I've wanted a .458 Win Mag for the collection for a long time, and finally found one I just couldn't resist. It was hand made in 1993 by Peter Hambrusch in Ferlach, Austria on a Steyr M98 action. Ferlach is Austria's oldest gun-making town. He's mostly known for his elaborate double rifles and ridiculous "mega magnum" guns in .700 Nitro Express.

This particular Mauser was built in a very Germanic style which is why I found it so fascinating. It's also a very practical rifle. It has a very tasteful engraving scene on the floorplate of a cape buffalo. Peter Hambrusch was kind enough to answer my questions about it via email. He still makes these, and they start at $15000 and go up from there, depending on engraving. I was lucky enough to snag it for the price of a Model 70. The scope mount is a German EAW system and is also ridiculously expensive. Mr. Hambrusch said the rifle's barrel was built with Austria's finest steel in his Ferlach workshop.








Some may remember this hilarious video from years ago, it went kinda viral in the early 2000s. This is Peter Hambrusch firing his ridiculous "Mega Magnum" bolt action rifle in 700 Nitro Express Happy to add one of his big bores to the collection

Awesome looking gun.  Enjoy.

Very nice rifle. I wonder about recoil with the Euro style stock with the amount of drop on the (comb) butt.

I will find out soon enough lol. It’s definitely been hunted with, but well taken care of. Mr. Hambrusch recommended I use factory Federal ammo with it.

Anyone have a good 30mm scope recommendation for this? Thinking a 1-5x Leupold but I may pony up for a Kahles to keep it all Austrian.

I only used Leupold’s when I lived in AK because they wouldn’t fog up and were pretty rugged, but that was 40 years ago. I also used fixed power scopes as well, 3 or 4x. I liked the simplicity and lighter weight. But todays options are a lot better.

Beautiful rifle!  Please provide a range report when you get it set up.

I envy your ammo budget.  That baby doesn't eat cheap!  😎

Very nice!

I probably won’t shoot it much outside of zeroing it for whatever scope I put on, but I do have a real big wild hog on my land I’d like to shoot with it. I also do plan to go to Africa for a hunt within the next ten years and will definitely use this rifle. Mr. Hambrusch said that’s what it was built for.

pure sex

I just scored a killer Kahles K16i off the EE, hopefully the bolt can clear it. Will be nice to have a top end Austrian optic on top of this top end Austrian rifle The EAW swing mount setup is really cool. They are stupid expensive though, $600 for the parts and $3-500 gunsmith job to install. Luckily all I have to do with this one is the last few steps since it was pro-mounted by Peter Hambrusch. Here is a video showing how it works:



Looking forward to doing some blasting with it.

Damn, that's beautiful.  Thanks for sharing it.  

Been learning a lot about this round, I'll probably start loading up some Barnes 300gr TSX bullets and start working my way up to the full power dangerous game loads. Here's a good video Ron Spomer made on the topic:

That is very nice

If you want to go down the .458 rabbit hole, there are some 458 WinMag lovers here - .458 WinMag loads and more. I don't think there are a more knowledgeable crew on the big Winchester cartridge. There is a lot of loading data there.
Warning - they don't care for the 458 Lott.  

Omg that is enormous amount of info, thanks!

Settled on a Leupold VX-6HD 1-6x LPVO for the optic, and I also talked to EAW in Germany who recommended their new RMR adapter too, so I got that and also mounted up a 3MOA Vortex Venom. In just seconds, I can swap between optics, red dot, and iron sights. Pretty cool for a dangerous game rifle! Now to start loading some rounds...

I was thinking the same thing! Though, with it being a win mag recoil should still be very reasonable, just be glad its not Lott or a Wells.