I've been looking at some of the rifles in the local gunshop and a question came up among us. The new Rugers we've been seeing all seem to have good throats on the chambers, being on the medium side, not too long or short. The last couple of Remingtons we checked were a little longer than Rugers. Howas were longer even than the Remingtons. CZ's were on the short side.
The one we couldn't find to check was a Winchester model 70. Has anyone out there got one and checked it?
The way we checked is using an empty case we took the most popular bullet and crush fit it by closing the bolt on a partially seated bullet. The bullets used were:
.308--165 Nosler BT & 165 Sierra Spitzer
.270--130 Nos BT
7mm-08--140 Sierra #1910 Spitzer
This gave us some idea of the length of the leade or throat. We were just wondering how Winchester fared in this test from other people's experience.

Bob

I answered this post over on the huntamerica.com forum. I've got a 2 year old push-feed M70 in 7mm Rem Mag. Haven't measured the throat precisely, but seating a 175 gr. Hornady SP bullet in a fired case and closing the bolt almost pushes it in right to the cannelure. Very short throat. The rifle shoots very well with these bullets.

I'm working on a 1980's vintage Winchester in .280 Remington, and it has a short throat. 154 Hornadys are seated to 3.3" Not that I would use round nose bullets in this rifle, but if you did, you would have to seat 'em deep.

IF you put a flat-based bullet into an empty, unprimed, resized case BACKWARDS then chamber it the rifling origin will push the bullet into the case neck, and when extracted will show you exactly the length of the chamber throat.

True. I knew that method and have used it. Like I said, I hadn't measured the throat length of this rifle precisely. The method I used did give some idea of the clearance of that bullet's ogive to the rifling. If I'd miked it that way and seated to the cannelure where I intended to seat it, I'd have a pretty exact measurement of the bullet's jump to the rifling. The question was a general one, though, and I provided a general answer. Thanks for the tip!

I am in the process of working up a load for my Winchester Laredo .300 mag and have found that if I load to BARELY fit in the magazine, the bullet is over 120 thousandths short of the lands.

I have a 86-87' manufacture rem 700 .270 that has a really long throat. My father in law let me use his stoney point tool, he only had a 280 stoney point drilled case. so I figured that would work just as good as a 270 one. unless the 280 is a bit shorter than a 270win I don't know. but there was no way to make the bullet touch the lands the plastic tip came through the 280 case about 1/8" past the case mouth. but I wouldn't trade the gun for anything. got her ready for deer hunting 2 weeks ago, loaded a few rounds, and off to the range. I shot 3 3 shot groups and the average was .80 it also took its first deer, I am happy

It won't make much difference in any of the new factory rifles and most of the old ones, as the magazine is so short that one usually has to set his OAL by the magazine and not the throat in a hunting rifle, otherwise he is limited to a single shot...