How to make a pigs ear from good quality silk purses

This post has been shamelessly lifted from my other Blog the https://280british.blogspot.com/
Way Way back in the mists of time, well the 1990's I had a brief love affair with a French personage. This was a model of 1936 7.5 x 54 mm MAS. It was lovely and simple even with a trigger pull measured in days rather than pounds, it was a superb battle rifle that didn't get the chance it needed.
7.62 x 51 mm NATO was 30 years later than this magnificent cartridge. I loaded up 6.5 x 55 Swedish cases that I had necked out by 1mm with 48 grains of IMR 4895 and a 148 grain Nato MG ball bullet and away it would go at the correct sight settings to appear in the bull out beyond 400 yards. 2700 feet per second was on the chrono when we finished testing.
Sadly we parted company, I needed to fund something else in my life (a mortgage I think) and I sold all of my military bolt action service rifles, My P14, Ross M1910, SMLE No1 MkV and the MAS 36.
Of all of those I liked the Mas the most, simple effective and with a great cartridge.
I decided to keep an option for the round alive on my certificate and arranged to keep a slot open for a 30 calibre rifle with a 55mm case. The Swedish case whilst 1mm longer then the French 54mm case fitted well, maybe it shrank slightly in length when expanded or maybe (more likely) the military chambers were generous to say the least.
Ok it seems an odd chambering to call it but Rigby Anglicised the 7x57 Mauser by naming it the .275 Rigby so why not!
So eventually a donor rifle was found, in this case a reasonably scarce Remington 700 ADL in 6.5 Swedish (means no changes required to the bolt) for a good (cheap) price and it was sent off with the rifles designated to become .280's to a Riflesmith.
Ok Its Riflecraft again but at the time in for a penny, in for a pound.
I specified a lightweight sporter barrel, screw cut for 1/2" unf and left about 4 rounds so they would measure for the reamer and use for proof.
Oh foolish me. Whilst I was about to pull the plug on the .280 project PTG did eventually send the reamer.
I authorised the work and paid the balance.
Oh foolish me.
I waited at home for my satin stainless sporter weight barrelled rifle to arrive. It did and as I unwrapped the shorter than expected package to find that they had sent it stripped not assembled (more later) and that the package had been jumped on by at least two parcel force employees on the way.
As I unwrapped the bubble wrap I found this;

 Yup the trigger was snapped, in two places, takes some doing that

 I sent these pics by email there and then and they promised to send me a new trigger!

Ok, I thought I would be getting a replacement trigger unit, after all who here has ever replaced a trigger blade in a Remington 700? You need 3 hands and thirty fingers to do it. Oh yes they sent a blade.
I tried but ended up sending the rifle back. Why did I give up? Well they couldn't have shipped the rifle assembled (parcelfarce would probably have broken the stock anyway) because the oversized fat barrel that was fitted wouldn't fit in the beautiful slim sporter stock that the donor rifle came from.
So I couldnt test it, the barrel was shiny (almost in the white) but at least the screw cut muzzle was the correct thread this time. I couldn't test the trigger but I could test the chamber by dropping in the ammo or at least drill rounds I had made.
Well I tried, the drill rounds went in about 3/4's of the way and that was it, live rounds too wouldn't chamber even some of the factory ammo I had left wouldn't chamber.
So I asked. I have yet to receive a satisfactory answer as to why the reamer is smaller than the test I ammo I provided for measuring and proofing. I have no idea how they proofed it, frankly I'm not even convinced they did.
Another trip up there this time to collect the rifle with replacement trigger fitted and the barrel channel reamed so it would assemble.
Frankly it was a dog to pull the trigger on. It has taken a year and a half of frustrating work to get the trigger bedded in and I'm not convinced yet it still pulls a steady pull within an ounce or two of the same weight each time.
I may yet have to spend another £200 later on to put in a drop in unit.
As for ammo, well back to basics, I fired off a handful of 6.5 x 55 Swedish factory loads to fire form them. That meant I had the right material to start with. I loaded up some 150 grain fmj .30 calibre bullets and found some 130 grain hollow points and loaded up some test rounds with 48 grains of IMR 4895. In theory I was back where I was in the 1990's but with a great sporting rifle fitted with a nice 8x56 Schmidt and Bender.

Its a very good looking rifle but by god it weighs something awful and its very unbalanced. That said I have yet to test it on game yet as I cant guarantee that the thing will shoot properly.

