276 Pederson rounds.Anybody ??
I have one complete eight round clip of this ammunition loaded but do not have a rifle to shoot it in..Anybody loan me one for eight rounds to shoot??You can have the empties for the loan of your rifle.Thank you.JUST KIDDING but promised Heavyiron I'd get the ball rolling on a new cartridge qwuestion.modoc
BILL
KEEP YOUR POWDER DRY.BUT NOT HOT.....single action S&Ws are keepers
BILL
KEEP YOUR POWDER DRY.BUT NOT HOT.....single action S&Ws are keepers
0
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Hi Modoc,
Thank you so much. I don't believe we're going to see many takers on your generous(?) offer. What a deal!
To give this thread some educational content so it isn't a total waste of time and for those readers who don't know of the 276 Pedersen, it was a US Army experimental cartridge developed between 1923 and 1932 for the experimental Pedersen semi-automatic rifle. There were at least 10 variations of this cartridge, and a relative of which was the 30 Pedersen which resembles a 9mm pistol cartridge and was a device made to be attached to the 1903 Springfield to convert it to full automatic (not to be confused with the Pedersen rifle). Various loadings with 120 to 150 grains were tried. The Pedersen never came to fruition and especially after the Garand came on the scene. The 276 Pedersen was never manufactured as a commerical cartridge and no commercial rifles were ever produced. Surplus ammunition was available for a while after WWII. Ammunition and rifles are strictly collectors items today. An entire box of 276 Pedersen ammunition was on auction on the evil website last month.
I feel better now having got this off my chest.
Regards,
Heavyiron
"If I don't see you nomore on this world, I'll meet you on the next one, and don't be late!" - Jimi Hendrix0 -
Way back, I usta be a full fledged (amature) cartridge collector.
Sold out because I couldn't support both guns and ammo hobby.
Anyway, in my stuff was an en block clip/charger unit of 276 rifle ctgs,....a little, but, not too much like that of the Garand.
The ends had tabs that folded around the ctgs. for enclosure,...AND,...it held 10 rounds.
Somebody tipped me off that it was an origonal Pederson, and, I ended up selling it alone for 50.00, the way I remember. I havn't seen one since.....soooo, watch out for this clip, in your travels.
Bob0 -
That clip full of original ammo is what I have.It was developed for use in the M1 Garand rifle.Pretty close race between it and the 30-06, however the Government finally decided that since they had hundreds of thousands of 30-06 rounds in storage they had better stick with what they had,so the 30-06 became the ammo for the Garand also.Very interesting things our leaders come up with.What happened with the 9mm pistol round?? Simple, they sold out to the United Nations..As is well known,we have the best politicians money can buy.
BILL
KEEP YOUR POWDER DRY.BUT NOT HOT.....single action S&Ws are keepers0 -
Heavyiron,
Correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't the .276 Pederson the 'original' Garand round. John Garand had the rifle fully developed using it and that was when Douglas MacArthur Sr(?) basically said, "No, we need it chambered for the 30-06." (1929) And wasn't that when the standard chambering of .30 Cal (30-06) subsequently went from the 198 gr. WW-I standard to the 150gr. standard (or 147 gr.) of WW-II? (so it would work in the garand).
I can definately say I'm not sure those facts are all right but that is the way I've heard or read it.
Interesting li'l tidbit: compare the .276 pederson to the "brand new" 6.8 SPC that is really starting to take hold. It's different but not by much. The .276 used the old 6mm Lee Navy base (.445) while the 6.8 uses the 30 Rem base (.420)
We have the second amendment so that all the rest are secure....UNK>0 -
Hi Sandwarrior,
I have heard that same story.
I have not been able to verify that exact story, but from my limited references have been able to reconstruct a similar one.
There were prototype Garand rifles in 276 Pedersen, but there was no mass production of the Garand in 276 Pedersen.
Two of the 10 or so varieties of the 276 Pedersen were named the T2 and the T2-E1. The T2 had the same rim and head dimensions as the 30-06. The T2-E1 was modified specifically for testing in an early version of the Garand. A 276 Pedersen looks like a 30-06 but is actually a little smaller overall.
Both the Pedersen semi-automatic rifle (again not to be confused with the Pedersen Device for the 1903 Springfield) and the Garand competed in trials prior to WWII and as we all know the Garand was adopted.
The 30-06 descended from its parent the 30-03 which was developed in 1903. In 1906, the 30-03 was adopted in the Model 1903 Springfield service rifle. Most of these early Springfields were refitted with barrels chambered for the 30-06. The 30-03 was about 0.07 inches longer than the 30-06 and used a 220 grain round nose bullet. The 30-03 was successor to the 30-40 Krag or 30 Army. For several years ammunition manufacturers loaded both the 30-03 and 30-06 rounds.
In about 1926 the US military loaded the 30-06 with a 172 grain bullet which the Garand did not like. In 1940, the 30-06 was again changed to a flat base 152 grain bullet that the Garand did like. This was called the "Cartridge Ball caliber, 30 M2", which was the loading used in WWII.
Now what Gen. Douglas MacArthur, then Army Chief of Staff, really said I don't know. But what he did is documented. Remember the US was now accustomed to and in love with the 30 Army (30-40 Krag) cartridge and the 276 Pedersen was in development from 1923 to 1932. Well, what MacArthor did in 1932 was to disapprove any caliber reduction for the US military arms. Therefore, his decision met the immediate doom of the 276 Pedersen.
