I have a win. mod 71 Deluxe in 348..working up loads seemed mild loads were to hot, after much investigation I stumbled on the fact that factory and handloaded ammo once fired will not accept a bullet, therefore the neck chamber is tooo tight, so I need to have the necked either polishedd out or recut, Is this correct and who has a propper neck reamer...ON firing even mild loads the lever drops a tad, a fault of the 71s tapered locking lugs as compared to the 86s square lugs, never the less its the tight neck causing the problem, correct????

You need to neck turn the brass. It's not that hard to do. With the tools you can do it by hand. Target shooters do it all the time .We set it up in a lathe or milling machine.

Get hold of Jack Belk I'll he could hellp!

I have the tools to outside neck ream..Id need cutters for the 348, but think I should take a chamber cast first.

You might want to check your case length. I have had more problems with cases stretching and ending up getting pinched than I have had with tight necks. I got pressure signs and bullets wouldn't enter the fired cases. .348 cases do stretch a bit.
C.G.B.

I doubt it's a chamber problem.

Try marking the brass with a sharpie and find out where the interference is. It appears from the linked image that the neck is slightly tapered .002 from the base of the neck to the case mouth. Images of the loaded rounds seem to show a heavy roll crimp too.



https://upload.wikimedia.org/w...imensions_sketch.jpg

all cases were new, trimmed, and expanded just a tad to accept bullets, then light crimped adn the fed well and the minimum loads were used to start with..They shot fine but I noticed the lever dropped just a bare tad, indicating the minimum loads were a bit too warm!! then I tried to put a bullet in the fire cases and got no go..

That tells me the problem is in the neck, and yes I suspect I could outside neck ream and solve the problem, just like I do on my bench rest chambers, BUT WHO WANTS A 348 WITH A BENCH REST CHAMBER?? so Im off to the friendly gunsmith to take a chamber cast and find out the problem..Im guessing a polishing of the neck chamber might work as perhaps build up from lead bullets perhaps, but we will see. It was suggested that it didn't come from the factory that way, but Ive seen worse..

OK, try a poor man's headspace check. Sacrifice a fired case and cut it off behind the shoulder. Seat a fired primer w/o anvil about .020 proud. Chamber the round hard to lockup. Remove case and measure protrusion. That is your headspace number. If over around .006 you have an issue.

It doesn't have head space, thats the first thing I checked..

Ray, does the problem happen with old refired brass as well? I expect you are not running very high pressure and the new brass might not want to react to the diameter of the chamber neck right away.

stripped it down completely and cleaned the inards squeeky clean, along with the chamber, so if I can ever get this puppy back together again, I will fire it..I tested it for headspace in the beginning, but with light loads, REtested with warm loads and got some beginning headspace .007 008 and 009 depending on load and thats pretty common.. Headspace can be managed by neck sizeing with an ocassional FL resize in some cases..So I need to have the locking lugs, both left and right, replaced if I can find them, and thats not likely, the other option is a sligtly rough chamber can cause the lever to drop giving the impression of a hot load, but it can also be activated by the primer upon firing in such a case, and polishing the chamber will cure that. I had this happen once before and that was the fix..

Hopefully I will have the best and most expensive long tang 71 in history..It sure is slick working since I cleaned it in detail..

I suspect the neck of a fired case will not accept a bullet because the load is low pressured enough that the neck is no expanding.
I also think the lever dropping is related to the same thing. With such low pressure, there is, effectively, no back thrust. With no pressure against the locking blocks, it is common for the lever to drop.
I would pull the barrel so I could get a good measurement on the chamber neck. Regards, Bill

I think I got it fixed..

quote:

Originally posted by Atkinson:
I think I got it fixed..

What was the problem?

A 1937 chamber that had some rust but not pitted, it cleaned up well an is working, hope I never have to put one together, think the good Lord for the good gunsmiths of this country..A lever action Win can get plumb dirty in around a 100 years...bore is excellent..