I have a post 64 M70 that has severe galling and wear on the locking lugs and recesses. I cleaned up the locking lugs on my little lathe and now want to clean up the lug seats in the receiver. My little lathe won't handle that job but a friend who has taken gunsmithing courses at Lassen College and has a lathe big enough to do the job wants to work with me on it. I don't know what size his lathe is-it looks like about a 10 x 20 or 24.



My plan is to fit a mandrel that has been turned on centers to the bolt bore and then fit sleeves(probably aluminum) to front and rear of the action. Turn OD of sleeves concentric to bolt bore and then hold rear sleeve in 4 jaw and indicate it in and hold front sleeve in steady rest. The rear sleeve would have to be long enough to reach the 4 jaw chuck.



Is there a simpler way to do this in a small lathe?

When truing an action, everything is referenced from the bolt bore. Whether parallel or inline. Usually this is done by an action jig which is a large diameter sleeve that has two sets of adjusting screws. The jig is held in the jaws of the lathe and it is indicated oof a mandrel that is fitted to the bolt bore. GO to Greg Tannel's website and get the idea of how it's done.

or just stamp another 0 behind the 70 and you are all set!!!
woofer

Marc,
The system as you describe it would work fine. Simply fitting the sleeve to the receiver ring and then running this sleeve in the steady while driving with a mandrel in the bore works too.
The sleeve with adjusting screws at each end also works well and I've used a similar sytem for odd shaped peices for years. When using this on an action some care must be taken to avoid distortion of the receiver. Receivers can be distorted much more easily than one might think.
early on in my carrer I used a piloted lap to smooth up and true locking lug seats. It worked surprisingly well but was a bit time consuming. Regards, Bill.

Woofer: Your post is not very easy to understand, but are you trying to imply that excellent accuracy and reliable performance CAN NOT be obtained using a Remington 700 action?

If that is the implication you are trying to relay then I pronounce you not only a fool but an illiterate as well!

Your obvious inexperience and dubious intelligence has been duly noticed!

Hold into the wind

VarmintGuy

Thanks for the reply Bill. I thought about just driving the mandrel but for some reason I was thinking there would be nothing to indicate off of. But of course I can indicate off the mandrel. That will eliminate making a sleeve for the rear.

I thought about lapping but it would certainly take a while to do. Also the minor diameter of the threads is smaller than the diameter of the bolt lugs so a simple cylinder shaped lap that will enter the threads won't completely clean up the full diameter of the lug seats. I had some ideas about how to deal with that but when all is said and done it seems simpler to set the receiver up and machine it.

VG,

Woofer's post looks pretty easy to understand for me. It appears that he is implying exactly the opposite of what you are implying. You might note that.

Marc,

Give Dave Manson (Manson Precision Reamers) a call (810) 953-0732 and see if he can help you out.

Good Luck,

Rick