New rifle tight chamber

RangerPark

RangerPark

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I have a rifle on hand in 7mm Remington Magnum. Bolt won't close on any ammo that I have available. Checked with a Manson go gauge, it's extremely tight and will only close with a significant amount of force. Double checked everything, it's all clean and I don't see anything causing interference.

Warranty work is not really an option on this rifle. At this point I think my only option is to have the chamber touched up with a finish reamer.

Could there be anything I missed? Any other possible solutions before I go with the reamer option? Thanks!
 
Are you trying to chamber factory ammo or reloads? sizing belted magnums can be a real pain and in some cases requires a special belted case body die offered by Whidden, if it is a savage, you can loosen the nut and spin the barrel out, if it's anything else, you could polish the lock lugs with some super fine valve grinding compound and gain a few hairs
 
Before trying anything more agressive, are you sure they’re isn’t any factory debris/grease left? Trying break cleaner/ pneumatic air
Wont hurt at least.
 
yodave said:
Are you trying to chamber factory ammo or reloads? sizing belted magnums can be a real pain and in some cases requires a special belted case body die offered by Whidden, if it is a savage, you can loosen the nut and spin the barrel out, if it's anything else, you could polish the lock lugs with some super fine valve grinding compound and gain a few hairs
Click to expand...

It won't chamber anything, not even the go gauge. I thought about lapping the lugs but I'm afraid I need more. Ideally I'm looking to have no resistance at all on the go gauge.

Some of my reloaded brass have started to develop the donut above the belt but they all chambered fine in my previous rifle.
 
Don't know what type of rifle this is.
If the bolt has to be forced closed on a GO gauge, you are using the gauge incorrectly. A light touch should be employed, preferably with the ejector and extractor removed if possible. If the extractor is not easily removable, make sure that the gauge is hooked underneath the extractor. A plunger ejector definitely will affect the "feel" of using the gauge - that is why it is a good idea to remove the ejector if it is the plunger type.
If the bolt does not close easily on a belted magnum GO gauge, this would suggest that headspace is too tight.
It tells you nothing about whether the chamber is too tight. The gauge doesn't contact the chamber, apart from the bolt seating area.
IF the headspace is below spec., a light application of a hand turned reamer could well do the trick. The reamer may or may not make contact in the chamber; might only shave on the belt shoulder of the chamber. Or, it might shave on the shoulder or body areas.
If warranty work isn't an option, gunsmithing may be required. If you don't have a reamer and aren't really sure about what needs to be done, get the rifle to a gunsmith.
 
RangerPark said:
I have a rifle on hand in 7mm Remington Magnum. Bolt won't close on any ammo that I have available. Checked with a Manson go gauge, it's extremely tight and will only close with a significant amount of force. Double checked everything, it's all clean and I don't see anything causing interference.

Warranty work is not really an option on this rifle. At this point I think my only option is to have the chamber touched up with a finish reamer.

Could there be anything I missed? Any other possible solutions before I go with the reamer option? Thanks!
Click to expand...

Reloads don't count if you have a problem... factory ammo or virgin brass only...

If the bolt closes on a go gauge, even if firmly I am fairly sure it will close on factory ammo as all factory belted magnum ammo is under size as far as headspace is concerned.

So try some factory ammo before altering the chamber.

What make/model of rifle?
 
Thank you to everyone who responded so far.

The rifle is a new Remington 700 AWR. I'm not willing to deal with warranty, even if there's one. Since the bolt closes on Remington ammo, I'm thinking they wouldn't do anything anyway.

I have made sure everything is clean so this isn't a debris or cleaning issue.

The bolt will close on virgin brass and Remington factory ammo.

The bolt won't close on anythning once fired or Federal factory ammo.

The bolt remains very hard to close on the go gauge. This is with the firing pin and ejector removed. I'm using Manson gauges. I have installed prefit barrels in the past and there's no way I would have accepted this level of interference with the go gauge.

I can see a Whidden die helping with the reloads but that won't fix the tight chamber problem.

Since this is a factory barrel, It was probably torqued until the cows came home. I'm going to remove the barrel and re-torque to 50 ft/lb and see if that does anything. If not, I'll probably be looking for a reamer.
 
