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9,3x74R "Goering" caliber on pre-1912 gun? Damn, you're all from the Moon!
9,3x74R on pre-1912 drilling? - I don't believe my ears!
What's wrong with you today? Did you eat too much fresh tomatos early in the morning?

Geno,
Not refering to the gun,the caliber !
It wasn't the "Goering caliber" in pre 1912,it,9.3X74R, was still around in the 1930 and 40's when he used in the Luftwaffe drilling and his hunting rifles too !!!
http://www.amoskeagauction.com/64/78.html

where did you find those tomatos ?

Montenegrin,

Here's my DR with pre-1912 proofs and the bores proofed at 118/35:

http://www.rbsiii.com/collection/rifles/muzzelverschluss_93/muzzelverschluss_93.htm

Curl

Curl,
Yours is a beautiful DR, a perfect unity of function and form, as a matter of fact one of the nicest Continental rifles I've seen; my sincere congratulations.
9.3x74R came out in the early 1900s so rifles chambered for it were not realy rare in pre-WWI Europe, but they were quite uncommon compared to 9.3x72R (which was to the Cenral European hunter roughly the same as .30-30W in the US, as far as popularity was concerned).
With kind regards,
Jani

Jani,

Thank you very much for your kind comments.

Curl

This is from the German Gun Collectors web site article by Steve Meyer:

Rifle Gauge Table

A brief table that is pretty helpful for pre-WWI German rifles shows the use of fractional 'gauge' numbers for barrel diameters. This was largest plug gauge diameter that would fit in the bore. The British proof law of 1868 had set up standard gauge sizes from .300" (172.28 gauge) to .450" (51.05 gauge) in .010" increments in the same sense that a shotgun bore is gauged, by the number of round lead balls of that diameter that make a pound. The Germans adopted this somewhat awkward system as well.

Gauge - inch
51.05 - .450
54.61 - .440
58.50 - .430
62.78 - .420
67.49 - .410
72.68 - .400
78.41 - .390
84.77 - .380
91.83 - .370
99.70 - .360
108.49 - .350 common on 9,3mms
118.35 - .340 common on 9,3mms
129.43 - .330
141.95 - .320
156.14 - .310
172.28 - .300 very common on 8mms

These are most frequently seen with a / instead of the decimal point, as in 172/28 or 84/77

CptCurl:

What's the steel type stamp on the top of the tubes near the breech?

Kind Regards,

Raimey
rse

Raimey,

The stamp is "Prima Krupp Stahl".

Curl

I have two 9.3 guns, one a cape gun and the other a stalking rifle. You can get bullets from Buffalo Bullets, Hawk Bullets and Huntington with no problem. The Buffalo bullets seem to match the current 193 gr copper jacketed ones, Hawk sells a 200 grain soft copper jacketed one my cape gun loves. Huntingtons sells a 200 grain lead bullet that is very good. Steve Meyer I think has posted the most important fact. Your gun is on the small side as far as bore goes. Slug the barrel as well as chamber cast. I failed to slug the bore on my stalking rifle and was putting .366 bullets down a .348 bore. Accuracy was not good and I almost lost some teeth from recoil. Huntingtons sells .348 bullets that should work well. They also sell brass as does Buffalo bullets. S&B sells loaded ammo but it is expensive and is really for the .365/.366 bore guns. I'm a member of the GGCA and had Steve's article. It was excellent but I should have read it before I fired. This is a nice cartridge for deer out to about 100-150l yard, low recoil and can be very accurate.
Frank

After slugging the bore, most "little" 9.3's do very well on a diet of 35 caliber rifle bullets or 38 pistol bullets. Huntington's has Norma 9.3x72R brass, too. I find the 200 grain Hornady XTP bullets do very well indeed in the old Forester's Patrone.

c.