We went over to Cabela's Saturday morning. I had a fair pile of gift cards that were just aching to be turned in...

I came home with a older, sporterized Mauser. Lovely, dark wood, older 2.5-8 BalVar scope with the adjustable mounts, custom trigger (turned out to be a Canjar), a Geo. Lawrence sling with push-button release swivels. The tag read: "7mm Remington Ackley Improved Magnum". A little negotiating and a pile of gift cards later and I scratched a check for a total of $185. Regardless of what it was, I had more than that in parts.

A little research later and I can find no such thing as a "7mm Rem AI Mag" as the 7mm Mag pretty much started out with all of the Ackley improvements when released.

At this point, we are confused.

Last night I pulled the stock and took a good look. The barrel is stamped "7MM ACKLEY MAG" (was partially obscured by the wood) with no mention of 'Improved' or 'Remington'.

The bottom of the barrel was also stamped: "R.EXE" or maybe "EXF"---gunsmith maybe?, "4...27...72"---assumed to be the build date and "1...10"---assumed to be the twist.

This lead me to read a little more in Ackley's books and experiment some.

I have exactly 1 empty 7mm Rem Mag case. It does not chamber, being too long. I also had a distorted .300 Weatherby Mag case (long story) that I cut off at approximately the shoulder length of the 7mmMag. That also would not chamber. I cut off a little more and finally got it to chamber.

I'll make a chamber cast next after I pull the scope out of the way.

Everything is clean, well done and apparently not abused. Whatever it is, I expect it will shoot.

The trouble is, I cannot find any drawings of the Ackley Magnum so I don't know what it should be or is.

Got anything on the 7mm Ackley Magnum?

Also, from a little reading, it looks like the 1:10 twist will probably only work up to about 150gr or so. Sound about right?

Thanks!