WESTLEY RICHARDS .425 MAGNUM EXPRESS – OLD-SCHOOL BIG-BORE GUNMAKING
If you had to choose a single bolt-action rifle that can uniquely identify Westley Richards, a .425 rifle such as this would be it.
If you had to choose a single bolt-action rifle that can be uniquely identified as a Westley Richards, a .425 rifle would be it.
THE .425 MAGNUM EXPRESS CARTRIDGE
Designed and patented by Leslie Taylor, the .425 Magnum Express cartridge was introduced by Westley Richards in 1909 (some sources say 1908) and fired a 410-grain bullet at an advertised 2 350 fps. With an actual bullet diameter of .435” and delivering over 5 000 footpounds of energy, it was the most powerful magazine rifle in the world for a short while. Mostly chambered in bolt-action rifles using Mauser actions, Westley Richards also built a few double rifles in this calibre. It was a proprietary cartridge and very few other manufacturers ever built rifles in this calibre.
The .425 was comparable to the .404 Jeffery and .416 Rigby, and these three always competed in the “battle of the .400s”. All three were designed to duplicate the ballistics of the famous rimmed .450/400 Nitro-Express that fired a 400-grain bullet at about 2 150 fps, but in a boltaction rifle. The .404, with its bullet diameter of .423”, used a 400-grain bullet at a slightly lower muzzle velocity of 2 125 fps. It required a Magnum action, although many were indeed built on modified standard-length actions. The .416 also required a Magnum action and launched a .416”, 410-grain bullet at 2 371 fps. This article does not intend to compare the merits of these three cartridges, as this is a longlasting and ongoing debate. (The purpose of this article is to take a detailed look at how the .425 rifle was made, especially the five-shot model.)
All three cartridges are classic and worthy, and all have their pros and cons. Depending on your particular bias, you can make a strong case for any of them. It seems that the .416, with all its glamour, was used by royalty, the .404 was the gentleman’s workhorse, and the .425 was the ugly duckling that no one spoke about, but that also got the job done.
Although fairly unknown today, the .425 was quite successful in its heyday. Everyone who used it had great respect for it and praised its performance. It was standard issue in the elephant control section of the Ugandan game department for many years, and according to John Taylor, it was very effectively used by those rangers. Taylor himself had high praise for the .425 cartridge, saying, “There is no question, it is a most excellent cartridge and a real killer.” He was so impressed that he wished for a pair of such rifles when he wrote, “I have often thought that a battery consisting of an open-sighted 26”-barrelled double .425 and a 25”-barrelled aperture-sighted magazine .425 would take an immense amount of beating for general all-around work amongst dangerous game.” He was also most impressed with the bullets loaded by Westley Richards for the .425, including thick-jacketed solids and the patented LT round-capped and pointed hollow-capped bullets. He considered the “capped bullets of
Westley Richards’ the best expanding bullets extant”. At that time, these early “controlledexpansion” bullets of Westley Richards were in a class of their own and way ahead of their competition.
Taylor’s only complaint was that the 28” barrels Westley Richards used on some of their .425 bolt-action magazine rifles made them ungainly and clumsy in thick bush. Why they insisted on this barrel length remains a mystery. One can only assume that they wanted to get as close as possible to the advertised muzzle velocity of 2 350 fps. Unfortunately, the reputation of the .425 was badly tarnished when Westley Richards brought out the low-cost “Game Ranger” models after WWII. These were built on FN actions and did not have enough hand-fitting to ensure 100% reliable feeding.
Frederick Courteney Selous ordered a .425 magazine rifle (serial number 37798) from Westley Richards in 1911 for one of his last African safaris – probably the last rifle he ever purchased. He was very impressed with it and wrote the following famous lines: “I can give your .425 Magazine Rifle the highest praise. Had I only possessed such a rifle in my old elephant hunting days, I am sure that I could have killed three or four times as many elephants as I actually laid low.” (Subsequently, Westley Richards used this quote extensively in their adverts.) Legend has it that he received the rifle in his London apartment only an hour before his scheduled departure for Africa. Not wanting to take an untested rifle on safari, he opened his bedroom window and fired a quick five-shot group at a neighbour’s chimney some 100 yards away. He then took out his binoculars, and after verifying a most satisfactory group, hastily departed before the police could investigate further. Incidentally, this very rifle, also a five-shot takedown model but without the sideclips, was “rediscovered” in 2016 and sold on auction in Las Vegas.»