If the bolt drops on factory ammo then it is all within spec, brass fired from another chamber seldom fits into another rifle, especially if it was originally fired in a savage chamber, they tend to be generous
 
RangerPark said:
Thank you to everyone who responded so far.

The rifle is a new Remington 700 AWR. I'm not willing to deal with warranty, even if there's one. Since the bolt closes on Remington ammo, I'm thinking they wouldn't do anything anyway.

I have made sure everything is clean so this isn't a debris or cleaning issue.

The bolt will close on virgin brass and Remington factory ammo.

The bolt won't close on anythning once fired or Federal factory ammo.

The bolt remains very hard to close on the go gauge. This is with the firing pin and ejector removed. I'm using Manson gauges. I have installed prefit barrels in the past and there's no way I would have accepted this level of interference with the go gauge.

I can see a Whidden die helping with the reloads but that won't fix the tight chamber problem.

Since this is a factory barrel, It was probably torqued until the cows came home. I'm going to remove the barrel and re-torque to 50 ft/lb and see if that does anything. If not, I'll probably be looking for a reamer.
Click to expand...

Your problem is trying to use previously fired ammo that was fired in a larger chamber and not correctly sized to fit this chamber. It's your fault, not the rifles fault. Belted magnums should be headspaced tight on a go gauge as all belted magnum ammo if under size as far as headspace is concerned.

Leave the barrel alone and use new ammo/brass or size your old brass correctly... or run a finished reamer in 2 thousands of an inch...

I always tell my customers when they get a new barrel and chamber to dump all their old reloads and use new brass...
 
RangerPark said:
It won't chamber anything, not even the go gauge. I thought about lapping the lugs but I'm afraid I need more. Ideally I'm looking to have no resistance at all on the go gauge.

Some of my reloaded brass have started to develop the donut above the belt but they all chambered fine in my previous rifle.
Click to expand...

This could be a large part fo your problem. Trying to rerun casings from another chamber. Try some virgin ammo or casings before doing anything further.
 
It's the Larry Willis die I have in mind, not the Whidden. Anyone here with experience with those?

As much as I don't want to get rid of 100 otherwise perfectly good 1F Nosler cases, I'm starting to think it would be the less aggravating of all my options.
 
I would be inclined to try a Redding shoulder body bump die first, they may even make a small base die as they do for other cartridges
 
A recent post that I made - I discovered my issue was right in front of the belt, by using jiffy marker on the case to find out where it was hanging up and not chambering -

"I can not help with your other concerns, but have a bit of experience now with the Larry Willis die. It will resize about 1/8" or less of the case, immediately in front of the belt - that is all that it will do - where a normal Full Length die does not have much effect. I have several belted magnum rifles that I reload for - each has had factory ammo or new brass to start with - I never needed it for them. Until I bought some previously fired Norma 300 Weatherby brass. Fired at least once in somebody else's chamber. I full length sized them in an RCBS die - not a single one would chamber in my new-to-me 300 Weatherby rifle. Once that Larry Willis die showed up - one by one, every one of them failed that little built in gauge on top. So a tube of Extreme Pressure grease, and set to re-sizing them - they work perfect, now. So, as has been posted by others, maybe you will never need to use it. But when you do need to use it, I know of no other way to deal with the issue, except to discard the brass and buy new ones to replace."

In my case, I had 150 Norma cases. My impression was about $4 per case to replace - so $600. Was worth to me for that one time use to buy that Willis die - I may never use it again. But is same size for any belted case, based on H&H sized belted case - there are a lot of them.
 
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yodave said:
I would be inclined to try a Redding shoulder body bump die first, they may even make a small base die as they do for other cartridges
Click to expand...

Do those resize all the way down to the belt? I did a sharpie test on my 1F brass and can see the small bulge above the belt.

I'm currently using a Forster F/L sizer and it leaves the small bulge. Wasn't an issue in the Tikka those cases were fired in but it's an issue now.
 
RangerPark said:
It's the Larry Willis die I have in mind, not the Whidden. Anyone here with experience with those?

As much as I don't want to get rid of 100 otherwise perfectly good 1F Nosler cases, I'm starting to think it would be the less aggravating of all my options.
Click to expand...

The Willis die works really well.

If you have other belted cartridges or shoot a lot, it may be more economical in the long run
 
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