6.5x303

[awp101]

Guy offered an interesting rifle today, Martini Henry rebarreled to 6.5x303. Never heard of it, priced at the top end of what I was looking to part with today (ESPECIALLY not knowing anything about the round). Guy offered it for $550 including the dies and whatever .303 brass he had lying around the table.

Sounds interesting but I can't find anything at all about it. Being a sucker for the Martini-Henry and Martini Cadets didn't make it easy though...

Any thoughts or experience from anyone here?

[JReed]

Now that would be cool. There are a ton of wildcats that were based on the .303. The problem these days is finding dies and load info for them.

[mescalero1]

A lot of .303 wildcats were made by the english & the aussies.
That one I believe is an Edward Epps wildcat, one of the better ones

[mescalero1]

Cartridges of the world 7th edition has 25/303 load data.
And I made a mistake, that is Ellwood Epps of Canada

[6pt-sika]

I am a sucker for most any 6.5mm in a rifle I like

Local gunsmith has a 98 Mauser in his shop for sale thats been restocked and rebarrled to 6.5-06 . If it had a classic stock instead of the Monte Carlo he saw fit to put on it I most likely would have brought it home by now

[awp101]

Cartridges of the world 7th edition has 25/303 load data.
And I made a mistake, that is Ellwood Epps of Canada

Neither the 25/303 or 6.5-303 is in the 11th Ed and I looked through my combo volume of Wildcat Cartridges and didn't find anything BUT I was looking for 6.5x303 instead of 25/303 so I'll see if anything shows up looking for that!

I didn't get the sellers contact info but I'm hoping he's at the show next month.

[6pt-sika]

I didn't get the sellers contact info but I'm hoping he's at the show next month.

I've left a show without the guys info before and later the following week called the folks that put the show on and was able to get what I needed .

[junkbug]

I have never heard of this conversion/wildcat, but I am no authority. I do have an M-95 Dutch Mannlicher carbine in 6.5x53r Dutch. I make brass for it by setting the shoulder on .303 British back with a 7.62x54r Russian die, and then neck-sizing the brass with a 6.5x55 Swedish die. It is similar in power to the 6.5mm Carcano, and like the Carcano, the Dutch Mannlicher needs its own special clips. I like this little carbine.

Your Martini Henry may very well have been rebarrel with a surplus Dutch barrel, which is available at Numrich. At least you wont need the clips.

This round has just slightly greater case capacity than a 6.5mm Carcano, and was designed for a very similar rifle. Many people just use the 6.5 Carcano reloading data, and call it good. There is a little loading data for the 6.5mm Dutch at the bottom of this page.
http://yesterdaysweapons.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=270


However, I am not certain that the 6.5mm Dutch, and the 6.5x303 wildcat are one in the same.

By the way, the 6.5mm Dutch was also known as the 6.5mm Romanian. It was also chambered in civilian Mannlicher sporting rifles during the turn of the last century, and was especially popular amoung the British. They refered to it as the .256 Mannlicher (.256" was the bore diameter). Here is a link on the 256 Mannlicher.
http://www.rathcoombe.net/sci-tech/ball ... icher.html
http://www.loaddata.com/members/search_ ... licID=1078

Guess you have to sign on to the load data site and pay the yearly fee to get the powder charges.

Hope this helps.

Sean

[6pt-sika]

I have never heard of this conversion/wildcat, but I am no authority.

I made a thread on a New Zealand forum after reading this and got a fairly quick response from some down there !

I was told that there were quite a few "wildcats" made on the 303 Brit case .

This gentleman mentioned the 22-303 , 6mm -303 , 25-303 , 270-303 , 6.5mm-303 , 35-303 .

He also said quite a few of these had factory loaded ammunition for them as well !

But in this mans words the 6.5-303 was within about 200 FPS of the 6.5x55 . So I think you could call it a light 260 REM .

Still be kinda neat to have one on a SMLE

[6pt-sika]

About 4 months ago I gave a guy at work the only SMLE I have ever owned !

It was one of the ones that was made by Savage back in WWII . That would have been perfect for conversion to 6.5mm-303

[awp101]

6pt, I asked my friend Mr Google last night using different variations of 6.5-303 instead of 6.5x303 and found some intersting things. I don't know if 6.5-303 is the same as .25-303 but I bet it's very similar. One thing I did note was that some of the loading were noted as not safe for certain Marks of SMLE rifles, usually the early ones. The 2 I have are MkI No3s IIRC so I doubt I'd convert one of those.

Also the show was a fairly large one and I didn't get the seller row or table info either.

[6pt-sika]

A lot of .303 wildcats were made by the english & the aussies.
That one I believe is an Edward Epps wildcat, one of the better ones

I was looking in a 2003 "Huntington" catalog and they show that RCBS will make special order dies for the "6.5mm-303 Epps" !

[Kansas Ed]

The Ackley books show a photo of the 6.5/303 Epps cartridge, give a little writeup, but no data. Ellwood Epps from Ontario did do a version, and according to Ackley it has about the same case capacity as the 256 Newton. They say it compares to the Newton very similarly.

Ed

[dbateman]

the 303/25 is a fine cartridge it is eqivelint to a 257 roberts and a grate cartridge dies are still availble and factory ammo is
still avalible in 87qr hollow points have shot alot of pigs donkies scrub cattel its a grate cartridge if you are looking for
some thing in that power range oh its a good long range round to