I have a question regarding barreling a Mauser: On a large ring the distance between the bolt face and breech is governed by the inner �C� ring. It would seem that other than changing bolts there is no practical way to decrease this distance. My question is, what is the maximum allowable distance from breech to bolt face? All the Mausers I�ve measured have hovered right at .100�. I seem to have .110� stuck in my head as the Max but can�t remember where that figure came from. I ask because this equates to the amount of exposed brass and obviously less is better.

Thanks,
Mike

Zir .110 is fine ( still deeper than a rem 700 or Win M70).Much less than .100 & you start having a problem with clearance for the nose of the extractor.

z1r---

.103 to .105 encompasses about 98% of M-98s. You can VERY easily reduce that distance by stepping the breech end of the barrel.

For instance---

You have an action with a severely pitted bolt face and it takes .010 to clean it, (more than that and it's best to have it re-heattreated.). So now the proper distance from the face of the barrel to the end of the headspace guage is .115.

(Arrived at by measuring the distance from the front of the receiver ring to the inner ring and subtracting that from the distance from the front of the receiver to the bolt face and subtracting .002 more for thread seating and crush. .735 minus .630 = .105 minus .002 = .103)

To get back to .103/.105 protrusion, face .010 from the outer .355 of the barrel face. That will leave the same amount of metal around the cartridge case and maintain the dimensions as they were meant to be.

Thanks Gentlemen.

And thanks to JBelk for the correction advice. It'd be like a semi-safety breech.