mauser 1898 8mm? with bent down bolt?

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Not a fan of the thumb clip 05 and 14 mods as it weakens the left receiver wall in an already weaker design than the Mauser. This was done as an economy measure simply to provide reserve troops in the rear echelons with something that went bang for the Germans or to be exported to places that really did not care about the welfare of their soldiers.

In the past, Slamfire has provided some documentation on one of his posts that the Ludwig and Loewe made receivers of the GEW 88 were defective and here is a brief summary of some of the issues, http://www.cruffler.com/historic-august99.html

Look for a Steyr or German arsenal make without the thumbcut if you believe that Ludwig Loewe receivers had issues. Haven't seen any controversy over those.
 
Not a fan of the thumb clip 05 and 14 mods as it weakens the left receiver wall in an already weaker design than the Mauser. This was done as an economy measure simply to provide reserve troops in the rear echelons with something that went bang for the Germans or to be exported to places that really did not care about the welfare of their soldiers.

In the past, Slamfire has provided some documentation on one of his posts that the Ludwig and Loewe made receivers of the GEW 88 were defective and here is a brief summary of some of the issues, http://www.cruffler.com/historic-august99.html

.
so its like caring a:eek: old german stick grenade around if shooting full 8mm loads and a must to reload under charge loads to shoot safely
 
The lightly loaded US 8mm Mauser (Fed, Win, Rem) works well in these guns and uses a .321 bullet to be OK in both bore sizes. Firing WWII style hot 198 gr ammo with a much longer bearing surface than the WWI 154 gr loads is the problem.

I have owned and shot my 1891 Ludwig Lowe Gew 88 since 1992 and never heard the story about supposed issues before.
 
so its like caring a:eek: old german stick grenade around if shooting full 8mm loads and a must to reload under charge loads to shoot safely

Some people have reported receivers cracking where the thumbcut was made on the receiver. The cruder Gew88-14 mods included welding a charger bridge to the receiver which gives me loads of confidence in the metallurgy. Given the state of metallurgy at the time, I use mine as a wall hanger only as I like my face and hands just fine. I would not load any hotter than for a .30-30 (about 37000 psi or less) or thereabouts pressure wise in these old firearms or better yet shoot cast bullets with moderate loads unless the bore is horrendous.

Reduced loads can be an issue depending on the pressure spike of the powder that you use. Kabooms have been reported sometimes in old firearms when a fast pistol powder is used for a supposed light load instead of a lighter load of a slower burning rifle powder like H4895. Some of this issue could also come from a jacketed bullet with a light load stopping or slowing down in a barrel resulting in a pressure spike with other factors like barrel fouling, pitting and roughness playing a part. It is also easier to double charge with a powder as well. Not all firearm designs are equally successful in history and there is a reason that Germany spent a lot more money to reequip with the m98 within a decade of adopting the GEW 88.
 
The lightly loaded US 8mm Mauser (Fed, Win, Rem) works well in these guns and uses a .321 bullet to be OK in both bore sizes. Firing WWII style hot 198 gr ammo with a much longer bearing surface than the WWI 154 gr loads is the problem.

I have owned and shot my 1891 Ludwig Lowe Gew 88 since 1992 and never heard the story about supposed issues before.
Slamfire knows a bit more than I do as he researched it but I have found independent evidence that it was a thing when I was restoring one to working order. As a result, it is a wallhanger.
 
Some people have reported receivers cracking where the thumbcut was made on the receiver. The cruder Gew88-14 mods included welding a charger bridge to the receiver which gives me loads of confidence in the metallurgy. Given the state of metallurgy at the time, I use mine as a wall hanger only as I like my face and hands just fine. I would not load any hotter than for a .30-30 (about 37000 psi or less) or thereabouts pressure wise in these old firearms or better yet shoot cast bullets with moderate loads unless the bore is horrendous.

Reduced loads can be an issue depending on the pressure spike of the powder that you use. Kabooms have been reported sometimes in old firearms when a fast pistol powder is used for a supposed light load instead of a lighter load of a slower burning rifle powder like H4895. Some of this issue could also come from a jacketed bullet with a light load stopping or slowing down in a barrel resulting in a pressure spike with other factors like barrel fouling, pitting and roughness playing a part. It is also easier to double charge with a powder as well. Not all firearm designs are equally successful in history and there is a reason that Germany spent a lot more money to reequip with the m98 within a decade of adopting the GEW 88.
i been reloading my swiss k11 308 with under charge loads with fast powder as wc 844 made more for 5.56 haven't had any issues yets and i double check the cases always for powder height;) i think the k11 can handle at least 42 to 44,000 psi pressure
 
i been reloading my swiss k11 308 with under charge loads with fast powder as wc 844 made more for 5.56 haven't had any issues yets and i double check the cases always for powder height;) i think the k11 can handle at least 42 to 44,000 psi pressure