I have however been able to test the ammo I loaded. Hmm, that tight chamber means I get better MV for the same loading, 48 grains of IMR 4895 pushes 150 grain bullets along at 2900 feet per second. Its becoming a barrel burner. Which if it does burn out the chamber may mean I can chamber the original ammo or get a new barrel and get it chambered properly.

When I queried the overtight chamber the smith accused me of blowing out my Swedish cases to almost a 308 case dimension.

When I pointed out that it was immaterial, the reamer should have been made to cut a chamber to chamber the sample cartridges I delivered. This was the only chamber reamer Pacific Tool and Gauge delivered to our smith that year, you might think they would get it right, that the smith would check and the proof house would ask? No nothing they are all cunts the lot of them, lying bastards who failed to deliver the services paid for.

Next time I'm going to pay through the nose for a decent smith!

Je suis M. Rigby

This is a Rigby; (apologies for the rubbish formatting on this page, cheers wiki)

This is a French version of the Rigby, (Honest):

The more observant of you will notice that it isn't French and isn't built by Rigby.
Let me explain.
For a few years I was the very proud owner and user of a 1911 built .275 Rigby. .275 is the Anglicised version of 7x57 a Mauser cartridge used by many countries before WW1.
It is a superbly effective cartridge capable of very long distance shooting and available in a variety of bullet weights. 
Wiki states:.275 Rigby
"The ballistics of the 7×57mm became popular with deer and plains game hunters. The relatively flat trajectory and manageable recoil ensured its place as a sportsman's cartridge. The 7×57mm can offer very good penetrating ability due to a fast twist rate that enables it to fire long, heavy bullets with a high sectional density. This made it popular in Africa, where it was used on animals up to and including elephants, for which it was particularly favoured by noted ivory hunter W.D.M. "Karamojo" Bell, who shot about 800 African Elephants with 1893 pattern 7×57mm military ball ammunition using Rigby Mauser 98 rifles, when most ivory hunters were using larger-caliber rifles.^[12] Bell selected the cartridge for moderate recoil, and used 11.2-gram (172.8 gr) long round-nosed military full metal jacket bullets for reliable penetration. Bell sectioned an elephant skull to determine the size and location of the brain, and used careful aim to ensure bullet placement in the brain.<sup>[2]"


More of that later
Mr John Rigby as described by Wiki again:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Rigby_%26_Company
Rigby

"</sup>During the period from the Crimean War to the First World War, every facet of firearms and ammunition underwent radical change and thousands of related patents were filed in Britain, the United States and Europe. The areas of greatest interest were military rifles (a matter of grave national importance) and, because of their prestige, top-shelf sporting guns. John Rigby & Co. was deeply involved in creating guns and cartridges for both markets. Because of his expertise, in 1887 the British government appointed John Rigby superintendent of the Royal Small Arms Factory at Enfield Lock. There, Rigby and his large staff resolved design and production problems for a new rifle and its cartridge: the .303-calibre Lee Enfield, which in various forms went on to serve as the principal battle rifle for the United Kingdom until 1957.

By government policy, at the age of 65, in 1894, John Rigby retired from government service. He returned to the family firm with the latest knowledge on repeating rifles, smokeless powder, metallurgy, rifling and bullet design, as well as international contacts at the highest levels of gunmaking. One of these was Peter Paul Mauser, and, in 1898, Rigby was appointed the exclusive importer and distributor for Mauser rifles and components for the British Empire. For sale under his family name, John Rigby also developed sporting versions of the G98 Mauser rifle and its ammunition, notably the 7x57mm infantry round. With hunting bullets, this became a highly successful stalking cartridge known as the .275 Rigby.

In 1912, John Rigby & Co. lost the exclusive British sales contract to a member of the Mauser family, but Rigby continued to base its magazine rifles on Mauser (and Mauser-style) actions and still does so today. Among professional and sporting hunters in India and Africa, Rigby became known as the 'aristocrat of bolt-action rifles'.

In addition to its .275, Rigby developed an equally successful medium-heavy game round known as the .350 Rigby, and its rimmed counterpart for double rifles, the .350 No. 2.

At John Rigby's request, in 1900 Mauser began to develop a stretched version of its G98 action for larger cartridges. This became known as the Magnum Mauser and has served as the foundation for countless bolt-action big-game rifles ever since. The larger action was originally meant for Rigby's interim .400/.350 round, but in 1911 the company introduced the .416 Rigby cartridge for rifles built on the Magnum Mauser action. This was the first magazine rifle that could perform on a par with the powerful Nitro-Express double rifles, for one-third to one-fifth of their prices."

