I have been reading some material about swaping barrels on Savage 110s. Suposedly Midway is carrying everything you need to do this type of project yourself. The headspace is set with the barrel lock nut?

Has anyone tried this or know anything more about it. Thanks for the input
Happy Holidays,
HBB

[ 12-24-2002, 22:50: Message edited by: hillbillybear ]

HB Bear,

There is an article in the new American Rifleman (January 2003) Dope Bag about the Savage/Midway switch barrel guns.

The head space is set by a head-space gauge, and the barrel nut is tightened to lock the barrel in place.

jim dodd

Thanks, Jim
Happy Holidays
HBB

HBB:

For the love of God, save your money. If you're going to do it, get a couple of pieces of thick leather and a pipe wrench. Lock down the barreled action appropriately. Those locking nuts on the barrels come off VERY easily. If you're going to something with factory ammo, use a round of "respectable" ammo to set your headspace, tighten the locking nut in the same manner you took it off, and you're good to go.

You absolutely do NOT need to buy "specialized tools" to swap a Savage barrel for a Savage barrel.

Good luck.

Russ

By the way, depending on the cartridge you're swapping "to," you can either open up the bolt face or swap bolt heads. If you're going to something smaller, you'll need a smaller head. I think Brownells lists them at around $12 or so; I don't know what Midway is charging.

You "can" get the headspace gauge if you want, but I wouldn't spend the money if I had any good Federal factory ammo around.

Russ

Currently I have Midway barrels for 257 Roberts, 6.5x55 Swede, 280 Remington, 308 Win, 338/06, 35 Whelen, and 416 Taylor in addition to the original Savage 30/06 barrel for a left-hand Savage 116 rifle. Using Midway provided wrench. Headspacing off factory ammo or my own resized cases. Can swap barrels in less than five minutes.

Using Warne detachable scope rings and Bushnell 4200 series scope. One inch groups with first handloads. Will develop accuracy loads one of these days. Also installed Timney trigger.

Website and telephone calls to Midway indicate swap barrel system has been discontinued. Further phone calls and investigation indicate that this is not true. The new short magnums, e.g. the 300 Winchester Short Magnum and 300 Remington Short Ultra Magnum, have been discontinued. But the standards calibers and traditional H&H based magnums have not been, though they are currently out-of-stock. The Midway people that I finally got through to claim this system is more popular than they originally imagined and that people are trying things with the system that had not been anticipated. They originally thought people would buy one new barrel, install it, keep it on, and discard the original barrel. The idea that people are buying many barrels and swapping them routinely was not anticipated, per the Midway people's comments.

I have had no problems yet. This is not to be confused to be a recommendation or endorsement, just a report of current experience. Have swap barrel systems from other providers (gunsmiths) that have advantages and disadvantages.

After reading the American Rifleman article, it is obvious that they and Midway both thought of the operation as a "change barrel" process to change the barrel to a new caliber -- once.

Obviously people here are trying the switch barrel concept, and changing back and forth.

This would be one way to buy one of the new Savage guns with the new trigger (which is in limited caliber choices), and change the barrel to something the shooter is more interested in.

jim dodd

headspace gages and witness marks...

you can rent them from www.reamerrentals.com for like $5 bucks.

jeffe

My 22BR barrel will headspace off of a piece of brass. My 17 Mach IV barrel, however, must be headspaced using a shim, since even with a piece of brass in the chamber, I wind up with zero space between the bolt nose and the end of the barrel. I use a piece of drink can, which is about .0045, temporarily stuck to the end of the bolt nose. Tighten the barrel up to the shim, lock the nut, remove the shim, shoot, enjoy.

Rich in VA

If you use loaded ammo, don't forget to take the striker or firing pin out of the bolt. Sure would not want one to go off while working on it.

Headspacing is really easy on a Savage. Just insert the Go gauge or casing into the chamber, put bolt in the gun, and screw in the barrel until it stops, then tighten the barrel locking screw. You now have a minimum headspaced gun.

I have been to the Savage plant, and that is exactly how they do it.

[ 12-26-2002, 17:33: Message edited by: Terry Blauwkamp ]

Thanks for the input guys it really cleared up my understanding of the situation. I think even a hamfisted all thumbs country boy such as myself could perform this type of rebarrel work.

I am very intrigued by the idea of building a "poor man's" custom rifle all by myself.

If all goes well I should have the project well underway by the Spring.

Good Shooting,
HBB

[
When you were there, Terry, do you recall meeting Joe DeGrande? Great guy.

Russ[/QB][/QUOTE]

No Russ, I don't I had a older fellow named Henry that gave me the tour.

In case any of you think you can just walk up and get a tour, it won't work.

I BS'ed my into the office, and then told the receptionist, to think up any story she had heard before that got someone in for a tour.

As she was laughing her self silly, the "boss" walked by and wondered what was so funny?

She told he what I had said..... as he too was laughing, he said "call Henry to come up here for a tour".

