I'm looking at a Chilean 1895 Mauser produced by Loewe and converted to .308 nato somewhere along the line.


My question is...is it safe for modern .308Win ammo?


I've learned that, almost without any doubts, that the Spanish 1893 (small ring) Mausers were converted to a carbine 7.62 NATO and have been tested by
Samco to withstand WELL almost double+ the pressures for modern .308 Win before blowing apart, but I can find nothing about the 1895 Chilean
Mausers that were converted to nato .308.....anyone have any info????

Not safe for much shooting. For unknown reasons, instead of rebarreling or reboring and rechambering the conversions had a chamber soldered in after reboring.



See http://www.rebooty.com/~dutchman/1895Chile.html for information about this botch job. Too
bad, as with a proper conversion it'd be safe for the NATO spec ammo at least, as with the Spanish Mausers.


As it is it's not really safe for much shooting with the 7.62 NATO ammo and definitely not safe for .308 commercial loads. Once it eats through the solder
enough it'll come apart. Also, in my experience, .308 is the worst ammo for Bubba generated reloads that are grossly overpressure. Guaranteed to blow
this sucker up.

Another problem with these antiques is that if you puncture a primer, you will get a faceful of high pressure gas.


I always flinch when I see somebody shooting anything in the way of antique Mausers but a '98 Mauser.