Yesterday's Weapons Forums

I am curious about the conversion process of these rifles.
I gather that they originally fired a .323 diam long. heavy? bullet- that 'rode' the rifling? How did this work?
Will a longer heavier .323 work in the 8x56?
Was the bullet in anyway special to fill in the grooves ?
Were they originally .330 barrels or did they 'freshen" the rifling to .330 from.323 during the rechambering ?
I understand a theory was that they could fire the old 8x50 in the 8x56 in a pinch? Has anyone tried this?
Thanks

Yes, that 244 gr bullet was of special design. It had a hollow base( think Minie ball) that was supposed to allow obduration of the bullet to fill the bore.. My M95 long rifle in 8x50 will give 2" groups at 100 yds. if I do my part using commercial 170 gr .323" bullets. I even killed a deer with it.I've never tried any heavier ones.-TR

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The groove diameter in the M95S varies considerably. I have one that has a 0.326" groove diameter. I bet it would shoot fairly well with 0.323 bullets. There is a lot of printed misinformation about the factory bullet diameters. Some say 0.323 others say .329. I have miked German, Austrian and Hungarian bullets for the 8x56R and all measured 0.329-0.330". I wish I could borrow about 10 8x50s to slug the bores.

But that does not answer your question. I don't trust the literature concerning these as some authors know how to write, but not measure and some writers copy---err quote the misinformation and perpetuate it.

An example is this very rifle. The American rifleman the source of sources published a set of drawings of barrel threads of different rifles 1962 pp 27-30. One almost properly contoured drawing says "Steyr-Mannlicher Model 1895 straight pull rifle". The O.D. on the threads says 1.020 inches when it should be 1.060 inches. The length of the threaded part diagramed as .693 when it should be about .780 inch. The thread was listed 14 threads per inch. All I measured (5) were 12 threads per inch. Unless they rethreaded 8x50s to this ( I don't think so) it can cause problems. They did not specify which M95 so????? I know someone mixed the captions most likely, maybe.???

That is why I would like to actually measure some and give a definitive published answer. Although there are plenty of experienced people on the case, I will continue to look.

Rem1875,

Look back at the older posts under reloading and ammo.

Gary G. did an extensive explanation of the 8x50 cartridge, its bullet diameter and bore diameter of the 8x50 rifle.