✅ SOLVED Rimfire cartridge ID help

[Tedyoh]

Hi,

Found 4 of these today (which the I.D. happens to match the 20 O.D. bullets Ive found in this same area a while ago) and they all look the same so I'm pretty sure no material or length broke off the neck....there seems to be a + (plus) symbol on the bottom in the middle with a very fine circle around it, hard to tell in the picture. Dimensions are;
O.A.L = 1.5"
O.A.L to neck = 1.3"
O.D. @ rim = .622
O.D above rim = .562
I.D. @ neck = .41 (maybe .42)

Thanks In Advance......

 

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[HutSiteDigger]

Neat find! We have a expert here named CannonBallGuy who will be able too tell you what you got, time frame,etc. Hopefully he will be on here in a few minutes or hour.

 

[pong12211]

Well they appear to be rimfire to me.. No centerfire primers in them.. Common rimfires are 22 long rifle, 22 short, 22 magnum, 17 hmr that's just some of them.. I may be wrong but i'm willing to bet it has to be one of the rimfire cartridges... Just my opinion..

 

[wvwildman]

its a 41 swiss

 

[wvwildman]

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[Bigcypresshunter]

Well they appear to be rimfire to me.. No centerfire primers in them.. Common rimfires are 22 long rifle, 22 short, 22 magnum, 17 hmr that's just some of them.. I may be wrong but i'm willing to bet it has to be one of the rimfire cartridges... Just my opinion..

Heres a page from 1909 Sears Roebuck & Co catalog on available rimfire cartridges that may be of interest but it looks like wildman got it..

 

[Bigcypresshunter]

Heck of an ID.

 

[wvwildman]

Heck of an ID.

my grandpa use to have one along time ago

 

[Tedyoh]

Thanks guys - looks like the .41 swiss was the only rimfire cartridge that carried the "+" headstamp

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

I'm late to this discussion because I went to bed last night uncommonly early. Yes, it is a ".41 Swiss" cartridge-casing, for the .41 Swiss Vetterli Rifle. A couple of those casings have shown up in this forum previously. Here are some photos I posted in reply to those ID-requests.

Note the cross-in-circle headstamp (which means it's a Swiss-made casing), and the Vetterli rifle's distinctive round "double firing-pin" marks -- unlike the civil war Henry rifle's double "dash" firing-pin marks. Two of the photos show an American-made cartridge for the .41 Swiss Vetterli rifle, and the box's label identifies it as that, even including a drawing. Thus, there is no doubt about the correctness of the ID.

Someday will probably ask for the time-period of the Swiss-made casing found by Tedyoh. The .41 Swiss Vetterli rifle was the Swiss army's primary Infantry rifle in the 1870s. After it was replaced in that service by a more advanced rifle, the surplus .41 Vetterlis became popular with game-hunters here in the US from the 1880s through the early 1900s. That is why an American ammo-maker began mass-producing cartridges for that rifle in the 1880s. So, Tedyoh's dug-in-the-US imported Swiss-made casing probably was manufactured in the 1870s/80s.

 

[Bigcypresshunter]

I guess the cartridge was not available from Sears in 1909.

 

[Bigcypresshunter]

BTW the last post by CBG is what I consider a quality post that we can all learn from. Good explanation with good clear supporting pictures that we can all understand.

 

[Tedyoh]

The best posts as always - thanks for the dating info as well Cannon.....