I have tried to stay out of this thread, but find I can't anymore:
1) Once again, very few people actually read the original post before responding.
The use of "hot handloads" in the header was unfortunate, because that is NOT what the poster really meant, as is plain from his first post. Instead he asked about using maximum loading manual loads, which cannot be considered "hot." Even the hottest 6.5x55 load data around is only about 55,000 PSI, which is considerably less than .30-06 level, which isn't all that warm itself. (I must also emphasize PSI is electronic pounds-per-square-inch, not CUP, copper units of pressure.)
2) The 96 Mauser action has been proven to be basically as strong as any small-ring 98 action--that is, totally adequate for any cartridge with a .30-06 sized case head. This has been proven many times when 96's have been rebarreled (often by modern manufacturers such as Kimber) to cartridges such as the .22-250 and .308, which have factory loads producing well above 60,000 PSI.
The third 98 lug at the root of the bolt and the better gas-handling of the 98 are basically irrelevant in this discussion. They're there for catastrophic case failures, common in the early days of smokeless cartridges. They're still fine features, but modern brass is good enough that many bolt actions designed after the early days didn't have nearly as many features to handle case failure.
The pre-'64 Winchester Model 70 is a prime example. It basically has zero provision for keeping gas from a blown case out of the shooter's face, but Internet discussions of the pre-'64 almost never mention this. Yet when the 96 Mauser action comes up a bunch of experts have to bring up the ways it was inferior to the 98, and imply firing one with loads producing more than 45,000 PSI is as dangerous as driving on the wrong side of a highway.
A 96 action in good condition (no deep rust pits, cracks, etc., both of which are rare) will easily handle any of the data for handloading the 6.5x55 in America, as long as the chamber throat matches the original specifications. This is both because the 96 actions are pretty darn strong, thanks to the very good steel used, and because even the "hottest" maximum loads published here aren't all that warm.
