short action long enough for .257 R?

[Argonaut]

Well I can't believe I don't know this, but is the short action  Remington 700 long enough for this cartridge?  I am thinking it is because of the 6mm Rem being based on 7 mm mauser as is the .257 roberts.  I have one .257 but it is heavy and I just need something lighter. I have a short action 700 rem that is a good candidate for a barrel swap.  nothing wrong with the current one (a .243) I  just like the .257 roberts.

[Sweetwater]

I'm sure you do know it, it just hasn't come to you.

The short answer is yes. Absolutely.

The 700 action replaced the 721 and 722. The 721 being the long action and 722 being the short action. The 700 is so close to the 722 that when the airlines lost the bolt to my Dad's 722, the Gunsmith fitted a bolt from a short action 700. Remington chose the 722 to chamber the 257Roberts. Folks claimed the bullets took up too much powder space and chose long actions to chamber their custom rifles in 257Roberts. Jack O'Conner, among others, found no fault with the 722 chambered for the 257Roberts. I personally have two of them, one from the late 40's and one from the early 50's. They are both tight, shoot like hot cakes, and perform admirably with bullets over 75grns and thrive on 117's and 120's. (Barnes 125's are a stretch and hard to find, so won't be discussed here.) Powder space has never been a problem. Mr O'Conner had a pet load claiming 3000fps for a 117gr bullet and IMR4350 powder. Dad adopted that for his 257Roberts in the late 50's and has never looked back. The powders we have today make that load performance easy to duplicate, and we came close to the magic 3000fps, but never hit it with 117's. 100's roll over 3100fps. Our rifles have been trimmed to 21.5 inches. Not sure why other than Dad and Gramp didn't care much for the 24in barrels.

Take a deep breath and do it.

Regards,
Sweetwater

[scratcherky]

IMHO, a long action is better for the 257R. It will allow you to get optimum performance out of this round. This is especially true if you are a handloader.

[Graybeard]

The one I had didn't work. Strangely a round at SAAMI standard length actually would not fit into the magazine on it. Dunno why perhaps it came from the factory with some manufacturing defect but when I tried loading rounds into it the darn things wouldn't fit. I had picked it up used and traded it off to the gun shop I deal most with and let someone else worry with it besides me.

But the answer is yes generally they will work OK but you do need to deep seat heavier bullets to make them fit the short magazine box on short action rifles. Doesn't really hurt anything performance wise.

[Argonaut]

I dug up the one factory loaded .257 cartridge I have and it fit in the magazine. It certainly maximizes use of available space doesn't it!  I do have another .257 but it is a ruger number one. now you would think I could seat bullets way out there with that but the start of the rifling lead doesn't allow more that  .02 over factory length before your engraving rifling on the bullets.  At least with the bullets I load which are 100 grain hornady interlocks.  So the short action of the Remington would not really be the handicap one would think.  And I would not have to worry about ammo for one gun not fitting in the other.

[dpe.ahoy]

In rebarreled a short action savage (243) with an Adams & Bennett barrel from Midway and it has worked perfect for 6 years.  Unless you are using a powder that is way up in the neck, seating the bullet a little deeper isn't going to make any difference.  And if you're trying to put that much IMR 4350 in the case, you will be over the pressure for any cartridge factory loaded today.  DP

[Tackleberry]

The Mauser Yugo Action is perfect for the .257 Roberts. I built one last summer. Shoots like a dream....

[mudstud]

Absolutely, a short action 700 is long enough for a 257 Roberts.  One of the most favored rifles in this household is a 700 Mountain Rifle, in 257 Roberts, which is a short action.  Furthermore, if you peruse the 2009 Remington catalog, you may notice that the new 700 CDL SF Limited for 2009 is in a 257 Bob, and appears to be a short action with a 24" bbl.

IF I was gonna build a 257 Roberts, I would give serious consideration to a Model 70 Classic short action, as the magazine length is longer than a 700.  In fact that is the primary reason I bought a Model 70 Classic SS in .243 Win a few years back.  The rifle is still untouched, another project not yet brought to fruition!   

[Waldo Pepper]

I have a FN from Belgium on a Mauser action with a chrome vanadium steel barrel made in 1953 and it is a dream and talk about seating bullets farther out in the case. I load 75 gr BTHP and VMax that step out at 3600 fps plus and that round is sudden death on Coyotes and occasional feral dog at 400 yards. The 90 bullets is the largest I shoot anymore since I quit deer hunting, but I still have a couple boxes of the 120 gr spitzer rounds I loaded. They were loaded to about 2800 fps and took several nice white tail bucks the round before retiring from serious hunting.

Speaking of hot hand loads for that rifle, I never had a empty case show any sign of having been over pressured. You would think pushing a 90 gr bullet close to the 4000 fps range would be rough on the case, never experienced any problems.

One strange thing about the rifle is it is so loud as to be unreal, been asked before on several occasions what kind of magnum I was shooting. That 21" barrel is loud and at dusk or predawn the flame is three feet at least. The gun was originally owned by the big game hunter Fred Baker, the rifle was pictured in one of the hunting magazines of the 50's with his wife holding the rifle and posing with her antelope she killed while they were on safari in Africa.