Who has reamers and reloading dies for the .270 Gibbs?

I have never heard of the cartridge before

OTTO---

Be careful when ordering Gibbs calibers. There have been at least four variations that I know of and many times the reamer you get for the chamber is totally different than the reloading dies.

I'm pretty sure Hunnington's Die Specialties has the reamers to make dies. Contact them and get a cartridge case drawing then send that to a reamer maker (Dave Manson is my favorite) and have him grind you a reamer to match the dies.

Which ever way you go you'll be spending a lot of money for VERY little if any advantage. Powder capacity is only 2 grains more than the 270 Win. and a full 10 grains less than a 270 Weatherby Mag. There's no point whatever in the 270 Gibbs.

Hey"
I have a set Of RBCS .270 Gibbs Dies,
1geejay

Once again JBelk is right on the money.

Rocky Gibbs made his rep in the days before chronographs were generally available and velcoities were estimated....there's only so much you can do with the basic '06 case and one of them "ain't" making it a magnum.

I had the same problem with my 240 Gibbs.

My solution was to assemble the rifle then send three fully fireformed cases to Huntington and they made a set of dies to fit. Worked great.

A comparison of the 270s was made by a friend and I in the early 80s in a Winchester M70 with 24" barrel.
The stock 270 Winchester chambering achieved 2970fps with 150 Hornady's and 4831 powder. This load was maximum and gave .0005 expansion of the head of the brass.
Rechambered to 270 Gibbs and achieved 3130 fps at the same pressure levels.
Rechambered to 270 Weatherby and got 3210 fps. It was necessary to set the barrel back slightly to rechamber to the Weatherby since the shoulder location on the Gibbs was too far up to clean up.
The change in case capacity above the 270 winchester is more like 6 or 7 grains I think. I would probably not build myself a Gibbs unless I felt I wanted to duplicate Grandpa's rifle. Grandpa never forgot the lecture he got on headspace when he took his damaged rifle over to Rocky's place. He had been firing 270 Winchester factory loads. This was when I was about 14 years old. A while back. Regards, Bill.

Rocky Gibbs lived on the edge, I went through the Gibbs stage in about 195?...Lots of pressure there...Try a 270 Wby if the std. 270 isn't enough for you, that is the only way to get a substantial increase in velocity.

I agree that the performance of the Gibbs line was originally overstated (not unlike the WSM line today). I disagree that the Gibbs concept, which uses the longer-than-necessary neck of the '06 brass to increase case capacity is not a good concept. Bill Leeper's numbers look pretty close to what I would expect.

Ken Howell's line of cartridges, with their '06 headsize and magnum length, carry the Gibbs concept its maximum reasonable extent. If I wanted a higher-performance .270, coupled with greater magazine capacity (and smooth feeding), I think the Howell cartridge would be the logical choice.

I read that Gibbs made a hydraulic press to form brass as it's so difficult to do so otherwise.

This is carrying the "improved" concept to the ridiculous and is why we were stuck with the ill designed belted cases. It's just easier to fireform a belted case and not have to jam the bullet into the leade or fire pistol powder in a case with a filler or small wad.

I thought about the Gibbs line at the time and am glad that I stayed away from it.

Someone did get some "basic brass" at once that was the 06 case as a straight cylinder. I don't recall what became of that.

In summary the Gibbs line was a bad idea done wrong. I think he used military brass also as it was cheaper. I bet he said it was stronger. Maybe so but it held less powder.

Gibbs did push the edge. However, in reading about him one small fact is usually overlooked. When he quoted barrel length it was from the nose of the bullet. So when you compare velocities remember his barrel was about 3" longer than you would expect. So his 26" barrel is 29" by the way we normally measure.

If the Gibbs cartridges are such a bad idea then why is the 9.3X62 such a good one. Looks like nearly the same case too me..

I have a couple of Gibbs cartridges (240 and 7mm). I also have a few Ackley improved cartridges (257, 7mm, 280, 30-06, 8mm-06). The Ackley's are easier to fire form then the Gibbs. The Gibbs give you slightly more performance. The Howell line as, mentioned, simply takes this idea a step further. Regardless of opinion, the simple fact is that improving the cartridge gives a larger case capacity. All other things being equal, this will give you more velocity. How much will be dependant on the other components in the firearm. Whether that is worth the trouble (and it is varying degrees of trouble) of special dies and forming brass is really an individual call. Some of us like to fool around with differant cartridges. FWIW - Dan

[ 02-03-2003, 19:59: Message edited by: dan belisle ]

Many of us like to try or experiment with different cartridges, rifles, etc. I'm all for that.

However, I am convinced that if you really want more velocity than the standard cases provide, then you should go to a magnum case. Cartridges such as the Gibbs line give only slightly more performance, and that is reached by going to more trouble than it is worth - unless you just want to play with it.

Jerry

My dies are from redding , when I get home I'll check to see who made my reamer. After rocky moved to Idaho he used vernon speers chrono, Jack O'conner said "I don't know how brother Gibbs does it but it's not smoke and mirrors". The powder capacity is not 2 grs extra, it's 6 grs extra, don't confuse it with the Ackley. The Hydraulic case former is to extend barrel life, the cases aren't that hard to make( R.C.B.S. made these for several years).

Otto, my reamer is from Clymer

After rocky moved to Idaho he used vernon speers chrono

I asked about this once while touring the Blount facility in Lewiston, Idaho when they still gave tours. The person showing us around said "Yes, he did use our facility. Most of the time he was in there alone because most folks were scared to be in the same room with him. We just knew someday he was going to blow himself up".

This goes hand in hand with what Ray stated. He definately lived on the edge with some of his loads. I also remember "Mr 270" himself saying he couldn't believe that the action would open with one finger after seeing what some loads chonographed in that facility. Rocky definately liked turbo-charged loads.

Gibbs was a firm believer that the brass case was the weak link. His loads that produced the high velocities were loaded in the brass that was strong enough to take the pressures. Put the same load in Remington brass and it wasn't a pretty sight.
My uncle still has the rifle grandpa had. It is an FN action with a Douglas barrel in a straight grained but not unattractive stock.It is still a pretty good shooting rifle. I made my headspace gauge using dimensions from a fired case from this rifle.
As a 14 year old kid I was impressed just to be in an actual gunsmith's shop whenever we were there. It was full of wondrous things. Regards, Bill.