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Hot Topic (More than 10 Replies) .30-06 Rimmed (Read 21329 times)
waterman
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.30-06 Rimmed
Dec 11th, 2005 at 3:19pm
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The Hammerli website has a photo of some rifles on a rack with a sign that says IIRC "in transit to US government".  Supposedly these rifles went to a US team competing in the International Matches in Europe 1925-1930.   

A friend just bought a Hammerli match rifle with a 3-digit serial number, a very long barrel (28 to 30 inches). bore .300, groove .310 and chambered for what appears to be a rimmed .30-06 case.  A dummy .30-06 cartridge chambers perfectly but does not eject. A chamber cast says it is a .30-06.  From the photo, this looks to be one of the Hammerlis on the rack.  The rifle has scope blocks and target front and rear sights.  The rear sight slide has several scribe marks that appear to be settings for specific loads.

In Hatcher's Notebook, Julian Hatcher includes a photo of himself as team captain and a table of loads used in the various competitions, but he never says exactly what rifles were used.  Flayderman's Guide refers to International Match Springfields.   

Can anyone shed any light on the rifle or the matches?  Might this rifle, if purchased by the US gov't, be considered a secondary martial arm?  There is no "US property" stamp.

An envious Waterman
  
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Dale53
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Re: .30-06 Rimmed
Reply #1 - Dec 11th, 2005 at 4:20pm
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Hammerli built centerfire single shot rifles for many years for Olympic position shooting. Look in your old issues of Gun Digest. There should be pictures and specifications for these rifles. I lusted after them but at that time, I was in no financial position to buy. I have not kept current with centerfire Olympic shooting (if there is still any going on) but at the time the cartridge normally used was the army cartridge of the country of origin. In Hammerli's case, that was the  7.5 Swiss (kind of a "tight" .30 caliber).

At that time, there were no local center fire matches for position shooting (prone, kneeling, and standing) around here. I am speaking of 300 meter matches.

I came close a couple of times to having a bolt action rifle built up just for this purpose (since I could not afford a Hammerli Single Shot), but without local matches as an incentive it never happened.

Interesting Note:
The Swiss hold a Federal Schutzenfest every five years. The last match attracted over 72.000 competitors which is one percent of the population. By comparison, if the same percentage showed up at Camp Perry 2.500.000 America citizens would shoot.

Dale53
  
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FITZ
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Re: .30-06 Rimmed
Reply #2 - Dec 11th, 2005 at 8:11pm
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Waterman, the Hammerli Team rifles as used by the U.S. 1930 team were chambered for the 30-06 Match ammo of the time. They were rimless and incorporated a extractor that would pop over or around the case and snap into the extractor groove and were quite reliable. I have owned two. Still have one and will look closer at the extractor for you. These Rifles were ordered from Hammerli after the Springfield Armory gave up on trying to make the 03 Springfield rifles shoot as well. The hammerli has a short fall very fast striker and fantastic multi lever set trigger system. If your freinds Hammerli is one of the originalTeam rifles it will be in the serial # range 450 to into the 500"s. By the way the numbers on the butthook assembly are not the serial numbers. The real serial numbers are marked in two places. Under the forend on the face of the reciever, and also by Springfield on the face of the barrel at the breech in very small neat etching. It is reported that Springfield ordered 25 complete rifles from Hammerli and 25 spare actions. Have seen the numbers reported up to 25 rifles and 50 actions. In most cases the butthook and the butthook base plate numbers do not match as the rifle had two different hooks. A prone and kneeling hook and a offhand hook and they were all interchangable and the team members were not fussy about keeping them in order. The complete rifles recieved would not shoot our ammo worth a damm and it wasa dicovered that the barrels had Swiss bore and grove diameters. This gave a groove diameter of .311. So Springfield rebarrelled them using existing pressure proof barrels selected for their very uniform bore and groove diameters all the way thru and found they achieved even finer accuracy than with the star gauged match barrels of the
time. Well, enough for now. Gongradulate your buddy on a tremendous find. Regards, FITZ.
  

FITZ
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waterman
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Re: .30-06 Rimmed
Reply #3 - Dec 31st, 2005 at 12:26am
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The rifle is indeed a regular .30-06.  Just a gunky extractor or something.  Rifle is in SN range of US team rifles, with SN on barrel & tiny markings as described by FITZ.  But barrel has Swiss proofmarks.  Is there any written source of info? Were Springfield barrels sent to Hammerli?  Also, WOW does it shoot!

Salivating & scheming,
Waterman
  
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FITZ
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Re: .30-06 Rimmed
Reply #4 - Dec 31st, 2005 at 8:57pm
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Waterman, OK here is the sound of the second shoe dropping.
There is no record of Springfield ever sending any barrels to Hammerli. So, if it has Swiss proof marks it is most likely a Swiss Barrel. The folks at Springfield by the way never really got over recieving barrels with wrong bore and groove dimensions only two weeks before the team was to embark on boat for Europe. But there may be another explanation. After the U.S. Teams success in the 1930 International matches there was a hue and cry for these Rifles. The NRA in response made arrangements with Hammerli to take and forward orders for team rifles that were to be identical to the U.S. rifles. There were no mistakes on these as to Bore and Groove dimensions and some small number were imported. The cost by the way in 1931 and on was $300 to $400 no small sum at that time. The real test would be in my mind do the Buttplate Base and Butthook numbers on the left side match? If they do it is most likely this was one of the Rifles from the NRA. The actual Team Rifles got all their accessories all mixed up. In thirty years I have only managed to reunite one butthook to its original Rifle. It was a Prone hook I bought loose and a freind and I were comparing numbers and realised he had a team rifle with the same numbers on the base. End result I traded it to him. He has a large collection of them as he has been pursuing them for nearly 45 years and bought every one that ever passed his way. So anyhow congradulations once again on a nice find. By the way both of mine have been terrific shooters also. Regards, FITZ.
  

