Carcano sporterized action....

Ahhh yes, the double set trigger shows that this is a "Cooey Carcano" action. Apparently there was a recall for these rifles because people were shooting the Milsurp 6.5 Carcano round through them with scary results. I haven't heard of any dies for the 6.5 M.S. round, although I have seen old commercial rounds at gunshows. I would post a "Want To Buy" (WTB) ad in the "Exchange of factory ammo and reloading equipment" on this website. That might be your best bet..
 
Hi, roberto mervici!

BOY, does that 'handle' ever sound Italian! I think this old rifle might have a worthy home.

About the 7.62x39 conversion, friend. First off, the only barrels available that you might get cheaply will be rifled 1 turn in 10 inches and will need a bullet of at LEAST 150 grains. That WOULD be one thing to do except for the fact that the 6.5x54MS is one of the finest-balanced cartridges ever designed, anywhere.

It only has about as much POWER as a .30-30, but that long bullet has a higher Ballistic Coefficient than you might think and it has the highest Sectional Density of anything you can get. And the BC can be improved GREATLY with a modern pointed BT bullet! It is a wonderful Bush cartridge, will plough its way through anything. I don't NEED to remind people of WDM Bell, the Scot who took 1100 Elephants, but I will, anyway: this cartridge was one of his favourites, for good reason.

The Cooey Carcano combines the availability (in the 1930s) of the Greek MS cartridge with the simplicity, safety and speed of the Italian Carcano action. This is NOT a bad combination. Analysing the basic design of the Carcano action will show you that, in theory at least, it is better than a '98 Mauser, even though it never caught on outside of Italy and Japan. The famous Arisaka safety is, mechanically, a variant of the Carcano safety. The Bolt is a combination of early and late Mauser but actually is an improvement over such: lugs are CLOSER to the Chamber and thus stronger for their size. The Carcano ACTION is lightweight, but that came strictly from scaling-down an action for the smaller diameter of the Cartridge to be used in it. The Carcano action, taken by itself, is quite amazingly robust and can be just wonderfully accurate due to its great rigidity which comes from the fact that it has NO THUMB CUT and thus a strong and uninterrupted left-hand Receiver rail.

Allright, friend, you have Carcano bass and dies. You have not wasted your money because there is VERY VERY LITTLE actual difference between the Carcano casing and the Mannlicher-Schoenauer casing: JUST enough that they don't interchange. I have seen military Carcanos which WILL accept and fire the MS round, although generally the tight chambers of the Italian barrels prevents this being an easy thing to do. The MOUTH of the MS round hits the front STOP of the Chamber inside the Carcano barrel. The MS round in a Carcano, though, is prevented from easy chambering by the position of the SHOULDER of the case; the MS is just a FEW thousandths too long in this area.

If this were my rifle (and I own 3 of them, so this will be done), I would just file the TOP of my shellholder down about twice the thickness of a sheet of typing paper, set your dies and then FL resize your brass, starting like that; you might even be able to back off a little. Just be sure to put THAT shellholder with the dies and mark "MS" oin the kit, just so you don't get it mixed-up with your other die sets. That SHOULD be enough so that you can get the Carcano cases into the Chamber of this nice little rifle. You might even be able to back off a bit; the two Chambers were VERY close.

The Cooey BARREL on this rifle, as you have discovered, is VERY tight. You will NOT want to run regular .268" Carcano bullets in this one. These rifles are at their best with a .263" or .264", which is cheaper and much easier to get. Your dies will handle this bullet, doubtless, because the proper Carcano bullet has never been available in North America until very recently.

One point: the Carcano cartridge usually is loaded with SLOW powders because of the 31-inch barrels of the old Fucile '91... but the Italian military always loaded it with FAST Ballistite powder. Your rifle is much closer in length to the Truppi Speziali Short Rifle and will give a merciless fireball and blast with slow powders. I have been loading for my own Carbines and TSs with IMR-4198, a very FAST powder. No fireball, no earth-shattering report..... but very nice groups. So I tried some in my Model 41, which has a 27-inch barrel..... and the thing started making groups UNDER 1 inch at 100 yards, using the factory iron sights.... and very mild recoil. The load used was 28 grains of IMR-4198 and a Remington bulk-pack flat-base 140-grain .264" pointed bullet, seated to the OAL of a standard Carcano cartridge. This is NOT a hot load (actually, it is quite mild, but the rifle likes it) and it should be a safe START load.

You will want a couple of CLIPS for your rifle. The ammunition loads into the 6-shot Clip and the whole Clip goes down into the Magazine. When the last cartridge is chambered, the Clip drops out the slot in the bottom of the Magazine. A partly-filled Clip can be ejected UPWARD by pressing the Button insde the Triggerguard. If you put a strip of Masking Tape across the bottom of your Magazine while hunting, you won't lose your Clips; they are expensive and hard to find. Friend JP (on this forum) has CLIPS. I believe he is at P&S Militaria, which is in your Province.

You have the makings of a very nice woods rifle, friend. Do enjoy it.

BTW: be SURE that the LOCKING SCREW which holds the Barrel Extension to the original STUB CHAMBER is done up FULLY. Put some glue or Loc-Tite or paint or Nail Polish on it so it doesn't try to work out. This is very important because it keeps everything aligned and tight.
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Allo Granite, aprreciate the suggestion, as a mater of fact I do have a SMLE barreled action that I am planning to hause in a military stock as soon as I find all the pces... and already have a 7.62x39 (cz878), but this carcano I kind like it as is I think it has panache and will look good in a nice sporter classic stock.
Tks, Roberto
 
roberto mervici said:
but this carcano I kind like it as is I think it has panache and will look good in a nice sporter classic stock.
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I never heard a better reason for leaving a rifle the way it is. Panache...that's some good english brother. W.P.Kinsella would be proud.

