Can older actions be sleeved to make them stronger?
Hypothetical question. Say you had a late 1800's Mauser where the metallurgy was questionable, could it be sleeved to make the action strong enough for modern pressures?

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Thanks for the great reply

+1 what doug said.
Just not a great way to do things nor would it provide the strength in the correct area.

Sleeving benchrest actions was the rage once upon a time. IIRC the desired result was to stiffen, not strengthen, the action.

I was in knee pants then, mind you.

For an eye opener, take the barrel off any mauser or clone and look at the abutments where the bolt lugs bear against, the shape, thickness, where half or more of the ramp abutment was removed AND look at the bolt lugs themselves...the thickness, width, height...any cutouts or notches.

You can calculate the shear area on the bolt lugs and on the abutments, which will give you a number to use to calculate the amount of pressure they MIGHT hold, then think about HOW the pressures push against those structures, then think of the strength of the metals in those days.

The 3rd "lug" was put on the M98's for a reason.

It is amazing just how stong even the early Mausers are, but everything has limits.

Sleeving was for adding stiffness rather than for adding strength...along with larger diameter and longer threads.

Take a look at a the latest Browning aluminum framed rifles and you will see a good example of what Doug is talking about. Take the mag out and look at how many lugs are actuall engaged at lock up...there may be 6 lugs on the bolt, but only....of them actually engage their mirror in the barrel extension.

Old mausers still produce substantial ballistics and keep taking game all over the world.

Luck

"stronger to take modern pressures?"

Though it is true some modern cartridges are loaded to higher peak pressures than most were in the old days, those aren't necessarily "modern" pressures, just higher ones.

Some cartridges in the old days had pretty danged high pressures. Take the 280 Halger, which was basically a .280 Ross loaded hot as Hell.

Some of the Newton cartridges were loaded fairly "warmish" too, and so were most of the wildcats which have now become "legitimized" factory cartridges...such as the .22-250 Savage, and the whole Weatherby series of cartridges which grew out of wildcats such as the "CCC" and PMVF (Powell-Miller Venturi Freebore) series.

Anyway, the older, maybe weaker, actions can still handle high velocity loads, so long as the loader uses modern powders. One of the advantages of modern powders is that they allow us to load to a relatively mild maximum pressure and then maintain that pressure for a longer time.

That allows us to put more total pressure "under the burning curve" and apply it to the base of the bullet. The result of applying a close to max pressure for a longer time is that it boots the bullet in the butt more, thus producing better (higher) velocities without materially increasing the danger of blowing up an action.

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