Just Too Powerful: The C96 in 9mm Mauser Export

Cool Forgotten Weapons merch! In an effort to widen its potential marked for the C96 pistol, Mauser offered it in 9x25mm (aka 9mm Mauser Export) as well as the much more common cartridge. The 9mm cartridge was made by simply blowing out the bottlenecked case to a straight walled type and loading a 126gr bullet. The two cartridges has the same muzzle velocity (1360fps) and effectively equal ballistic coefficients, so the rear sight graduations were left unchanged (a very clever design feature!). In fact, the only distinctive feature of the 9x25 model aside from its bore and chamber dimensions was the addition of a small divot to the follower to improve feeding with he straight walled case. Only about 150 examples of 9x25mm C96 appear to have been produced, based on the surviving Mauser order books. The cartridge was also used in the experimental C06/08 Mauser p