Thanks to Wolfgang for some credible info:

>>vom Hofe cartridges have always held an exclusive top position among hunting rifle cartridges,
similar to a Lamborghini among automobiles.

Mr. von Hofe had been employed by Halbe and Gerlich (Halger) in Danzig and then by Wilhel Brenneke in Leipzig.
In 1931 Mr. vom Hofe brought out the new hunting rifle cartridge under the designation 7x73 Hofe-Mann Super Express,
followed by the 6x61.5 Hofe-Mann Express. Ammunition was manufactured by DWM. Weapons in Suhl by the Funk company.

In 1937 the small 5.6mm v.Hofe Super Express followed with but also without rim.

During the last years of the war, vom Hofe was employed by the Reich Aviation Ministry and in this context in Peenemünde.
He died on May 4, 1945 in Rechlin/Pomerania.

But the history of the vom Hofe cartridges did not end there.
In 1956, Walter Gehmann acquired the company name and the associated rights.
From 1942 to 1945, Gehmann worked at IWK as head of the Infantry Ammunition Department.
Gehmann was already world champion in 300 meter rifle shooting (Lucerne) in 1929.
He was also German champion 24 times.
The 7x73 was developed from the 300 Holl & Holl.
The 6x61mm was probably designed to compete with the .244 HV Magn. Halger.
With a 6.5 gram, this cartridge achieved a muzzle velocity of 1028 m/sec. from a 65 cm barrel.
Both calibers were not successful. The reason for this was the experiment with the 5.6 mm caliber that had already begun at the time.

In 1937 the 5.6 Super Express appeared, which has remained practically unchanged in configuration and ballistics to this day.
From 1938, this cartridge appeared with the newly designed Teilmanel bullet with a spiked aluminum tip.
Even then, the jacket consisted of 90 % Cu and 10 % Zn, the so-called tombac.

In 1941 Gehmann developed the 7x66 Super Express.
Roy Weatherby had similar ideas at the same time in faraway California.
Weatherby developed his high-performance cartridge series in rapid succession from 1942 onwards.

Gehmann resumed work on the 7x66 in 1954.
He initially used the .404 Jeffery case.
The shoulder angle was 60 degrees.
Loaded with a 10 gram partial and full metal jacket bullet.
With a powder chamber of 5.54 cc, the case of the 7x66 S.E. still has a high level of capacity even today in this Kaiberg group.
a high degree of capacity (for comparison: 7x64 = 3.71 cc).

Work on the 7 mm rim project began in 1957.
The 8x75R Behr was retracted to the 7mm caliber.
The shoulder angle here was 50 degrees.
Another change was made at the beginning of the 60s.
The case neck was changed to 10.3 mm and the angle to 30 degrees.
The 9.3x74R was now used as the main receiver.

In the mid-50s Gehmann began to develop its own bullet,
as all conventional partial jacket bullets in high-performance cartridges often failed miserably in hard target resistance.
The result was the so-called stop-ring bullet made of tombac.
The 8 gram stop-ring bullet developed was intended for killing medium-sized cloven-hoofed game.
It was therefore obvious to add a correspondingly heavier counterpart for heavy cloven-hoofed game.
It was not until 1962 that the 11 gram stop-ring bullet with a two-part lead core was released.
This had a 3.8 mm high steel ring located directly below the separation plane between the two lead cores.
between the two lead cores.
This meant that there were now two stop-ring bullets available to hunters.
Stop-ring bullets have no longer been manufactured since 1972.
The IMK had given up ammunition production.

At the end of 1963, Gehmann turned his attention to a 6 mm ammunition based on the 7x66.
The result was the 6x66 v.Hofe Super Express.
With a shoulder angle of 50 degrees.
In 1965/66, mainly 6.5 gram bullets were tested in it.
Nosler Partition, Remington Core-Lokt and DWM-Starkmantel.
Propelled with 5.1 gram Norma 205 ( today MRP ) powder, the cartridge achieved 1160 m/sec.
with 70 cm long barrels. The velocities were measured 25 meters in front of the muzzle.

These values showed that the 6x66 v.Hofe SE could have been an excellent all-round cartridge.
With a powder capacity of 5.62 cc, it ultimately delivered even more favorable ballistic data than the 6.5 x 68 (5.18 cc).

Because the use of ammunition in a caliber of less than 6.5 mm on cloven-hoofed game (except roe deer) has since been prohibited in the Federal Republic of Germany, Gehmann regrettably abandoned this excellent cartridge, which, by the way, had proven itself very well in foreign hunting practice.

In this context, it should also be mentioned that at the time. (1965 / 66 ) the test firing
at the IWK were carried out by a Mr. G. Freres.
The very same man who in 1984 publicized a 6x62 Freres cartridge that was apostrophized as a “high performance cartridge”<<
Forced Translation.

Hochachtungsvoll,

Raimey
rse