DESIGNED BY LESLIE TAYLOR
» When the famous Leslie Taylor (managing director and designer at Westley Richards from 1899 to 1930) set out to design the world’s first “Short Magnum”, he had very specific design goals. He wanted a dangerousgame cartridge with at least the stopping power of the .450 NitroExpress, and in a bolt-action rifle using a standard M98 military Mauser action. Using the .404 case as a basis, he shortened it by 5 mm (exactly the amount required to fit the .425 cartridge into the 84 mm box magazine of a standard M98 military action) and cut the rim down to 12 mm (the same rim size as the 8x57mm military cartridge), giving the .425 cartridge its characteristic rebated rim. The neck was made even longer than that of the .404, which was essential for gripping the bullet in a heavyrecoiling magazine rifle. All this resulted in an odd-looking cartridge, but do not let looks deceive you – it was all about function. Ironically, Dakota Arms also used the .404 case in the 1990s when they came out with a whole range of “modern” Short Magnums.
Up until 1912, John Rigby was Mauser’s exclusive distributor in England and did not make the Mauser Magnum action available to other makers. Whether this influenced Leslie Taylor, we do not know, but being able to use a standard military M98 action and a rebated rim had many advantages. Firstly, there was no need for expensive machining work on the M98 bolt face and extractor; the standard M98 bolt was used as is. Secondly, the stripper clip notch in the military action could be used to reload the .425 quickly with cartridges held in stripper clips. Much was made of this in the early advertisements for the .425 rifle, as it was the only dangerous-game rifle ever to have this feature. Unfortunately, the standard 8x57mm military stripper clip could only hold four of the fat .425 cartridges, so Westley Richards had to make a special extended stripper clip that held five .425 cartridges. Ammunition could be purchased from Westley Richards, already pre-packaged in five-round clips.
Thirdly, spare parts were abundantly available. If your extractor or firing pin broke whilst on safari in Africa, the chances were good that you could find a surplus military M98 rifle from which to salvage the parts. Fourthly, the standard-length action required a shorter bolt stroke to reload. This was something WDM Bell felt very strongly about, and he cautioned against the use of Magnumlength actions in his writings.
Finally, the Oberndorf Mauser Magnum action was expensive, and Westley Richards wanted to keep the rifle’s price down. The 1912 Westley Richards catalogue gives the price for the five-shot .425 rifle as £25. In the same year, a best-quality .416 bolt action from John Rigby retailed for £45 – a substantial difference.
A disadvantage of the standard M98 magazine was that it could only hold three of the fat .425 cartridges. Leslie Taylor felt this was not enough and thus designed and patented (Patent 100 of 1909) the five-shot extended magazine.
As already mentioned, the standard M98 magazine box was used, the only modification being to widen the magazine lips at the top to cater for the fatter cartridge. The lower magazine extension piece was machined from a solid block of steel and matched the internal dimensions of the upper M98 magazine box exactly, thus extending it downwards. The standard M98 floorplate was used at the bottom of the extension block, albeit modified with the addition of a quarter-turn release. It did not release the floorplate but rather the complete lower magazine extension, which was fitted with a massively strong hinge at its front. This allowed the hunter to speedily change from one bullet type to another by hitting the quarterturn release. This action immediately emptied the full magazine and then refilled it with a stripper clip holding five cartridges of a different bullet type. These are military repeating rifle principles applied to dangerousgame culling operations!
Some, who have obviously not inspected these rifles closely, mistakenly believe that the extended five-shot magazine is a single-column design. This is not true; it is definitely of double-column configuration, although the internal width of the magazine box is only 22,4 mm at the rear (the standard rear width of the military 8x57mm M98 magazine box), which is much narrower than the 26 mm used by Mauser for the magazine box on its own .404 sporting rifle. One vitally important item that is not standard in the M98 is the magazine follower, which has been ground to a special shape for the .425 cartridge. Twenty years ago, Charlie Haley wrote an excellent article (Man Magnum, January 2000) in which he examined 16 retired .425 Westley Richards rifles from the Zimbabwean Tsetse Control Department. He concluded that jamming was caused by an incorrect replacement magazine follower and not by the rebated rim as had been speculated.
To ensure that the bolt face strikes the base of the cartridge case and does not catch on the bevelled part of the rebated case, the feed rails of the action were modified so that the top round in the magazine came up very high. To stop this top round from inadvertently “popping out” of the magazine, a pair of spring-loaded retaining clips called “sideclips” was incorporated into the action. Although it certainly looked strange and no other manufacturer ever tried something similar, reports from all who used it confirmed that it worked very well. Having enough sideways movement to open up when loading the magazine, one can simply push the fresh rounds past the sideclips. Similarly, when the bolt is closed, it pushes the sideclips out of the way without any noticeable resistance.