He said my question was the best one he had heard in such along time that I deserved a tour. Henry was none to happy about it, but after a bit, he warmed right up, and next thing I knew, I had been there 2 hours,and could not get away from him. I thought he was going to adopt me there for a while.

They do some really simple things, like polishing the chamber with a countoured "Flex Hone". It also breaks the edge of the chamber so it feeds smoothly.

They also drill the barrels with them standing vertical and also after button rifling, they chamber them in a vertical position too, rather than like in a lathe.

Last week I woke up and got ready for work but my pants were still wet, while they dried I changed the .416 Taylor barrel over to .220 Swift and mounted the different scope. Hows that for easy and quick. The first few times you do it you will check over and redo it because it's so easy youre sure you're doing something wrong. I ordered the barrel nut wrench but when I saw the barrel vice I printed off the picture and showed it to my brother in law. He built me one from scrap at the machine shop.

I'm having a problem setting up my A&B 416 Taylor. With a piece of belted brass in the chamber I close the bolt and screw down the barrel until I am out of threads and the bolt still opens an closes easily implying that I still have a fair amount of space between the bolt face and cartridge head. Can I fireform with a light load of Unique, cereal and wax plug and just headspace off the shoulder of the formed case? The barrel lock nut is out as far as it can go. What gives?????

Snowcat,

You need to get yourself a belted magnum go gauge and really figure out what is going on. Setting headspace off a piece of brass is a dangerous practice IMO. My gunsmith and I just had a discussion on this, with variance in brass you can be way off. A go gauge will cost you all of ~$15 from MidwayUSA; various body parts are mostly irreplaceable.

Good luck,
Todd

Here are a few facts to think about.

A Forster headspace gauge measures 0.220" SAAMI specs.

A WW 458 Win Mag case measures 0.212"

A reformed Rem 416 Rem Mag case measures 0.208"

A Rem 7mm Rem mag case measures 0.206".

The threaded portion of my A&B 416 Taylor barrel measures 1.550" as does the original 30-06 Savage barrel.

Snowcat; If you ran out of threads trying to use just a piece of belted mag brass you have something very wrong somewhere with the barrel, the chamber or the bolt or you're doing something else extremely wrong, or maybe just jerking chains.

I, just today, faced off my Forster headspace gauge to 0.2115 so all the brass I use will fit and work without excess stretching.

You need to listen up here, Snowcat, before you become a deceased feline.

FIRST: Get a piece of new 458 Win Mag brass, grease it up and run it into the sizing die that you are going to use.

SECOND: Take that piece of reformed brass and put it into the A&B barrel, put the bolt into the receiver and lock it down. Screw the nut onto the barrel, screw the barrel into the receiver until the brass touches the bolt face, put the barrel into a barrel vice and lock the nutmaking sure the receiver doesn't turn, I use a 16" cresent wrench over the front sight base, you don't need much torque. IF YOU RUN OUT OF THREADS DOING IT THIS WAY THEN YOU HAVE A BIG PROBLEM WITH THE CHAMBER. SEND THE BARREL BACK AND START OVER.

Run a search on my posts and most all the problems I had and the solutions will be reveiled. You have a fast learning curve here, one wrong move can do the doo-doo. Screw the malto-meal case forming crap, you seem not to understand the parameters here. Either that or forget all I've written and just name me as your beneficiary, that would work. I need a new truck anyhow.

Mak-
I'm asking here, which should imply, at least, I've got brains enough to understand the ramifications of excessive headspace. Should the barrel nut edge extend past the end of the barrel threads (it does on the original 25-06 barrel)? If so this would explain my inability to screw the barrel in far enough to headspace correctly as my nut bottoms out where the threads end. If I remove the recoil lug and rethread the barrel it only takes an additional 1/2-3/4 turn of the barrel to snug things up. So, I was kind of more wondering if there were mechanical reasons (like a change in barrel contour) which might interfere with the way the new barrel threads into the receiver. I may just need to mill some length out of the barrel nut to allow the barrel to seat deeper. As for the malt-o-meal deal, something I read and wondered if the low pressure might allow the brass to flow lengthwise enough (brass isn't sealed as tightly to the cylinder wall) to correct minor headspace conditions. I guess you don't think so.

To suggest that I am jerking anyone's chain is an insult.

[ 03-13-2003, 11:01: Message edited by: snowcat ]

Just to chime in real quick. One thing to remember is not all barrels are compatable with all calibers. IE, the 300WSM has different threads on the barrel than some of the other standard calibers so you cannot just swap them. My buddy bought a 300 WSM with the intent of puting a 257 Roberts barrel on it. The threads are different. Found this out after buying all the stuff to do it.

Dogcatcher--
I had heard of that inconsistancy and its dissappointing because I'd really like to play with the wsm cases. What I ended up having to do is knock down the last 1/4" of threading on the muzzle end of the barrel nut slightly, clean up the threads and now the nut turns onto the barrel far enough to allow me to turn the barrel firmly against a formed, chambered case. Thanks for the heads up.