Musgrave Mk III
- Category
- Rifle
- Barrel
- Not recorded
- Weight, empty
- Not recorded
- Introduced
- Not recorded
About
What it is, and why it matters
The Musgrave Mk III is a South African centre-fire bolt-action sporting rifle built by Musgrave in Bloemfontein. Like its companion Mk IV, it is built on a Mauser Model 98 pattern action and barrel sourced from Santa Barbara of Spain, giving it a controlled-round-feed claw extractor, a three-position wing safety and an internal box magazine with hinged floorplate. Rifles of the series carry serial numbers beginning with 'R-' and were chambered for popular full-power sporting cartridges such as the .308 Winchester.
Musgrave rifles took their name from South African gunmaker Ben Musgrave; the Bloemfontein-built Mk III sporter was a civilian hunting cousin of the record-setting Musgrave RSA target rifle, whose Mauser-pattern action was shared across the marque.
Published dimensional specifications for the Mk III are scarce; several measurements are left unrecorded. The Mk III and Mk IV share the same Mod 98 based Santa Barbara actions and barrels. Musgrave actions were also manufactured at Lyttelton Engineering Works near Pretoria before the marque was absorbed into Denel/Armscor and continued under the Vektor name.
Specification
Everything measured
IdentityWhat it is, who built it and when.
- Manufacturer
- Musgrave Rifles
- Category
- Rifle
- Country
- South Africa
- Status
- Discontinued
ActionHow it cycles, what trips it, and what feeds it.
- Action
- Bolt action
- Firing mechanism
- Striker fired
- Trigger
- Single stage
- Capacity
- 5
- Magazine
- Internal
MaterialsEach swatch is the material itself, not a colour chosen to stand for it.
- Frame
- Steel
- Barrel
- Steel
- Stock
- Wood
- Finish
- Blued
BallisticsFrom the service cartridge, not a handload.
- Muzzle velocity
- 838 m/s
- Muzzle energy
- 3412 J
- Effective range
- 300 m
Trajectory
What the round does downrange
Solved from the muzzle figures and the bullet. The dashed rule is the effective range on the record, and the crosses are the steps the solver returned.
No load solved for this record yetThe flight path is computed from a cartridge and a bullet. This record has no ammunition filed against its chambering, so there is nothing to solve.
Features
What it has
What the record lists as fitted, drawn from the catalogue.
Mauser 98 action
Controlled round feed
Claw extractor
Internal box magazine
Hinged floorplate
Iron sights
Standing
How it compares
This record has too few measurements to compare with others yet.
Answers
Questions about the Musgrave Mk III
What caliber is the Musgrave Mk III?
The Musgrave Mk III is chambered in .308 Winchester.
How many rounds does the Musgrave Mk III hold?
The Musgrave Mk III holds 5 rounds, fed from an internal magazine.
Who makes the Musgrave Mk III?
The Musgrave Mk III is made by Musgrave Rifles (South Africa).
How does the Musgrave Mk III operate?
The Musgrave Mk III uses a bolt action, and its firing mechanism is striker fired.
Compatibility
Which parts fit this firearm
Studio
Every part that mounts on this, resolved
Not a list the maker typed out: the answer comes from the mounts this firearm exposes and the interface each part needs, so it stays right when either one changes.
- Every part that mounts on any firearm in the catalogue
- Interface standards, platforms and fit overrides
- The same answers through the API and the MCP server
Requires a signed-in GunSpec account on the Studio plan. The answer is computed per part, so it is not part of the public record.
Provenance
What the record holds
Every figure above was taken from one of these pages. The confidence reflects how much of the record came from a page a claim can be checked against.
In service
- Civilian hunters and sport shooters
- South Africa
Provenance
Confidence in this record
60%
Stockists
Where to buy
Offers link straight to the shop. GunSpec never takes the order.
No shop has listed this firearm yet
Stock and prices come from the shops themselves. If you sell this firearm, you can list it and it appears here.
List a firearmMCP
Ask an assistant about it
The same record, reached the way a person asks for it rather than the way a program does.
Ask GunSpec
Works with
Point an MCP client at GunSpec and it answers from the catalogue rather than from memory. A free key covers the read tools.
API
The call that returns this record
The same fields, in the same units, from the same endpoint the page reads.
curl --request GET \ --url 'https://api.gunspec.io/v1/firearms/musgrave-mk-iii' \ --header 'X-API-Key: your_key'{ "id": "musgrave-mk-iii", "name": "Musgrave Mk III", "manufacturer": { "id": "musgrave", "name": "Musgrave Rifles", "countryCode": "ZA", "foundedYear": 1950, "website": "https://www.musgraverifles.co.za", "logoUrl": null, "description": "South African manufacturer of hunting and sporting rifles, founded in 1950 by target shooting champion Benjamin Musgrave, revived in 2009 after a decade of closure.", "status": null, "defunctYear": null, "stateOwned": null, "makesFirearms": null, "parentId": null, "predecessorId": null, "createdAt": "2026-06-21 23:00:46", "updatedAt": "2026-06-21 23:00:46", "version": "69391aa1514f37347cb0181fdeea2a5cd2b6af86f1b0c905d48bf2043b0e726e" }, "category": { "id": "rifle", "name": "Rifle", "description": "Long-barreled firearms designed for accurate shooting" }, "country_of_origin": "ZA", "year_introduced": null, "barrel_length_mm": null, "weight_empty_g": null, "action_type": "bolt_action"}