headspacing????

[johnnygun]

I shoot a number of 30-06 rifles and all have passed inspection with a military armorer at the shoots. I saw a set of Forster headspace gauges on ebay and purchased them just for fun so I could "headspace" a 30-06 at my leisure.

I tried to headspace my springfield and none of the gauges would allow the bolt to close. I tried my 1917 enfield-same story-none of the gauges would allow the bolt to close.

I then grabbed my best garand, and all the guages allowed the bolt to close. I grabbed my worst garand(the one I use for blanks in re-enactments) and the bolt closed on all the gauges.

I'm confused. If these guns all checked out with an armorer,shoot perfectly(except the blank firing garand)and I never get problems with the brass, what am I doing wrong with thses gauges????

John

P.S.-the forster go gauge reads 2.0487, the no go gauge reads 2.0547 and the field gauge reads 2.0577

 

[tiriaq]

Are the extractors on the Springfield and Enfield causing the problem?

 

[Aries-]

a lot of guns need to have the Extractor removes from the bolt, or the gauge modified so the extractor does not touch the gauge. Also a field gauge that most military armorers use will allow a standard "no go" to have the bolt close on it. look at the sizes of them.

"FIELD: Corresponds to the longest safe headspace. If a rifle closes on a FIELD gage, its chamber is dangerously close to, or longer than, SAAMI’s specified maximum chamber size. If chamber headspace is excessive, the gun should be taken out of service until it has been inspected and repaired by a competent gunsmith. FIELD gages are slightly shorter than the SAAMI maximum in order to give a small safety margin."