decades ago. Very good quality brass. No, my lot is mine until the estate sale.

[GONRA]

GONRA remembers waaaay back (Interarmco era?) brand new unfired 11mm Mausers
in original zinc metal wrap were imported from South America
with all the olde orignal ammo you could shoot.

Rifles were cheep, ammo pricy but lots of it....

[Eutectic45]

Yes! The first rifle I bought was a 71-84 it was brand new in the case for 25$ (which was a LOT for a broke teenager).
The clincher was my high school buddy offered to buy one too, and we would split the cost of a bullet mold (which cost as much as the rifle)
My Dad fished and we cast our sinkers, so we were set for cheap cast boolet ammo.
The gun shop even had the correct diameter non-corrosive berdan primers.
The original 1800's ammo was corrosive and mercuric. The corrosive was no problem, you have to clean the black powder fouling with water.
The mercury weekend the brass so when we could got good brass we stopped shooting up what now would be collectors ammo and worth $$.

The bullet we used was Lyman 439186 which was about 0.003 too small but shooters said it would bump up on firing and I guess they were right because it shot better than the military paper patch stuff. A Boy Scout leader had a bullet swager and a metal lathe and real quick we had half-jacket swaged bullets. These tended to lead so they were not shot much.

Black powder was fun but a mess and corroded cases we soon converted to 2400 powder and 25 grains was our best load.
206371206372

[Earlwb]

Thanks for sharing your story. That half jacket bullet looks pretty good. But I think it would have been much better with some lube grooves on it though. The half jacket doesn't do much if anything to prevent leading. it is more of a gas check in this case.

[ascast]

FWIW-- I dismantled my stash of CIL 11mm recently to salvage the brass. What I found was alarming. The older stuff, like mazo kid's top box, was loaded with lots of newspaper wads both under the bullet And over the primer. The powder looked to be fine black, but only 25-30 grains. The bullet were badly corroded inside the cases. I am not sure why they were loaded like this, but I not have trusted them for deer hunting.