7.62 x 54 mm R
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The 7.62 x 54 mm R rifle cartridge is a Russian design dating back to 1891. Originally designed for the Mosin-Nagant rifle, it was used during the late Tsarist era and throughout the Soviet period, in machine guns and rifles, such as the SVT-40. The Winchester 1895 was also chambered for this cartridge per a contract with the Russian government. It is still in use by the Russian military in the Dragunov and other sniper rifles and some modern machine guns. The round is colloquially known as the "7.62 Russian". The name is sometimes confused with the "7.62 Soviet", which refers to the 7.62x39 cartridge.
The 7.62 x 54 mm R is one of the oldest cartridges still in use by any military in the world. In general performance, it is in the same class as the .30-06. It is also one of the few (along with the .22 Hornet, .30-30 and .303 British) bottlenecked, rimmed centerfire rifle cartridges still in common use today. Most of the bottleneck rimmed cartridges of the late 1880's and 1890's fell into disuse by the end of the first world war.
Contents |
[edit] Specifications
[edit] CIP Dimensions
- Round length: 77.16 mm
- Case length: 53.72 mm
- Rim diameter: 14.48 mm
- Bullet diameter: 7.9 mm
[edit] Nominal charge
- Muzzle energy: 3,960 J
[edit] Types of Ammunition
- Full metal jacket
- Hollow point
- Soft-point
- Light steel-core
- Heavy steel-core
- Tracer
- Super-incendiary
- Sniper (Снайперские)
The photo on the right shows, from left to right:
- Sellier & Bellot hollow point boat tail
- "Czech silver tip", mild steel core, light ball
- Hungarian silver/yellow-tip, mild steel core, heavy ball
- Wolf Gold soft-point
- USSR 1986 steel core light ball, Factory 60. [1]
- Yugoslav surplus (1953)
- USSR 1940s lead core light ball [2]
[edit] Surplus ammunition
Most surplus ammunition available uses corrosive primers. One commonly encountered type of surplus -54R is Czech "silver tip" (image), which is Czechoslovakian surplus from the 1960s. Newer-production commercial ammunition is not corrosively primed.
[edit] See also
- 7.62 mm caliber
- Dragunov SVD
- Mosin-Nagant
- Degtyerev DP-28
- PK machine gun
- Russian M1910 Maxim
- 7.62 x 53R Finnish
[edit] External links
- An evaluation list for variants, weights, and velocities of this ammunition type
- A dimensional diagram of the cartridge
- A description of the cartridge at Chuckhawks.com
- A guide to headstamps and bullet types at Mosinnagant.net
- CIP dimensions for rimmed cartridges
| Soviet infantry weapons of World War II |
|---|
| Side-arms |
| TT-33 | Nagant M1895 |
| Rifles & carbines |
| AVS36 | SVT40 | Mosin-Nagant |
| Submachine guns |
| PPD-40 | PPSh-41 | PPS-43 |
| Grenades |
| F1 | RGD-33 | RG-41 | RG-42 | RPG-43 |
| Machine guns & other larger weapons |
| M1910 Maxim | DS-39 | DP | SG-43 Gorunov | DShK | PTRD | PTRS ROKS-2/ROKS-3 |
| Cartridges used by the USSR |
| 7.62 x 25 mm TT | 7.62 x 38 R | 7.62 x 54 mm R | 14.5 x 114 mm |
