.257 FERGUSON Hot Tamale

[Fiftydriver]

Kac1345,

My customers are getting in the 1000 to 1200 round life if they take good care of their barrel and use a high quality stainless barrel with a 3 or 4 groove rifling system.

Also, a tight throat is a nessesity for any throat life at all with a round like this.

If your smith uses a generic built solid piloted reamer to chamber your rifle, I would expect abotu 500-700 roudns of useful life.

I designed my reamer with a throat 0.0002" over bullet diameter and this greatly reduces gas blowby and greatly saves on throat erosion.

The STW and Banshee are the two biggest 257 rounds that I feel are useful and provide a long enough throat life to justify building a rifle in.

I played around with the idea of a 257 RUM but computer models showed hardly any increase in velocity with available powders.

Good Shooting!!!

Kirby Allen(50)

[Fiftydriver]

Cheechako,

Please call it a 257 STW because this Ferguson had nothing to do with designing the round.

THe 257 STW is actually a substantial step up in power over teh Scramjet, in fact a solid 250 fps faster.

This makes the 257 STW head and shoulders above the 6.53 in all catagories.

I assure you that the 257 STW will do 4050 to 4100 fps in a 28" barrel without developing any more pressure then a factory loaded 257 Wby round.

Now getting or claiming this velocity in a 26" barrel, I would agree with your last comment.

The Lazzeroni stuff is alot of hype, the 257 STW is for real I promise you.

Good Shooting!!!

Kirby Allen(50)

[skeeter]

SPEED DEMON
I'am neck sizing my brass down with a .257 stw RCBS die.The FPS i'am getting is the most i can get and be safe.As of right now i have about 14 rounds loaded @ 80.5 grains and thats what i'am using for deer hunting this year.But after these rounds are gone i'am going to the 81.0 grains for the little extra speed.
I got the idear of getting a.257 stw from reading the same article as you did about James Ferguson rifles.
I called him and talked to him about 6 months ago about building me a rifle.He told me what die to get and it would take 3 to 4 months and it would cost about $3800.
That was to much for me.
Then i call Lost river tec. and ask about there bullets.I learded two 3 things.! They know James Ferguson VERY well.2 There bullet have nichel chrome in them and have a B.C. of about .530 . 3 they are about $36.00 for a box of 20.
I got my rifle built for about $500.00 and i have spent a lot of time with it pulling out my hair.I got it like i want it, but at the start i had a lot of unasnswered questions.If i could go back ,the way kirby Allen builds his rifles,and what i read about the way he necks down brass and ect. He would have built mine.
If theres anything wrong with the way i have done things in this artilc that i have talked about .OLD kirby Allen will let us know.I have posted what i think about him so if need to know something ask Kirby.
SKEETER

[ 09-12-2004: Message edited by: skeeter ]

[speed demon]

Is this some kind of improved .257 stw or just a .257 stw with a nickname? here is the link http://www.2joutfitters.com/STWrifle.htm

.257 stw owners look at those pics and see if it looks like your case or is it improved?I cant tell. Anyway he claims 4060fps with a 100gr bullet 26inch barrel.

[Mikecr]

Thats correct. The STW is smaller than the Scramjet. And if any brass on earth could be pushed in pressure, it's Lazzeroni brass.
QL shows the scramjet as having more capacity(2.5gr more), however I drew up both quick in RCBS load, and it looks more like 5gr to me. Now this assumes that the STW was simply necked down and not improved. The SJ I was building was 40deg at the shoulder, w/less body taper(like the Banshee), and nothing out there would have touched it.
In fact, the rifle is still being built by PGW. But I've decided not to use it(will sell).
The 257WBY is a full 20gr below the Scramjet.
Here's a pic comparing the two cases:
You may have to copy & paste into a google browser address bar to view(this, being angelfire) www.angelfire.com/id/psycho/images/257comp.jpg
http://www.angelfire.com/id/psycho/images/casecomp.jpg
www.angelfire.com/id/psycho/images/257reamer.jpg

[ 09-12-2004: Message edited by: Mikecr ]

[Ray Meketa]

You're right Mike. The Lazz is some of the strongest brass made. A SJ case weighs about 15% more than an STW even though the internal volume is only 2% more. And the quality is as good as Remchester IMHO.

The 7 STW, when it was adopted by SAAMI, was nothing new. Guys had been necking down the Rem 8MM Mag ever since brass became available in 1979. Before that they were using 300 WBY and 375 H&H brass. There are probably many shooters who were playing with their own version of the 257 STW for 50 years or more. I've been wildcatting for quite a few years myself and if there's one thing I've learned it's that there is nothing new.

[ 09-12-2004: Message edited by: Cheechako ]

[Mikecr]

Both are wicked.
Both are well beyond diminished returns.

Mine will be a light(titanium/carbon fiber) deer rifle. If I ever use it, won't be much.