M96 sporters in 30-06 confuses me

[Tudenom]

So, there’s a lot of these 30-06 conversions of Swedish m96 rifles floating around and it really confuses me.

How did they get these rifles to feed properly and how durable are they? It seems odd that a small ring action regularly chambered for lower pressure 6.5mm and 7mm cartridges can handle 30-06 pressures? And yet there’s a ton of them around and I’ve never heard of one blowing up.

I can’t imagine the average Swede was using low pressure hand loads, they must have used off the shelf ammo right?

Is this one of those situations where we’re assuming the strength of an action based on a cartridge limitation rather that what the actual strength is?

I’ve heard a lot of talk that the m98 is “safer” but does that necessarily mean a m96 is unsafe?

 

[bearhunter]

The M96 actions that are in chambered in 30-06 and several other chamberings other than the 6.5x55 are not conversions for the most part.

There are some ''conversions'' around that were done by gunsmiths and even some after market companies such as Globe Firerms, etc.

The Swede M96 actions are quite strong and capable of handling the commercial loads for cartridges in the 30-06 pressure ranges at their time of manufacture and likely still quite capable to day if the commercial cartridges are loaded within SAAMI tolerances.

I have one that I reworked to #### on opening, with a very decent Timney trigger, chambered for the 6mm Remington cartridge and fitted with a Remington take off barrel. I don't load the ammo for this rifle beyond the pressures the action was originally designed to handle safely. When the time comes to sell this rifle, I will swap out the barrel, if I'm still capable, with a NOS Swede 6.5x55 carbine barrel, still in the white.

I have seen these rifles chambered, by enterprising smiths for the 243Win as well as the 308win. Some of them were beautifully done, but IMHO are marginal strength wise, for anything, even commercial loads for those cartridges.

There were even commercial barrels offered by manufacturers out of the US and Europe chambered for what IMHO were high pressure cartridges beyond the strength of these actions.

Now this is where things get sticky. There are ''small ring'' 98 actions that have the same thread dimensions as the M96. Turkey manufactured a large ring action with the same threads as the M96, so they could manufacture barrels that would fit universally to the other Mausers they had in their inventory.

 

[Hitzy]

Lots of Swedish companies (Vapen/Stiga/etc) converted 96's into just about everything out there short of belted mags.
Kimber used the actions as well at one time for many different high pressure chamberings like 22-250/308/243 etc.
The 30'06 conversions required removal of some material behind the lower receiver lug, which is what most people question about the integrity and weakening the action.
There have been so many of them done I don't think there is anything to worry about there.
The only real issues with 96's is the gas handling in the event of case failure, everything kind of goes straight back into your face.
If you google M96 Kabooms you will find a few dozen examples that came apart pretty spectacularly, usually in the original 6.5x55 chambering, but again, pretty rare stuff.

 

[Potashminer]

I had asked similar question some years ago - that CGN guy Baribal answered - pointed out that STIGA (the one that I have) has unusually long throat - was a thing Roy Weatherby knew about to reduce Peak Pressure in his "boomers". And then the STIGA's, at least, were then "proofed" in Denmark - not sure that is a CIP country but likely similar standard - had to hold 125% of the normal service pressure - without deformity - after the modifications described above. I do not think the USA conversions required any proofing before sale to customer.

As far as gas handling in the event of cartridge rupture - not sure that I can find much difference between elderly Swede design and push feed (post 1964) Winchester - maybe is not experienced as much these days - compared to "back in the day" when it happened - apparently commonly.

https://www.canadiangunnutz.com/for...-Stiga-rifles-and-European-Nito-Proof-Testing

 

[Tudenom]

Thanks guys, that clears up a lot.

The long throat thing seems to be a trick the Swedes have been using for a long time, my Swedish rolling block in 8x58R has a super long throat and roomy neck and some people think it was to reduce pressures in an action originally built to handle black powder loads.

This all makes sense to me.