Here is a neat ctg with almost no neck. Sorry I don't have a picture. I was looking to see what else I could use in a .308win chamber in a pinch. I had some 300Savage lying around and curiosity got the better of me. It chambers fine, sounds ok when pull the trigger(remotely-a string), ejects fine, hits within 1 inch of zero @ 100yds. It is an unbelieveable fireform. There is less than.060inch neck approx .0024 mm.
Would I do it again? In a pinch---yes.
..........................................Andy

Andy, I seriously wouldn't recommend doing that again, the 300 Savage is short enough of the 308 Win headspace that you're almost certainly getting some pretty good case stretching, even though it may look OK outwardly. Straighten out a paper clip & put a small kink in the end & then run this on the inside of the case down toward the base, if you can feel a groove around just in front of the case web that is where the case is stretched. Another rifle with looser tolerances may well have given you a worse result than this, likewise a different brand of 300 Savage brass. Just my opinion FWIW
Steve.

Andy

Steve is right. That's not a good thing to do, even on a whim. You said that you tied the rifle down and fired it with a string but you did run the chance of destroying the rifle, even though you were perfectly safe standing behind that tree. As far as doing it again "in a pinch" I guess that means you would not hesitate to put your face behind the action the next time??

As the old joke goes, "Here, hold my beer and watch this" applies here.

JMHO

Ray

Should be a lot safer than fiering a .308 in a .30-06 chamber.
Never ever heard of that going wrong, and it happens a lot!!

Can anybody come up with a story were a rifle or shooter were ruined in a case like this?

I am not saying it is a good idea, but how dangerous is it - really?

In this case the length from rim to shoulder is identical, and the Savage has a tad larger body diameter than the Winchester.

Someone really has to document the hazard in this.

But as the .308 case meassures 2.010", and the .300 1.871", neck should be .139", or 3,55mm? And 0.060" is 1,55mm? 0,0024mm is not measurable, and as close to zero as 0.00001", so something is wrong with theese measurements??

Bent-

With new brass you are likely correct...not too much danger, MAYBE. Still more than I would care to experience voluntarily, but probably hasn't hurt TOO MANY people.

With previously fired brass, which will be work hardened and more brittle, less springy, less stretchable, I wouldn't care to predict what might happen.


There are a number of the old tales and precautions which one can accidentally ignore some of the time and get away with it without a scratch.

Take the situation of shooting 8m/m Mauser rounds through an '06. When I was quite young, I bought a DCM '03-A3 Springfield new in the cosmoline for under $15 delivered to my home. Took myself off to the gunshop, where they had a large felt cowboy hat full of loose loaded rounds on the counter at less than 5-cents per round. Were supposed to all be .30-06, so I just grabbed about half a paper sack full and bought them. (I didn't even count them, the store-owner/salesperson did.)

Next day found me down in the river bottom plinking with my new '06 (San Benito River, a deep, wide, dry stream-bed in the summer months) . Everything went well and it seemed pretty accurate, so far as I could tell shooting offhand.

I was picking up the brass, as I planned to handload for it. Looking at some, I found they had almost no neck left. Turned out they were military surplus 8x57 Mauser.

Didn't hurt me or the gun...I am still using it over half a century later. But I wouldn't, from that one uneventful experience, suggest to anyone that it is not a genuine dangerous practice.

quote:

Originally posted by Bent Fossdal:

I am not saying it is a good idea, but how dangerous is it - really?

Bent, you're probably right, but as you say, that doesn't make it a good idea or in anyway wise. Just for the record, I based my advice on the fact that all my manuals show the Savage round as being a few thou short of the Winchester round both in shoulder diameter, & base to shoulder length. I believe this would be enough allow the Savage round to be pushed forward by the firing pin fall & possibly cause stretching in front of the solid base. This is a recognised cause of case failure in cases which have the shoulder set back by being over sized, much as would be present in this case. Not knowing what state the brass is in & other factors such as tolerances etc. I felt comfortable in suggesting that Andy should perhaps think twice before trying it again.
Steve.

Me and my big mouth......

A good rule is to never stir in old truths...

Shinzo, if what you say is correct, I am way off. I checked the dimentions in the Donnelys book to cartridge conversions, and it showed that the .300 Savage was marginally wider at base and shoulder, and .001" longer from head to shoulder than the .308 Winchester. And by so I found it safe, just as safe as fiering a regular cartridge in an improoved chamber.

While my manuals show some discrepancy in measurements, they all agree in the Savage being slightly smaller in the critical dimensions than the Winchester round. Eg. the Hodgdon manual shows length to shoulder of Savage 1.552 vs Winch 1.560 & shoulder Sav .448 vs .454. The Nosler one shows the same as 1.559 vs 1.560 & .447 vs .454. As these stand its not a lot but in a situation where various production tolerances were working against one it could be significant hence my call as unwise.
I have always found the Donelly manual as great for inspiration but riddled with inaccuracies & needing a lot of cross checking, at least the one I've got is. I think its the first one out. Even the addenda I sent a way for was a bit dodgy in some of its measurements.
Steve

Bent

I'm sure you are right, that you'll get away with something like that most of the time. But it is certainly not something that anyone should recommend.

As to why you don't read or hear about accidents from stuff like that - probably because the shooter picked himself up off the ground, said, "Oh $hit, Oh $hit, Oh $hit" and then quietly buried the evidence and never told anybody about it. That's what I would do.

Bent, you are correct. My math is way off-I was distracted @ the time I wrote that. I did this several years ago. Since then I have done this a few more times, probably less than 12 times. Only one time remotely. There is virtually no case stretch near the base of the case, however I would never attempt to resize and/or reload one of these cases. Forget all the measurements and compare these two cartridges side by side in ones hand. The similarities are what spurred my experiment. I would not hesitate if no other ammo was available, to use factory loaded .300Savage in a modern .308 chambered rifle. Maybe one day I'll get the Darwin award too. I may need to do this again and save the cases and provide pictures and measurements of the before and after.

Andy

Well, i pulled out my calipers last night, and measured my .300 Savage and .308Win in my collection. Obviously Donnelly is wrong, as the Savage is smaller than the .308. Enough to say that Cheechaco, Canuck and Shinzo are the ones who have this right - to set a standard. Do not do this, period. God knows what someone else might do; "the .270 Win is pretty darn close to the .300 WinMag......"

I still believe fiering .300 Savage in .308Win chambers would be safe in most guns, but you never know. I have seen larger differencies in surplus 8x57 chambers than this, and they were safe to fire, even if the fiered brass was not suitable for reloading.
In a modern chambered rifle, It should be just as safe as fiering factory ammo in any surplus rifle.

But there still is no good reason to do so.

Use correct ammo always, end of story.