New to me DWM 416 Taylor :)

New to me Mauser DWM 1908 Brazilian action in 416 Taylor. Blackburn bottom metal, three leaf express rear sight. Soldered barrel sling stud, 3 position model 70 style safety, tally bases and rings. Stock is American black walnut with nice grain and straight through the wrist, Ebony fore end tip, rear Tally style sling stud, 2 screw fisher grip cap, shadowline cheekpiece, cross bolt recoil lug, fine wrap around checkering still feels new, and leather recoil pad. Rifle is in excellent condition and was completely built by the late Lew Bates of BC Canada.
I have dies, IMR 3031 and 4064 powder, 350gr Speer HotCor and 400gr Woodleigh’s, 37 proper headstamped brass, 30 fireformed random stuff and 40 more proper brass being imported from the States and actually found an additional 40 Bertram proper brass for it as well up here in communist Canada. Really looking forward to this one. Any suggestions on powders and loads are appreciated. Anyone else with a Lew Bates build?
Cheers

Looking forward to a range report

Nice!

Wow! What a beautiful gun, congratulations!! Looking forward to seeing how well it shoots!!

Beautiful gun you have there. What's on the menu trophy wise with this rifle?

Very nice, congrats!

Mark458 said:

Beautiful gun you have there. What's on the menu trophy wise with this rifle?

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Buffalo…but in the mean time I’ll be using it for bears up here.

Congratulations on a beauty! Varget works really well in mine. See if you can get your hands on Woodleigh's reloading manual. It has a fair amount of data. Raven Rock had them last I checked. Good luck!

That's a very nicely customized M98 into very usable 400gr/2350fps ballistics for Africa.
I wish you both good hunting!

Slickshooter:

Nice looking rifle.

I had a .416 Taylor made for me back in 1987. I'll look in my reloading file and DM you with some of the loading information.

Tsibindi

Congratulations on this fine acquisition! Woukd lovw the range report. Please post in the future.

TSIBINDI said:

Slickshooter:

Nice looking rifle.

I had a .416 Taylor made for me back in 1987. I'll look in my reloading file and DM you with some of the loading information.

Tsibindi

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Thanks man

Part of my brass order has arrived

What are you loading in them for buffalo?

I have 400gr Woodleigh rn softs, 450gr Woodleigh rn, 340gr Woodleigh pp, 350gr banded solids and some hdy 400 gr solids to try. I hope the 400gr Woodleighs and 350gr solids will shoot poi wise reasonably close for buffalo but we’ll see. I’m not holding my breath but I may be able to scrounge up some 400gr Woodleigh solids. But yeah, the 400 grainers for buffalo

Sounds like a good plan. I'm having some 450 gr Woodleighs loaded for my 416 Rigby and my 404 J. Looking forward to seeing how they shoot.

Excellent, let me know the results on the 450s with the Rigby as I also have one that I want to load up the 450s in.

Will do. Let us know the results of the big variety you have.

I have had a 416 Taylor pretty much since 1998, but for the brief time it took between selling the right handed rifle I first bought to try to cartridge in and getting my left handed custom rifle built.
I am afraid I cannot tell you much about the Improved version, as I have never looked into it.
Most Ackley improved versions will fireform brass by running the original case through the improved chamber. Not sure if your version is also an Ackley.
And I am not sure what the improved version provides for as an increase in case capacity and performance.

A-Square and Quality Cartridge both made/make 416 Taylor brass.
I am using Quality Cartridge brass in my current rifle. My load that I am using at the moment is 69.0 gr of Re-15 with 350 gr Barnes TSX bullets and F215 primers and is giving 1/2" groups at 100 yards. Sorry, have not chronied it in my rifle w/ 22" barrel yet. It is a mid range loading, and definitely below max. Recoil is also moderate for this cartridge. Hope to try a load with the 350 gr Speer Mag Tip bullets next for bison.

I used necked down 458 Win brass in my first rifle, as that is what came with it when I got it. My best load in that rifle was with the older 325 gr X bullets and W748. Sorry cannot recall exact load, but my paperwork shows loads were up to 80 grains w/ WLRM primers. The 350 gr X bullets and Speer Mag Tips were also pretty accurate, but not the 3 shot clover leafs that the 325 gr load gave. Max loads were supposed to provide approx. 2500 fps with 350 gr bullets.

Not sure that any of this helped.
I do know that it is possible to duplicate specs of 416 Rigby and Remington with the regular 416 Taylor and 400 gr bullets at approx. 2400 fps and over 5000 ft-lbs of energy.