Right, now thats the back story as it were sometime in the 1990's early on I would say I was the lucky buyer of a factory refurbished 1936 MAS in 7.5 French.

Again here is Wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MAS-36_rifle

And the round that fed it was: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/7.5×54mm_French

Lucky because not only were these rifles cheap but ammo was scarce (probably why they were cheap) apart from cheap Syrian Surplus.

Now the rifle and round didn't really make the impact on the shooting world or even European military shooting because the Germans moved in rather sharply before the rifle was in general circulation.

The reason for this is that the Mas 36 wasn't meant for infantry troops, they were working on a self loading rifle (the Mas 1944) and the Mle 36 was meant for second line and support troops. Pesky Germans ruining everyone's plans!

I did some research as the Syrian ammo was appalling to shoot, the Mle 36 had an "interesting" trigger pull, once described to me as measured in days not pounds and hang fire berdan primed ammo wasn't conducive to accurate shooting.

Perusing my book case in the pre broadband internet days I happened upon cartridges of the world and Bolt action rifles. Now both books have been slated for bias and inaccuracy along with myth peddling however in 1996 there wasn't much else to go on. French manuals were in French if you could find them and there seemed to be very little scholarly work done on French small arms that was widely available.

The rifle was unusual in many ways however I felt it was a good service rifle and capable of shooting very straight with the right ammo.

Cartridges of the world actually listed two loads with IMR powders and standard Nato 7.62 146 grain machine gun ball so I started a bit below and worked my way up to the recommended loads. 48 Grains of IMR 4895 and 54 grains of IMR 4831 both produce 2700 fps at the muzzle and put the bullets pretty much on target with the sights set correctly.

I hadn't discovered anything all I had done was test the loads and find I was in agreement.

The load I would use in future would be the 4895 load as it used a little less powder. I purchased the dies from RCBS and as recommended necked out unfired 6.5 x 55 Swedish brass and just got on with loading.

I had a few very good years surprising fellow competitors at Bisley and other places with how easy it was to shoot and how easy it was to hit the target in a nice tight group. 

By now INDEP or FNM as they headstamp their ammo had produced a round in this calibre, sadly it was underpowered and overweight so a 400m sight setting was needed to get near the target at 200.

A shame but they improved and Privi also got into the game so I had masses of brass for my MAS!

The years rolled around and I discovered deer stalking and was eventually taken to Scotland by a very good friend;

 A good day on the hill

 Inside the estate larder

I also stalked close to home as well as in Scotland;

 A Fallow Pricket

 Roebuck taken with a CZ527 in 7.62 x 39

Now of all of these rifles I favoured the 6.5 x 55 CZ550. It was my first proper stalking rifle and in a full stock it looked attractive.

I was hooked but I had a slot on my firearms license for a 7x57 and had fallen in love with a .275 Rigby that was in the auctions at Bonhams in Knightsbridge.

I was only competing against one other bidder who dropped out at £1000 so for a little under £1300 fees included I walked away with a 1911 built Rigby Mauser with a factory fitted scope mount. One had been fitted at some point to the side but removed, filled and reblued, the top mounted one had an old scope from Hertel in West Germany mounted. Still it was very good and worked well. Eventually I sold the rifle and became a dealer which meant I always had a 7x57 I could use should the need arise.

I do miss that Rigby and the prices have really improved however thats not what I am writing about. Lets go back to the MAS1936. I was struggling to find a bullet that performed as well as a Sierra Matchking, I even tried Game Kings and they just wouldn't group properly. I ended up going back to the surplus Nato ball and it was as good as I was going to get from that rifle. 

Whilst I was trying the Gamekings I thought to myself that it was a particularly nice load and looked the part. I had read that SFM (a Paris based ammo company) had produced hunting loads but no manufacturer chambered a sporting rifle in it and the MAS didn't lend itself to conversion to a sporter.

A few had been attempted but they didn't sell well and lacked grace frankly.

I thought to myself that the round itself was misunderstood, if the Germans hadn't invaded France at that time perhaps the round would have made a wider impact and become the 7.62 x 51 Nato round or at least been a contender. This and the Swiss 7.5 x 55 are both very capable cartridges of a nice intermediate length.

Anyway I sold the Mas 36, I also sold all of my service rifles I kept for range work but on sending in my license I asked for a one for one variation allowing me to continue using the M1929 cartridge should I get a donor rifle I can rebarrel.

Oh my it took ages, I eventually found in auction a Remington 700 ADL in 6.5 x 55 which of course meant no bolt alterations.

This is where I leave you for a day or two!

More to follow!