The whole situation of reduced loads causing kabooms turns on a whole host of factors that are out in the wild that can be difficult to reproduce in a lab. One issue was that the old CUP system of measurement failed to pick up very short lived pressure spikes of certain powders which resulted in problems for some. Red Dot was one of them, https://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/when-is-red-dot-not-red-dot.710661/. Another issue is the condition of the bore as friction is higher in rusty, badly pitted old bores that can foul easily and a bullet slowing down or stopping can be a bad thing. Some powders are sensitive to position which can make things in a reduced load worse pressure wise. There is some evidence that certain faster powders that fail to fill up a cartridge and that are position sensitive can cause problems. Some might be related to problems with the firearms such as being in a fire, undetected cracks from wear, and other problems such as a pitted chamber. And probably some of it was related to firing old milsurp ammo of dubious origins where the burn rate of the powder changed due to deterioration of the powder. User error in reloads or the occasional bad factory round also may affect things as well.

Most disasters, like the Apollo 13 oxygen tank failure, stem from several causes that were ignored at the time but appear obvious in hindsight.
 
Slamfire knows a bit more than I do as he researched it but I have found independent evidence that it was a thing when I was restoring one to working order. As a result, it is a wallhanger.


Ignorance is a wonderful thing. If you have not heard of something, than it does not exist, if you did not see it, it did not happen.

This morning I was researching the German Judenflinte (Jewish Musket) scandals that occurred during the production of the GEW 1888. An abnormal number of early, new production GEW 88's blew up. Ludwig and Lowe, a Jewish owned firm was making the majority of the GEW 88's, and that created the conditions for conspiracy minded anti semites to claim Jews were sabotaging the German Army. Jew haters of the period were quite technically ignorant, but the mishaps fit their world view. The blow ups were all due to the immaturity of the process controls and metallurgy of the era. Which were rudimentary at best. These are rifles built before phase diagrams were created for steel. Decades before Von Mises analysis. I don't know if they had pyrometers, though they could have used pryometric cones.

These old guns need to be treated as something that can go from zero to bitch in tenths of a second. Sure the machining looks great, the wood darn good for a service rifle, but you know, these were not hammered out under the Ice Mountains by Magical Dwarves. The steels of the era had high residual element counts because they did not have the ability to burn off non oxidizing containments. They probably had problems even measuring the stuff.

This is a paper I found on 19th century bridges and one on the Titantic rivets. You want to trust your head and health to antique metallurgy?: its your decision. I would recommend buying a spare head to replace the one you have, just in case.

MECHANICAL CHARACTERIZATION OF ANCIENT PORTUGUESE RIVETED BRIDGES STEELS

Abstract: In repairing and retrofitting processes of ancient riveted steel bridges is crucial to assess the structural state of old metals to guaranty structural safety. Metals under long-time operations (mild, rimmed low carbon steels <0.1% C, puddle irons) and cyclic loading present a tendency for degradation processes. The case-studies of this work are five metallic bridges existing in Portugal (Luiz I, Eiffel, Fao, Pinhao and Trezoi). This work presents the study of some characteristics of materials extracted from the five casestudies, such as: monotonic tensile strength, chemical composition, microstructures, hardness, notch toughness and fatigue crack propagation. In terms of monotonic tensile tests, the materials from Luiz I, Eiffel and Fao bridges are similar to puddle steel and the materials from Pinhao and Trezoi bridges are similar to mild steel. In terms of toughness only the material from the Pinhao bridge exhibits acceptable toughness properties, considering current design requirements. The materials from the other bridges exhibit relatively low toughness properties. The fatigue crack propagation data from the old Portuguese riveted steel bridges were correlated using the Paris's law and the possibility for a design crack growth rate was discussed


The Titanic sank on its maiden voyage in 1912. And an analysis of the materials of the period do not give me confidence in the materials, or standards.


Faulty Rivets Emerge as Clues To Titanic Disaster


Both findings were made under the auspices of the marine society forensics panel. Dr. Foecke, of the National Institute of Standards and Technology, a panel expert investigating the makeup of Titanic's hull steel, became intrigued by the new findings and obtained two hull rivets, cutting them apart with a diamond saw. He was surprised when his inquiry disclosed 9.3 percent slag in one rivet and similar levels in the other. By contrast, modern wrought iron has a slag content of 2 percent or 3 percent.