These are cool little rifles. I had one, but it wasn't for me. I recently passed it on to someone to appreciate. Very interesting though.

Adrian
 
Hi Smellie, I studied your replay and I thank you, if I am unsuccessfull in finding the die for the MS,(actually they are available but I do not want pay 90/100$ with shipping, the casing I found here in Mtl made by Privi boxer primers) I will follow your suggestion: If I got it right, lock the resizing die 6.5x52 a little higher on the press to compensate for the extra lenght of the 6.5x54 MS cartridge.... try and miss till ok.....
I have fair stock of bullets for the 6.5 old norma 139gr PPDC plastic point dual core cupro nickel, they perform superbly on deer and black bear, ( I also own a 6.5x55swedish ) but lately I got involved in casting and I would like to use cast boolits for the carcano....need to locate a mold 6.5 around 160gr. gas check.
Tks, I found the adress of P&S Militaria, they are about 130 mi. from me, away on vacation at the moment, I will give them a call in a couple of days.
I will keep you posted on the progress....
Regards,
Roberto
 
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Trade-Ex normally stocks the "fat" Hornady Carcano bullet, but this is NOT the bullet for the COOEY Carcano.

COOEY Carcano takes a regular .263" - .264" bullet; the bullet seals the bore perfectly because the BORE diameter is smaller, squishing the bullet, and all that "squish" has to go somewhere........ so it goes to fill the grooves, same as on any other rifle.

But an extra 4 thousandths can make for VERY difficult chambering and insane pressure levels.
.
 
collector67 said:
Ahhh yes, the double set trigger shows that this is a "Cooey Carcano" action. Apparently there was a recall for these rifles because people were shooting the Milsurp 6.5 Carcano round through them with scary results. I haven't heard of any dies for the 6.5 M.S. round, although I have seen old commercial rounds at gunshows. I would post a "Want To Buy" (WTB) ad in the "Exchange of factory ammo and reloading equipment" on this website. That might be your best bet..
Click to expand...

There was no recall - this is an "Urban Myth".

I suggest that you look at what "Boyds" has for stocks.

If you go the 7.62X39 route vía a LE barrel, the twist rate will be fine for any bullet lighter than 250 grs.
 
Andy said:
There was no recall - this is an "Urban Myth".

I suggest that you look at what "Boyds" has for stocks.

.
Click to expand...

Tks Andy, I had look at them and ordered the Rea classic walnut, I will remove the cheek piece since I am lefty and have no use for it.
To bad thus is not available in LH configuration, this will be the 4th stock I got from Boyds, got 2 T.Hole LH laminated 100% finish, one for a .338WM custom and the other for my .50 Rem ML, and one as the Rea I just ordered for a 7.7Arisaka, excellent rapport quality price.
 
smellie said:
...........Allright, friend, you have Carcano bass and dies. You have not wasted your money because there is VERY VERY LITTLE actual difference between the Carcano casing and the Mannlicher-Schoenauer casing: JUST enough that they don't interchange. I have seen military Carcanos which WILL accept and fire the MS round, although generally the tight chambers of the Italian barrels prevents this being an easy thing to do. The MOUTH of the MS round hits the front STOP of the Chamber inside the Carcano barrel. The MS round in a Carcano, though, is prevented from easy chambering by the position of the SHOULDER of the case; the MS is just a FEW thousandths too long in this area.

If this were my rifle (and I own 3 of them, so this will be done), I would just file the TOP of my shellholder down about twice the thickness of a sheet of typing paper, set your dies and then FL resize your brass, starting like that; you might even be able to back off a little. Just be sure to put THAT shellholder with the dies and mark "MS" oin the kit, just so you don't get it mixed-up with your other die sets. That SHOULD be enough so that you can get the Carcano cases into the Chamber of this nice little rifle. You might even be able to back off a bit; the two Chambers were VERY close.

The Cooey BARREL on this rifle, as you have discovered, is VERY tight. You will NOT want to run regular .268" Carcano bullets in this one. These rifles are at their best with a .263" or .264", which is cheaper and much easier to get. Your dies will handle this bullet, doubtless, because the proper Carcano bullet has never been available in North America until very recently.

One point: the Carcano cartridge usually is loaded with SLOW powders because of the 31-inch barrels of the old Fucile '91... but the Italian military always loaded it with FAST Ballistite powder. Your rifle is much closer in length to the Truppi Speziali Short Rifle and will give a merciless fireball and blast with slow powders. I have been loading for my own Carbines and TSs with IMR-4198, a very FAST powder. No fireball, no earth-shattering report..... but very nice groups. So I tried some in my Model 41, which has a 27-inch barrel..... and the thing started making groups UNDER 1 inch at 100 yards, using the factory iron sights.... and very mild recoil. The load used was 28 grains of IMR-4198 and a Remington bulk-pack flat-base 140-grain .264" pointed bullet, seated to the OAL of a standard Carcano cartridge. This is NOT a hot load (actually, it is quite mild, but the rifle likes it) and it should be a safe START load.
.........................................
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Click to expand...

Hello Mr.Smellie,
Hiesterday I received the brass for the 6.5 MS once fired Dominion head stamp... not young ..., I cleaned during the nite, now they look like just out of the factory, resized as per your suggestion, by keeping the 6.5 carcano die 1.5mm high on the press the measurement of the Mannelicher S. case is perfect as supposed to be. Made some dummy and is chambering flawless.
Now I will get some IMR 4198 and I will be in business.!!!
Next need to work on the Boyd walnut stock.
Thanks for your input,
Best Regards,
Roberto
 
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