The sideclips were very popular and, apparently, were always fitted to the best-quality rifles. Hence, sideclips attained a certain mystique and status of their own over the years. However, it seems that Westley Richards was able to make the .425 feed reliably without the sideclips, as many rifles did not have this feature, including that of FC Selous. »
A CLASSIC EXAMPLE FROM 1923
»
Westley Richards delivered the best-quality takedown boltaction .425 Magnum Express magazine rifle featured in this article to Levetus Ltd. in London on 22 October 1923. (Interestingly, according to the Westley Richards ledger, they manufactured only 30 boltaction and falling-block rifles combined in 1923.) The rifle weighs 9,5 lbs and has the patented factory optional extended five-shot magazine with a quarter-turn release. The 28” detachable barrel has a ramp front sight and an express rear sight with one standing and four folding leaves, marked from 100 to 500 yards. The detachable barrel uses the patented twin-lug or bayonet-type takedown system (Leslie Taylor’s patent 9711 of 1894), in which two diametrically opposed lugs on the barrel engage with mating shoulders in a collar fitted over the receiver ring. A small latch on the right-hand side of the fore-end locks everything in place. Obviously lapped in by hand by skilled craftsmen almost 100 years ago, the barrel still locks up like a bank vault, tight and solid with absolutely zero play. The words “Westley Richards & Co. London” are engraved on the barrel, and under the fore-end it is marked “425 EXP”, together with the proof load of 65 grains of cordite and a 410-grain bullet. The action is a modified military Mauser M98, with the Westley Richards serial number and “W.R. .425 Magnum Express” appearing on the left of the receiver ring.
The stock is made of highgrade wood and has a blank silver initial shield and a buffalo horn fore-end tip. The barrel and stock have round sling eyes toallowfortheuseofaclassic leather sling with hook swivels. The rifle feels solid and strong, feeds and ejects with utter reliability, and the action is slick and smooth. It exemplifies the timeless, classic British big-bore, dangerous-game, bolt-action magazine rifle and the quality workmanship that Westley Richards produced prior to »
»WWII. The .425 Magnum Express was unique to Westley Richards, and to speak of the cartridge is to speak of the company. If you had to choose a single bolt-action rifle that can uniquely identify Westley Richards, a .425 rifle such as this would be it.
.425 VERSION 2.0?
The .425 certainly is one of the most underrated, under-appreciated dangerous-game cartridges of all time. It never seemed to receive its fair share of coverage in the firearms press, while high praise was bestowed upon the .416 and .404. As factory ammunition became unavailable at one stage in the 1970s, the .425 was on the brink of extinction. Game departments withdrew it from service and sold the rifles as surplus. Subsequently, many were rebored to .458 Winchester Magnum and had their barrels shortened.
In a most insightful article written almost 40 years ago (1981 Gun Digest), the late Jack Lott admits that he also criticised the rebated rim of the .425 when he was “younger and more inclined to depend on theory” (translated: young and foolish). However, later in his life, after having gained much more experience and owning three such rifles (translated: old and wise), he came to respect the cartridge and considered it to be
“an excellent choice as-is for African dangerous game”. In the article, he puts forward some compelling arguments for the selection of a .425 magazine rifle over a double rifle for use as an African safari rifle.
The demise of the .425 has reportedly come to an end, and it has made somewhat of a comeback. There are now many hunters who wish to take on Africa with the original vintage rifles of yesteryear, and some of them have rediscovered this 112-year-old cartridge and are having classic rifles built for it. Consequently, prices of original, unaltered Westley Richards .425 magazine rifles have shot up dramatically over the last few years, with good specimens of especially pre-WWII vintage being snapped up by collectors.
Unbelievably, Westley Richards themselves are again making and selling new .425 rifles based on the original old fiveshot, takedown classic style. New ammunition is available from Westley Richards and Kynoch. Those who prefer reloading can source brass from Bertram, and bullets are made by Woodleigh. The .425 case is actually eminently suitable for today’s modern propellants, and velocities of 2 300 fps to 2 400 fps are easily achieved. Even though these new Westley Richards rifles are exquisitely crafted and qualify as works of art, I would still choose the classic and original 100-year-old rifle every time. And yes, I would like the sideclips on my old rifle, if you please.