Hi.
I have found a .224 Wby Mag fore sale at a "nice price". But I am a bit worried about the cartridge, who seems to be obsolete and expensive. My question is therfore; Is it possible fore a gunsmith to chamber it to 220 Swift or 22-250 or maybe a 22-243 Middlestead without changing the barrel? It is a varmintmaster rifle, with very nice wood.

Regards
Andreas

Personally that rifle (I'm assuming a scaled down Mark V) should be used as is. The case head is an oddball and while it might be opened up to the 22-250 It's just not something I'd recommend.

I'd bit the bullet and buy a few hundred rounds of brass or loaded ammo and dies and shell holder and just use it "as is".

Personally, if I saw one sitting in the used racks for $250 I'd leave it there.

Had it become popular and ammo was made by the majors it'd have been a different story. I doubt that many wildcats was ever made from the brass either. Great cartridge and beautiful rifle.....but no one bought them.

The 220 swift and the 22-243 will clean up the Roy's chamber with one pass of the reamer. The 22-250 will also on everything but the case length. The Roy is 1.923" and the 22-250 is only 1.921" so you're going to have a step .002" in front of the 22-250 chamber where the .256" diameter neck of the 22-250 steps to .250 before it goes to the throat diameter.

Like Vapodog said you're also going to have to open the bolt face from .430" to .473" and you'll probably have to play with the rails to get the fatter cases to feed properly.

Ok, thank you for the aswers. It was a big help for me. I will probably buy the rifle and start with the original .224 Wby. But it feels good to know that it is possible in the feature to chamber it for another, more common cartridge.

Best regards

Andréas

quote:

Originally posted by andpern:
Ok, thank you for the aswers. It was a big help for me. I will probably buy the rifle and start with the original .224 Wby. But it feels good to know that it is possible in the feature to chamber it for another, more common cartridge.

Best regards

I think you'll be very happy you bought it, if it is in nice shape. First off, there are no flys on the cartridge itself. It performs well at what it was designed to do...i.e., dispatch small to medium sized varmints out to 350 yards or so.

Second, and more important - You'll want to leave it in its original xhambering, I'd think. Really nice condition original Mark V .224 Weatherby Mag rifles have just about doubled in price this last year or so....at least in this neck of the woods. I know of a couple of "As New" condition ones which have sold for more than that (like over $2,500 U.S.) in the past 6 months. The .240 Wby Mags are going even higher.

andpern,

I had a .224 WM Varmintmaster 26" barrel that was phenominally accurate. I always regreted selling that rig.I also had one in 22/250 that I never fired. Prefered the combination of unique .224 in the unique action. If the one you have found is in good condition, I would buy it in a flash. They also produced 24" light barrel version. Dont know if 220 swift will fit in the magbox.
Next time you see the rifle,can you measure the magbox and let me know what length it is? It would be a great action to maybe chamber in 250/3000 savage for a light,nifty mountain rifle.