My 8 x 57mm Shaw Rebarreled Rifle: 1st time out this year

[Maven]

When I was much younger, I purchased a full military 8 x 57mm Mauser, but was persuaded to "sporterize" it for hunting (which I never did). After two disastrous restocking and one bbl. replacement (unnecessary IMHO), the rifle lay dormant for quite a few years. I then got the yen to restoreand restock it with a McMillan polymer (?) stock, pillar bedding, and a heavy Shaw barrel. The thing now weighs ~11 pounds! Although it is not a true bench gun, it is quite accurate with both cast and jacketed bullets. Btw, I shoot much more of the former than the latter in it as you can imagine. A couple of weeks ago after completing my "honey do's," I took it to our range for the first time in at least a year and for the first time at the range itself since December.

Although I had cast bullet loads (the ~200gr. group buy bore rider from the Boolits site from years ago), I also had twenty Hornady 170gr. jacketed round nose loads I wanted to use. Those were loaded with 42gr. IMR 7383 and Win. LR primers. Just to add, 7383 isn't nearly the "death ray" powder folks on the Internet say it is, but it is a bit "different." I.e., you don't want to compress it very much or leave the loaded cartridges in the hot sun if you can avoid it, especially with full snort charges. Lastly, it s ~ IMR 4831 in burn rate (at least my jug is), but it takes up a great deal more room in the case than the same charge of IMR 4350 or IMR 4831 I presume. Anyway, here are two targets (4"/side) of ten shot groups with the Hornady jacketed bullet for your enjoyment. The range was 50 yd. as I am quite confident of my shooting (1st time out!) at that range.

 

[Ben]

Great Shooting !!!!!!!!!
I love my 8X57mm rifles.

Deer beware.

 

[Tomme boy]

I had the same thing done from them. Varget and 4895 work way better than the slow powders in the 8mm. At least in the 4 different 8mm I had anyway. Brass was also a concern. Remington and some lots of Win were a little too thin. You would run into constriction issue with them. I ended up using converted 3006 brass. Way more consistent. The 200gr Sierra hpbt was the best bullet I found. Easy out to 1200 yds, my limit on how far I could go.

 

[CWLONGSHOT]

Both of mine love tiff shot of 4064/175 Sierra Spitzer. It has taken dozen plus deer for me. Most every one was a bang flop.

CW

 

[david s]

Shaw put the barrel (sporter weight) on my 7X57 Mauser. At the time I was hoping for a 6.5X57 but they didn't have any 6.5 blanks right then. So 7X57 it was, 20 or so years on and still no complaints with this compromise. Just a nice accurate rifle. Someday I'll end up with all the --X57 variants. It's just such a nice well-balanced case.

 

[Maven]

Tomme boy, 8 x 57mm brass is often hard to come by, but like you, I've had few problems converting '06 brass to 8 x 57mm. I'll even use .270Win. brass on occasion, which work quite well too.

 

[Bret4207]

My sole 8mm at this time is a Yugo 48 that's like factory new. It's never had anything but cast through it and shoots very nicely. I wouldn't feel at all handicapped being "stuck" with the 8x57!

Is Shaw still in business? They used to offer a decent product at a good price.

 

[richhodg66]

I have only dabbled a bit in loading the 8x57, but it is a great cartridge and should be among the best cast bullet cartridges.

Among other projects I haven't spent enough time with is an 8mm-06 I need to get back to. Couldn't get it to feed that real heavy flatnose made by Lee (Karabiner?), which is a shame, that would darn near be the equal of a .35 Whelen if it would.

 

[fiver]

not too long back [jan-feb?] i picked up a few bags of PPU from graf and son's.
it was even a reasonable 35-38 bucks a bag airc.
i'm gonna run some 170gr. hot cores with 4064 in them.

i've run 150's at 2850 which basically mimics my 30-06 load, but i've never got a chance to shoot a deer with that combo.

 

[Ole_270]

A little over a year ago I sent an early Ruger M77 Tang Safety 250-3000 to Shaw for a new barrel. I got it back early last winter. 2nd worst shooting barrel I've ever had, beating only Win 94 Ranger 30-30 that was pitiful. They "trued" the face of the action, and the new barrel was hitting the left side of the barrel channel so hard it wouldn't fit at all. Got the channel opened up and re-glass bedded the action. The Timney trigger was so loose it almost fell off taking it out of the packaging. The long Mauser style extractor was only held on by one side of the retainer clip. When I finally got it ready for the range, I found that not only did it not shoot worth a hoot, The velocities with each load was higher out of this 22" barrel than the book loads from a 24". Tried 4 powders and 3 bullet weights, only had one 3 shot group under 2" at 100 yards. They said to send it back for evaluation. Got it back a couple months ago with little better results. Extractor barely draws the empty halfway out of the chamber before dropping it onto the rails. The trigger was loose again. Finally I polished the crown in a fit of what the hell I'll try anything. Groups improved but still have at least one flyer per group, just not as bad as before. I'll never use them again.

 

[RicinYakima]

Is Shaw still in business? They used to offer a decent product at a good price.

Still in business but only make bolt gun barrels on order. Rest is AR barrels and uppers.

I have two 7MM barrels and happy with both.

 

[Rushcreek]

I've used Shaw barrels for 22-250, .250 Savage, 6.5 Remington, 30-06 Improved, 8x57mm, and .450 Marlin in custom rifles that I've put together over the decades. All were just fine. We still have the Browning/Sako .250 Savage- it's my wife's main deer and varmint rifle.
The 8x57mm loved the discontinued Hornady 125gr spire point- very accurate and very deadly on deer despite being labeled as a varmint bullet.

 

[Maven]

CW, et al, 48gr. IMR 4064 with jacketed SP's was one of the late Ken Waters' pet loads. I tried it on his recommendation: He was right!

 

[CZ93X62]

I only have one 8 x 57 Mauser rifle in the safe, it's a generic split-bridge Mannlicher action on a G98/40. It has run some Hornady J-words rather well, but it dotes upon the Lee 175 grain bore-rider ahead of 16.0 grains of 2400.

In years past I had designs upon the Steyr-Mannlicher Professional-series rifles in both 7 x 57 and 8 x 57. There was always too much month left at the end of the money when those were still being imported.

8 x 57JS is Europe's 30-06, so flexible and useful. USA loadings don't exploit the caliber's capabilities in any depth.

 

[Bret4207]

One of my early "deer rifles" was sporterized 98 Mauser 8x57 that weighed just under 657 lbs, or at least it seemed that way to 13 year old me. I think I shot it only a couple times, and never at anything live. I remember cutting the bullet out of a tree I'd shot. Took forever to dig that thing out with my Scout knife. I had that bullet in a box for years, don't know what became of it. Funny the stuff you remember.

 

[fiver]

chuckle.
i was shooting some old dead trees on my place out in the desert a few years back.
i figured i could get back some samples of my alloy to see how it mushroomed out of the 38-40 revolver i had at the time.
i dug and dug barely scraping the wood away and i finally got smart enough to look on the back side because i was gonna get out the chainsaw and cut the tree down.
guess how many exit holes there was... yeah all of them... LOL
if i'd have been some younger i'd have probably bored a hole all the way through without ever finding anything but grey smudges.