FITZ
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FITZ
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Re: .30-06 Rimmed
Reply #5 - Dec 31st, 2005 at 9:15pm
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Waterman,P.S. In Lt.  Col. William S. Brophy's Book
"The Springfield 1903 Rifles" Starting on page 127 to page 129 there is a brief description of these Rifles. It is somewhat
suspect as Brophy was a true 1903 Springfield enthusiast. And I feel his opinion was biased. The number of rifles built is questionable as in different publications the quantity has been described as  10 Rifles, 25 Rifles with 15 Spare actions, and 50 Rifles with 15 spare actions. If you find a copy of Brophys book and read further on you will find a number of examples of International target rifles using the 1903 action but fitted up with stocks and butthook assemblys that are obviously Hammerli in origin or copied from. The Springfield Armory went to great lengths to make the 1903 shoot as good as the Hammerli but they just could not equal the fine set trigger system or the Martini lock time. By the way a few years ago we contacted Hammerli to try and get some documentation. The response we got was. " We congradulate you on your purchase of one of our Rifles. Unfortunately we have no records from that time so cannot help you in that area." A little digging turned up the information that at that time the Swiss had their own law that forbid the keeping of Firearms records and the purchasers. FITZ.
  

FITZ
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Hey Joe
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Re: .30-06 Rimmed
Reply #6 - Jul 14th, 2006 at 1:01pm
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My good friend Moodyholler told me of this thread, knowing that I'm always looking for info on Martini Springfields.  Now have a chance to chat with someone who has had two of them.  Mine came from my Grandfather who was lucky to have a Govt Job in the '30s and lived in Wash DC where the DCM had a store.  I'm lucky that my older brother is left handed so I got the rifle with the big cheek piece.  Unfortunately it war reblued back when it was just an old gun, but as waterman says it sure will shoot. 
I never knew where the serial number was, so many thanks.  Mine is a couple of numbers lower than the 450 in Fitz' description.  I also note Springfield Research Service lists serial numbers from 418 - 473 and shows mine being targeted at Springfield on 9 Apr 1929.  Another source of info is Capt E.C. Crossman's 1932 "Book of the Springfield" chapter 4.
Any more information would be more than welcome.
  
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DoubleD
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Re: .30-06 Rimmed
Reply #7 - Jul 15th, 2006 at 9:56am
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Gent's,

How about some pictures of these rarest of rare Martini's...they are Martini's are they  not?
  

Douglas, Ret.
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Hey Joe
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Re: .30-06 Rimmed
Reply #8 - Jul 15th, 2006 at 7:21pm
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And fine Martinis they are too.  Hope the attach shows a rifle and not a grandkid.
  
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DoubleD
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Re: .30-06 Rimmed
Reply #9 - Jul 16th, 2006 at 12:36pm
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I was ready to oooh and aaaw...but no picture!
  

Douglas, Ret.
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Hey Joe
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Re: .30-06 Rimmed
Reply #10 - Jul 17th, 2006 at 10:04pm
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I tried to put in a picture.  A clash of culture between enjoying old single shots and doing stuff with a PC.  I even read the directions in the "help"; to no avail;  I got a young person to try to add a picture and that didn't work either.  I just went to the range instead.
If there is someone who can tell me how to add a picture, in words an officer can understand . . .
  
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DoubleD
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Re: .30-06 Rimmed
Reply #11 - Jul 18th, 2006 at 12:35am
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Officers don't do nothin', not at least in the Corps, when I was in.  They tell the Gunny to do it.  The Gunny gets some Lance Corporal to do it. 

Send me the picture full size right straight out of your camera and I will format it and put it up.  here is my email  (You need to Login or Register to view media files and links)

DD former Sergeant USMC, but was a Lance Corporal first.
  

Douglas, Ret.
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Drew458
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Re: .30-06 Rimmed
Reply #12 - Jul 18th, 2006 at 2:00pm
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Attaching a picture - when you're making a reply, the area on the Reply screen right below the region where you type in your Message is called Attach. You hit the browse button there and search your PC for the picture you want. On a Windows PC that job gets done by another window popping up when you click the Browse button here. Select your picture by highlighting it with a single mouse click, then click the Open button on the window that Windows opened. That puts the name and address of your pic into the little text box back here in the Attach area. Then it should get uploaded when you do a Post. 

Let's see if it works ...
  
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Drew458
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Re: .30-06 Rimmed
Reply #13 - Jul 18th, 2006 at 2:06pm
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The confusing part may be this: In the Add YaBBC Tags area, the 3rd button over on the top row is Insert Image. This isn't what you want. Insert Image is html code that will put in a picture that is already up on the Internet somewhere. It's just like a hyperlink, only its for pictures. 

Ok, give it a try so we can all see those Martinis!  Smiley
  
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DoubleD
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Re: .30-06 Rimmed
Reply #14 - Jul 18th, 2006 at 2:31pm
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(You need to Login or Register to view media files and links)
(You need to Login or Register to view media files and links)
(You need to Login or Register to view media files and links)

Hey Joe, sorry to see the lever got all mushed in the car wreck, hope you are okay!





  

Douglas, Ret.
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