I have a recently rebarreled Model 70 push feed. I just saw that the bolt nose is dragging on the back of the barrel mostly on the face of the bottom lug. Will this harm accuracy? The rifle is not shooting as well as I expected an aftermarket barrel to shoot.

Sounds to me the Smith set the face distance a little close.

And it depends on how much and how hard it's dragging.

Personally I'd take the barrel off and face it back about .010" for clearance then reassemble and check from there.

You could safely sand/polish the bolt nose back a touch to get the clearance. It it were much more that a thousandth or two you would have to use a lot of force to close the bolt.

will definitely harm accuracy

I thought about sanding or stoning the bolt face some. I think I would be happier with a little more clearance though. The barrel will come off.

I thought the bolt operated a little to hard. Yesterday I had the firing pin out and was going to adjust the resizing die. I was looking for a little "feel" when I got the shoulder of the case in the right place. Trouble is, I had "feel" with nothing in the chamber and started looking.

0.005" = minimum, 0.010" = maximum IMO.
Regards, Joe

It could be slop in the bolt handle allowing the bolt to contact the breech face when there is no round in the chamber and the safety is on middle position. This wouldn't hurt accuracy at all.

Take the firing pin assembly out and close the bolt. Does it move back and forth?

No. It's tight as a tick.

I only suggested removing the barrel as there is a concern with accuracy. This would afford you the opportunity to examine the chamber at the same time.

quote:

You could safely sand/polish the bolt nose back a touch to get the clearance. It it were much more that a thousandth or two you would have to use a lot of force to close the bolt.

X2

I looked at it again and the bolt face is pretty rough. Just polishing the tool marks out will probably fix it. I guess that is the easiest!

Just to clarify, the "bolt Face" is what the cartridge base is held against when the cartridge rim is under the extractor and cartridge is chambered. I think you're referring to the bolt "nose" which is the raised portion surounding the bolt face, right? You can take a couple thousandths off that with no effect, but if you take a couple off the "bolt face" you could end up with excess headspace.

You are so right John.
Butch

Yes, bolt nose! I started out right in my original post and confused myself.