8x57 ammo experience.

svt1940 said:
What weight of bullet was standard german loading and what velocity? Heavy bullet like 196gr may not be the best choice for my FN and Hakim, you fire your load in bolt action only or in semi-auto too? Thx:)
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I believe the standard WW2 German bullet was 196 grain with a velocity of around 2500fps. I loaded Hornady 195 grain bullets to mimic it. I only used that in bolt action rifles. When I had a G43, I used Hornady 150 grain bullets for it, to go easy on it.
 
I used the Igman $h!t on my moose hunt last year. I would use it on deer, but not moose. The information on the round rated it for moose and large NA animals. "I will never make the same mistake twice." The round would not penetrate. My round was placed properly, but, would not punch through. Let me re-phrase that, my rounds were placed properly, but, would not punch through. I almost lost the animal, but, after a couple of hours of tracking in the rain I managed to harvest him. Of course, I switched my 8x57 for my Husky .30-06. Should I use my 8x57 again for moose, if ever drawn, I will be reloading my own.
 
Back to reloading. while the cost to start is not cheap, keep in mind that once you have the basics, you can load for other cartridges for only the expense of another set of reloading dies. The most expensive part of a cartidge is the case. Thats like flushing money down the toilet if you don't reload.
 
steve1973 said:
I believe the standard WW2 German bullet was 196 grain with a velocity of around 2500fps. I loaded Hornady 195 grain bullets to mimic it. I only used that in bolt action rifles. When I had a G43, I used Hornady 150 grain bullets for it, to go easy on it.
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I will use 150gr Hornady with H335 or BL-C2 for my semi-autos and bolt action too to use only 1 type of ammo in my FN49,Hakim and K98.
 
smellie said:
Pblatzz, that Turkish stuff you were shooting was made precisely to the specifications laid down in 1904 for the original JS load, which was the standard rifle loading in World War One. Shooting it through your Turk Mauser, you were getting VERY close to 2900 ft/sec with the 154-grain greased-steel-jacketed pointed bullet.

When this stuff hit the market in the States, I didn't have the money to bring in a batch. I was, however, able to beg 3 bandoleers of it from a fellow who runs a museum. I pulled down 30 rounds and put the charges and slugs into fresh Boxer-primed brass. Tested in 3 different rifles (a Gew 98, a Kar 98b and a Kar 98aZ) which had, collectively, been through 7 wars that we could prove, this ammo averaged just over 1 inch at 100 yards through the three rifles. That many people dismiss this stuff as garbage is down to one single factor: dodgy primers.

Note please that there was NO effort to re-uniform the charges: the charges were dumped directly from the Turk rounds into the newly-primed Norma commercial brass and then the bullet seated. The reason for this was simple: this was a test to see what that ammunition would do when it was fresh. It was VERY good.

The powder, by the way, was a square-flake type which could not be told from original German WW1 powder (I pulled down a German 1917 round to check).

Hope you saved some of that Turkish ammo, friend!
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I shot it all. It was great and accurate too in my turk Mauser. Wow what a kick too.
 
Steve, 99% of German WW2 ammo issued was the SmE or the AP which they called SmK, iron-cored and hard-steel-cored respectively because they had a severe shortage of lead. BOTH were 178-grain projectiles. They also used a fair bit of LSp, which was Tracer, also a light-bullet loading. The 196 was the THEORETICAL standard, but darned little ever saw front-line use because of shortages.

KC, what kind of armour-plate was the Moose wearing? Either you were hitting BONE or else Mister Moose was wearing a tungsten jacket. Igman ammo is made in the old Kragujevac plant; they know what they are doing and have been making this stuff for the better part of a century. There was certainly enough of their stuff used in the Bosnian war of recent ill-fame. I have several boxes of their stuff and just pop one open when I need the brass. I regard it as too nasty for continual shooting in my WW1 rifles.
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The IGMOND 170g stuff has been giving me less than 1" groups in my Serbian Sandman, and if I am really on my game, and the Mauser gods are smiling, I can pretty well make all 5 holes touch at 100m. Igmond is the good stuff as far as I am concerned.......leaves some pretty good dents in the steel gong down at 325m.