From the above, it would appear that the military was more interested in maintaining a minimum 30 caliber bullet diameter and a single cartridge that could be used in almost all its main battle rifles and light and heavy machine guns.
This is the actual story as best as I can put it together from references.
Regards,
Heavyiron[8D]
"If I don't see you nomore on this world, I'll meet you on the next one, and don't be late!" - Jimi Hendrix0 -
I can verify that story.
My father was a draftsman/junior tool designer at the Springfield Armory working for John C. Garand in the early 1930's. He worked on the tool design of the M1 for the changeover from .276 Pederson (for which the rifle was originally designed) to .30-06. At the time of the changeover, the M1 was still in the prototype stage....it wasn't officially adopted until 1936.
According to what he told me, General Douglas MacArthur, who was U.S. Army Chief of Staff at the time, vetoed the .276 round for the following reasons:
We had millions of rounds of .30-06 left over from WWI.
The (then) current Squad Automatic Weapon (M1918 BAR) and Light Machine Gun (Colt M1919) both fired the .30-06 and having the Main Battle Rifle fire another caliber would cause supply problems.
All of the Government Arsenals were already set up to manufacture .30-06....and the slim Army budget (during the depression era) would've been strained to set them up to make an additional caliber.
The Pederson round offered no signifigant advantage over the current .30-06 round.
Considering the times (during the depression when all of the military budgets had been cut to the bone) the above reasons make sense to me.
Dad was at SA from '31 to early 1935. He then went to Colt (as a tool designer) until 1939. In '39 he was hired by Pratt & Whitney Aircraft as a Senior Tool Designer, and in early (I think) 1941, the War Production Board asked P&WA to loan him to Underwood to do the tool design for the manufacture of the M1 Carbine. Afterward, he went back to P&W and finished the war there.0 -
To keep this brief:
(a) The enbloc clips for the .276 are very scarce and bring big bucks.
(b) The rifles are even more scarce, although I do have a client who has one (no, I'm not going to violate his privacy - sorry).
(c) Yep, he does shoot it!
(d) The standard ammo is not all that hard to find, even boxes of it (which are usually grossly over-priced!).
(e) The earliest and limited prototype / development versions are a different story, as are the AP / proof and blank loadings (the latter is purely a British item and while I'm sure the US had to have made some proof loads, I've only seen the British version).
(f) One tiny nit to pick w/ heavyiron's otherwise superb reply . . . the version designed to match the head of the '06 is actually the so-called "semi-rimmed" type as the body of the case remained the same, only the rim was increased in diameter to match the '06 profile; it came before the T2 and these are two separate beasts. The difference between the T2 and T2E1 is in the configuration of the head, but they are both rimless with the rim matching the .276 body dimensions rather than extending beyond it to match the '06.
Interesting topic, guys!
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Reply updated here to avoid triggering the good Captain's posting limits . . . .
sandwarrior:
(a) You have things a bit backwards . . . the '03 used the Krag 220gr RN bullet matched to the head configuration of what would become the '06 . . . there are a few other minor differences, but this is the critical one.
(b) While the configuration of the base is comparable, there is no documentary evidence that Pederson copied the .236 / 6mm head design in creating the .276. There is, however, some strong inferential evidence from a WRA 6mm USN case necked up and loaded with a cupronickel jacketed 7mm Mauser spitzer which came out of his estate.
"There is nothing lower than the human race - except the french." (Mark Twain)0 -
guys,
Great topic! I understood the .276 case was based off the old 6mm Lee Navy. Xracer could you give any feedback on that? I thought the 6mm Lee Navy was really a great round that never got a chance to continue to prove itself because the U.S. Army totally controlled land ordnance. And since the Krag proved so undercapable to the 7mm(I think too it was lack of training not just round/rifle combo) The Army was going to field a bigger tougher round no matter what and the 6mm was simply overwhelmed by it. Standardization isn't a bad thing though.
My understanding too was also that the 30-03 was the new 30-06 case but retained the old Krag base. That didn't work so well and the base was changed to .473 in 1906(that's when Mauser sued).
Lastly, how did some 5th GRP. guy pull an obsolete round like the 30 Rem out of the blue shorten and neck it to .270? I'm really interested to know that one.
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Well guys, appreciate the info very much. It sets a lot straighter my knowledge of what really happened and why....and when.
We have the second amendment so that all the rest are secure....UNK>0 -
Considering that there were only 20 Pederson rifles(had a toggle action like a Luger pistol) made for testing and the ammo required lubrication for the rifle to function, you may have a problem. Pederson went off to England in 1930 to supervise Vickers' tooling up to build his rifle.
There were only 20 .276 cal Garands made with 8,000 rounds of ammo for testing. This rifle passed all the Army's tests and was about to be put into limited production, MacArthur vetoed it due to "war accumulations" and the supposed chaos the change would cause. He also said, there hadn't been any proof that a .30 cal rifle couldn't be made to work. (I have the letter in Hatcher's Book of the Garand in front of me here.)
The 172 grain M1 ammo first adopted in 1925 and using IMR powder, had the primers crimped in to keep them from falling out of some MGs. The early Garands were primer-actuated so J.C. quit developing it and went to gas operation.0 -
Sandwarrior....Dad never mentioned the specifics or dimensions of the changeover; merely that he had worked on designing the new tooling needed to manufacture the M1 in caliber .30-06. 0
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