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NRA Life member

George

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Shoot straight, shoot often, but by all means, use enough gun!

quote:

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Originally posted by Rifleman7:
appear to be as smooth as it should in my .308. I would take it back to the fellow that smithed it but it's about a 6 hour drive. The brass has some parallel makings on them after firing. Even mild loads are hard on bolt opening. I've checked about everything I can think of. Unfired brass chambers and extracts like silk. The bolt is just real hard to open after firing. The gun has a minimum chamber with a .339 neck so I'm real carful to measure necks after loading to make sure I've got .337. Bullets are usually seated .010 to .020 back from its jam figure. The stupid thing is that the rifle shots. 175 Match Kings will print in the mid twos for five shoots. The big question is - is there a home remedy I can try to smooth the chamber to see if that cures to hard bolt problem?

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What action are you using?

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LSF/375

I had such an experience with a new Remington 700 Limited Classic in 300 Weatherby when it came out some years ago. The fired cases from all loads, including factory loads that I knew were not over-pressure, stuck so strongly in the chamber that I had to pound the bolt open.

I solved the problem myself, with a rough-and-ready method that worked successfully. I got a 1/4 inch wooden dowel rod, cut it to about 18 inches, and wrapped about 1 1/4 inches of the end with emery cloth, with a pad of thick rubber band under the cloth to provide a "cushion" or "spring" that would push it outward. I made this in a layer, with the emery cloth on top of the rubber band. I stapled the end of the emery cloth to the dowel, and then wrapped it on the dowel by turning the dowel rod in my hand. (You have to make this by turning it in the direction -- clockwise, looking down the shaft from the non-emery end -- that will cause it to not bunch up when you put it in the chamber and turn it, as I describe below.)

I then put the other end of the dowel in an electric drill, and put the emery-covered end into the chamber of the rifle. I then turned the drill on, and used the emery in the chamber for a bit, moving it in and out so it would not rest at any particular point. Afterwards I took the emery off of the dowel and put a wad of steel wool on it and used this in the chamber to finish the polishing.

After this, the rifle worked like magic. No matter how hot a load, cases always extracted without any problem, like a hot knife moving through melted butter!

I wrote to Remington about it, and they replied that what they would have done was the same thing as I did -- polish the chamber. When I told the dealer who had sold me the gun about it, he said that having a new gun with an insufficiently polished chamber is not uncommon; according to him some even have visible tool marks in them. He mentioned that there are some autoloading pistols, for example, that will rip the rims off of cartridges that stick in their chambers.

[This message has been edited by LE270 (edited 12-27-2001).]

QuickLoad says you are hitting 66,000 PSI. I'd back off to 44 grains and work up slowly.

Every rifle is different!

Don

Regardless of powder charge and loading manual specs, cetris paribus, higher velocity means higher pressure.

I would think that anything over 2800 fps form a 26" for a 175 grn bullet from a 308 Win would be generating pressure troubles.

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MED

The sole purpose of a rifle is to please its owner