Mauser (?) 1888 Loewe Berlin - question

southsaskscotty

southsaskscotty

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I have a line on a rifle that I was hoping some of you on here may be able to shed a little bit more light on for me.

It is a
1888
Manufatured in by Loewe Berlin in 1890
I believe it to be complete, with cleaning rod.

What can anyone tell me about these rifles and how much would one be worth??

Thanks!!
 
Commonly called the "commision" rifle, does it have a cooling jacket around the barrel? If it has cresent on the receiver above the chamber it has been used by the turks.
Should be chambered in 8mm Mauser.
They don't tend to cause to much of a buying frenzy. I would say around 150 or 200max for price. IMHO

Cheers
 
Your Gew88 is a Mauser-Mannlicher hybrid designed by a German weapons commission shortly after the French came out with their own smokeless powder 8mm rifle.

Loewe was one of the private contractors to built the Gew88 rifle. They were in fact a company that supplied machinery and if I'm not mistaken this was their first foray into the arms business. They were major shareholders in the Mauser company, who was too busy making Turkish Mausers to take on the German contract for the Gew 88, so they built them at Loewe in the Berlin area instead.

Gew88 was a stop-gap rifle IMO. It was only 10 years later that the Gew98 was issued. What this means is that Germany built a lot of 88's and they went through a lot of changes over the years in terms of modifications and owners. (Turks mentioned) They saw front line service in WWI in some units, also many issued to reserve units.

There's the 88/Z (improved rifling - almost all of the early guns wore out their rifling very quickly) Your 1890 was certainly in this category and very, very likely has a replaced barrel. Look for a marking such as Z on the barrel and butt stock or...

88/S - rebarreled/rechambered for the Spitzer bullet introduced in 1903. Sights changed to reflect flatter trajectory of the pointed bullet. Look for an S marking too.

88/05 - same as S but modified for stripper clips

88/14 - same as S but modified (more crudely) for stripper clips

There are more variations.

Two important things: you need to SLUG THE BORE so you know whether it is designed to fire the .318 diameter round nose bullets it was originally designed for or the .323 diameter spitzer bullets that came out in 1903. You can blow up the rifle if you shoot large diameter bullets out of a small bore.

2nd: do not fire mil-surp or hot loaded 8x57 ammo in this rifle. It is not as strong as a Mauser action. The original S-Patrone bullet was only 154gr.

One of these is on my hit list for 2008 :)
 
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Hi

That rifle has been around for a *long* time.

As a wall hanger, go for it. As a shooter, be very careful. Weapons designs, fabrication technology, and steel making all came a very long way between 1890 and 1920....

Bob
 
One other thing - if its Mannlicher style (not converted for stripper clips), you'll need an en bloc clip for it as well. You have to load 5 rds (or less) as a unit on the clip. When the clip is empty it falls out the bottom of the rifle (original design) or springs out the top (later modification)

The German clip is slightly different than the Mannlicher clip. The commission modified it so it could be loaded either way in the Gew88 whereas a Mannlicher clip has a top and bottom.

I think you could spend a long time collecting the Gew88 variations. I might really be setting myself up for bankruptcy and divorce if I find one!
 
As a shooter, be careful, know what you are doing, but do have fun with the old girl.

I have two of these, and they are a BALL at the rifle range. I just don't put heavy loads through them (any more), but I know for a fact that they will digest all sorts of horrid loads.

Yours is early enough that it has a very slim barrel above the chamber. With the very early smokeless powder, these would sometime "lift" out of the barrel, making for a very interesting situation. The modified chamber got rid of this problem, but sane loading levels also can avoid problems here.

I have one with, and one without, the heavy chamber, and both are good shooters and a lotta funs.
 
I have an old Turkish 88 that I bought many years ago, probably from SIR. I fire lighter lead handloads out of it. Interesting old rifle. :p:p
 
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