The 93s are all over the place in their metallurgy and heat treatment because all, even the "weakest" ones were fine for the 1890s loads they used.

As a gunsmith, I get them into the shop that are very soft and others that are cased and quite strong. What I believe is that if you are going to use them for custom builds, it's best to simply case harden the inside of the receiver ring no matter what 93, 94 or 95 action you get.

I have done many of them. If you do a good case harden, it's ok to assume they are going to be strong enough for the application you will want to use them for, as long as you are not being Unrealistic. I would never try to make a short magnum from one.

But if you look at the amount of locking surface on a modern bolt action like a Howa, Remington or Winchester, and then you look at a 93 Mauser you'll see they are just about the same. So if the steel and the heat-treatment were also equal, the strength should be about the same too.

Safe to say that any load that uses the standard bolt face and runs at 54,000PSI or less, is going to be just fine in a 93 as long as the steel and heat-treatment are good.

Anything I made would use a standard Mauser shell just because going to the 308 shells (243, 260, 7-08 308 and so on) do not give any advantage over the 57MM 55MM and 53MM shells of the Mauser. Included in this group are the 2 "American Mausers", the 6MM Remington and the 257 Roberts.

So going from a 6MM Remington, 257 Roberts, 6.5 Swede, 7X57, 7.65 Belgian, 8X57, 9X57, 9.3X57 and 9.5X57---- I can't really see any "holes" in some hunters choice of game that could not be handled with one of them.