Was doing some research on the early TCR '83 Aristocrat rifles, and found this information on the Cast Boolits single shot forum:

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"I don't think the magnum conversion involved heat treating. All they did was replace the 1-piece locking lug with with a 2-piece one like the later Contenders. This allowed for more secure (uniform) lock-up and resulted in better accuracy and easier opening. You can still shoot any magnum barrel with an unconverted receiver, it just may not be all that accurate with the magnum cartridges and may be difficult to open compared with standard cartridges."

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I have never seen this said anywhere else, and always thought that it wasn't possible to use magnum barrels on "standard" TCR '83 Aristocrat actions.

What do you guys say? Is this guy right or wrong? If you say he is wrong, have you actually tried it, or are you relying solely on "common knowledge"?

What! Has no one here on AR ever tried a TCR "Magnum" barrel on a standard TCR '83 action? Hard to believe...I thought that between all of you guys, someone had tried everything that could be thought of....

Some early magnum barrels may be different, but any I've seen have a little pin in the locking area which matches up with the bolt in the receiver of magnum actions. The bolts on the magnum receivers have a cut in them to make room for that pin. One of the gunsmiths at T-C's custom shop told me that magnum actions, or actions converted to magnum are no stronger than regular actions. The difference is that magnum barrels with their magnum cartridges recoil faster and the bolts of the regular actions can move during recoil and the actions can "un-breech". There is a modification with the magnum actions so that the bolts cannot move during recoil so they stay locked. One can notice a difference in operation between the regular and magnum actions. If one opens a regular action the opening lever springs back to center position after the action is unlatched. With magnum actions the lever stays to the side when the action is opened, whether the lever is moved to either the right or left. I have both magnum and regular actions. I think one could use a Dremel tool and cut of the little pin on a magnum barrel and it would fire in a regular action, but it might "un-breech" if not used with a light load.

Thanks for the very useful and clear explanation. It is exactly what I was hoping to find here.

Just out of curiosity, do you suppose the bolt of the magnum action can be fairly simply installed into the standard action?

Or, alternatively, would it be feasible to cut the notch for the little locking pin into the bolt of the standard action so one could use a magnum barrel complete with pin?

Just asking for a guesstimate with those two questions, NOT expecting a definitive "Yes" or "No".

Thanks again for your help so far.

I have no idea if the bolts of a standard and magnum would be an easy swap without changing something else, but guess one could notch out the bolt. However, it seems it would be much easier to use a Dremel tool and cut the pin on a magnum barrel. I've never tried to take apart the actions except to take off the extra button on the safety, which is pretty easy.