What was acceptable in the Titanic's day? Rummaging through old books, Dr. Foecke found a 1906 entry for ''medium quality'' wrought iron. He analyzed a picture of the material and found that its slag content was from 2 percent to 2.5 percent, much lower than the Titanic rivets. But he said in an interview that ''as far as I can tell, there was no standard of the time'' for the amount of slag in wrought iron.


Complicating the picture, Dr. Foecke found that the slag of the Titanic rivets was very coarsely distributed, creating lines of weakness. Most surprising, its grain changed abruptly just before the area where the ends popped off, turning perpendicular to the axis grain and suggesting an area of major weakness. The grain might have been turned to the side, he said, when rivet ends were hammered too hard.


Dr. Foecke said that the examined rivets, though flawed by today's standards and suspicious by virtue of old evidence, had conceivably been ''state of the art back then.''
 
i been reloading my swiss k11 308 with under charge loads with fast powder as wc 844 made more for 5.56 haven't had any issues yets and i double check the cases always for powder height;) i think the k11 can handle at least 42 to 44,000 psi pressure

Just don't exceed the pressure limits of the original rifles. Then monitor the locking lugs for set back and cracks.
 
This is one of those I should prob keep my mouth shut, but the old 8mm is one of the few rifles I would never own and if someone gave it to me, barring other considerations, I would trade or sell it down the road as fast as I could get to my LGS.

What size bore is it?
How good is the steel?
Is this a collectible version?

OMGoodness, I just don’t have time for all that.

Ok, I’ll shut up now. Feel free to tell me to mind my own business.

Greg
 
Pre-1905 8x57 is different to post-1905. As noted up-thread, we have safe options in handloading and new production ammo. My understanding is the Germans loaded their 198gr FMJ's to run ~2500fps which is much easier to get along with than the 3000+fps the Turks issued.

The GEW1888, from what I understand, is not the rifle a K98k is.
 
There are three different 8x57 German military cartridges used for general issue. The first used a .318 roundnosed 226 gr bullet @ 2100 fps and about 40k psi (SAAMI recommends only 35000 psi and 37500 Cup for these btw), the second was used through WWI which was the 1905 spitzer flat based bullet of about .323 spitzer 154 gr.bullet @ 2880 fps. The WWII issued 8x57 was used in light machine guns as well as k98 rifles with the spitzer 197.5 or thereabouts gr. boat tailed bullet @ 2500-2600 fps fps.

http://www.omegacrossroads.com/GunCabinet/8X57/8mmMauser.htm

Older THR thread about ballistics of 8x57 Mauser https://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/8mm-mauser-ballistics.227273/

Be careful about applying Euro pressure stds. by CIP (Euro counterpart to SAAMI) to surplus rifles in the US as European firearms generally require proof testing, and in some cases require re-proofing firearms that are sold to another or substantially altered--new chambering, etc.

The GEW 88 Commission rifle has a Mannlicher style split bridge at the rear and the subsequent thumbcut in the 05 alterations did not do receiver strength any favors. It does have front locking lugs on the removable bolt head. The original issue of this rifle using the .318 bore is one of the reasons that pressure levels are set low by SAAMI for this cartridge as many were imported in the States and I believe that German sporters used the .318 bore size a bit longer than the German military did from what I have read. Unless the barrel is stamped S for spitzer for a .323 bore adopted by the German military in 1905, then it has a J (I) bore of .318. A lot of markings have been scrubbed or are unmarked from sporter conversions so slug the bore if you get one.

Re: 8x57 use in m98 Mausers types.
Obviously the later m98 model WWII rifles were generally built with modern metallurgy which allowed them a bit more leeway pressure-wise but the earlier GEW 98's are generally acknowledged as a bit more variable in their construction with a fair amount of soft receivers. Late WWI era GEW 98's demonstrate more variability in materials and workmanship as wartime production quality slipped--starvation, cold, wartime news, labor issues, and deprivation seems to have affected worker motivations and material shortages were everywhere.

Similarly, late war k98's (1944-45) vary a lot in production quality and there are persistent rumors about slave workers and forced labor motivation and sabotage problems in some plants. Use of such slave and forced labor practices in producing k98's is murky except for surviving documentation of certain factories, such as Steyr and Gustoff Werke definitely using it. But overall from surviving reports, we do know that slave labor use began slowly in 1942 but rapidly increased to making more and more of Germany's war time production by 1944-45.

Germany's manpower was being shoveled into the Army due to casualties on the Russian Front and elsewhere and able bodied males were scarce. Also, bombings and material/tooling shortages resulted in a rougher and rougher product and shortcuts were made in quality control to simply have firearms to shoot. Of the wartime makes, Oberndorf and Brno seem to have kept quality standards a bit more and were in relatively safe areas not affected by Allied bombing (latewar codes byf and dot). Have no information about slave labor use by those manufacturers.
 
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