Hi, new member requesting help

[chuck0990]

Thanks for the extra info, I'll see what I come up with and post soon. Thanks again.

[chuck0990]

I made a plug out of a pencil and closed the bolt on it. It measured 55 mm. A 6.5x55 cartridge wont go in all the way so I marked the cartridge at the edge of the chamber and it looks like the same measurement as the6.5x54 M-S. Is it possible to be any other than this cartridge?

[chuck0990]

I noticed the ball on the bolt handle seems to be a bit bigger tham most rifles I see.

[chuck0990]

Bottom of extractor

[chuck0990]

Bottom of the bolt. You can also see the engraved 8762 here on the bolt handle.

[chuck0990]

Side of bolt.

[butlersrangers]

NB'chuck': Your bolt is a standard Model 1894 Norwegian Krag bolt. Its original #??.685 is a mismatch for rifle #38,762. Someone, probably the 'Smith' who did the re-chambering, 'pencil-scribed' the #8/762 to show that the bolt was fitted to altered rifle #38,762.

If your barrel was 'set-back' (shortened at the breech) and re-chambered for 6.5X54 M-S, the 6.5X55mm Swede cartridge would be too 'fat' and too 'long' to fully enter the chamber.

[butlersrangers]

A couple of thoughts:

The Italian Carcano rifle is a variation of the Mannlicher 'turn-bolt' action, but, its cartridge has always been referred to as the 6.5mm Carcano, in North America. The cartridge was little known until rifles and surplus Italian military ammo appeared on the surplus market in the 1950s and 1960s. Until Norma offered loadings, hunting ammo was made by 'pulling' military bullets and replacing with commercial bullets. (Prior to sizeable numbers of surplus rifles getting to North America, after WW2, the cartridge was made just in Italy and military).

By contrast, the 6.5mm M-S cartridge and Mannicher-Schoenauer sporting carbine was used by 'published' hunters all over the World. Ammo and sporting rifles were imported to North America as early as 1903. The cartridge was always a bit exotic, but, it was loaded by American and Canadian manufacturers prior to WW2. (British gunmakers built sporting rifles, after WW1, using surplus 'Dutch Mannlichers', which utilized a rimmed version of the 6.5 M-S cartridge). In 1955, "6.5mm Mann." likely meant the M-S cartridge and its illustrious 'hunting' reputation.

[Dick Hosmer]

Neither of the cartridges in question is in any way rare, or expensive, or hard to come by. Why not just obtain an example of each and try them, instead of a pencil?

FWIW, my money is on the 6.5x54 MS, for the exact reason(s) Chuck laid out so clearly.

Just a thought.

[chuck0990]

Hi all, I just verified today my Krag is indeed a 6.5 x 54 M-S. I'm wondering what the max. pressure this rifle would handle. I also picked up a box of Norma 77 gr. while I was at the gunsmith's shop, how would these perform in this rifle? During my searching, I came across a collector who has a 6.5x55 (Swede) and a 30-40 Krag, he says they're both shootable, except the 30-40 is missing the butt plate, both are sporterized and he wants $200 for the pair with a box of 6.5x55. Sounds like a pretty decent deal to me, any thoughts?