Had some decent luck reloading some 180g Ballistic Tips also.........grouped right around an inch.

Have some 200g Match Kings coming..............I am thinking they are just going to be awesome! Bring on the Zombies!
 
from my log book, these are my chronograph numbers from a 24" barrel.

remington 170 gr 2190 fps
bell IK headstamp 150 gr 2729 fps
bell IK headstamp 180 gr 2480 fps
igman 170 gr 2590 fps
igman 198 gr 2413 fps

compare the remington load at 2190 fps to remington 30-30 170 gr ammo at 2140 fps out of a 20" barrel and you can see that pressure must be very low on the remington 8mm mauser.

smellie, you should write some articles and send them into RIFLE magazine, it would be nice to read something about milsurps from someone who knows what they are talking about.
 
Hi smellie. No, didn't hit bone. The first two in to him should have/would have been kill shots. :(

I read the same stats; therefore, bought the stuff. It was definitely hot enough (especially compared to the more tame NA loading). I chaulk it up to the bullet. Lessons learned. I'm glad I toted my .30-06 along as back-up, and lucky to track (and predict) well enough to get a second chance at him.
 
Bought half a dozen boxes of Igman a while ago. What crap. Blew 3 primers in the first box of shells, didn't bother using any more. At first I figured it may have been my relatively tight chambered Husky, so I used the stuff in a couple of K98's. Same deal. Lots of recoil, and flattened or blown primers. I will never buy or use any Igman ammo of any stripe ever again. S&B on the other hand, I have found to be accurate with acceptable velocities (8x64S). I've reloaded the brass and have found the brass to be as good as any North American brass I've ever used.
 
Igman ammo

I bought a lot of Igman ammo a while ago, in different calibres, mostly 8x57 and 6.5x55. It was on sale.

The 6.5x55 will group out of my Swedish Mausers, in the 1" to 1 1/2 inch area. The 8x57 is about the same....well within hunting standards.

I find the 8x57 Igman a lot better than the ordinary North American stuff, with Federal advertised at 2260 FPS. I haven't tried the Igman it on a Moose, but Deer drop nicely.

Game animals can absorb a lot. If someone has a bad experience with ammo based on one example, then it is hardly indicative of the overall performance of that type of ammo.

Personally, I have seen a Moose shot by Natives in Northern Alberta. They hit it with a .22 Long Rifle, waited a while, then slowly moved in toward it. The Moose retreated, and they slowly pushed it to where it was within a few yards of a road, then they stopped. After about 10 minutes, the Moose lay down, and they gave it another half hour or so, then walked up and started to butcher it.

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Bought some 198gr igman, They shoot great!. at 100yards it's right on, that winchester stuff drops 8 inches at 100 yards.
 
Mount Sweetness said:
buffdog....

You were able to watch this happen? Were there other spectators?
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I believe it... the natives up where I used to live were more of the hi-cap M14 and let 'er have it, but due to the moose therefore dying wherever they started barraging it, they cut it up with chainsaws.:cool:

Good thread, too, my brother's got a BRNO too so it's pleasantly relevant.
 
.22 and Moose

Mount Sweetness said:
buffdog....

You were able to watch this happen? Were there other spectators?
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Yes. It was close to the Highway. My Brother, myself, and two friends were near High Level, Alberta, when this happened. It was 1976, and we were going fishing in Pine Lake, in Wood Buffalo Park, which had 8 to 10 pound Brook Trout in it at the time.

We were not really impressed, but could not really say too much because of the "interfering with Hunting Rights" issue. Not really pretty, but it did provide them with meat.
 
Is THAT why Norma is so expensive, John......

and all this time I`ve been dumping their brass in with my silver half-dollars, waiting for the gold price to hit 1500!

LOL!
 
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