Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Winchester Collectors Tell Us About Your pre 64 M70 Failures and Malfunctions

Bsa1917hunter: I have been shooting and Hunting (both Varmints and Big Game) with my pre-64 Winchester Model 70's for 50 years now and have as yet to experience my first "failure" or "malfunction"!
When I was a young (dumb!) pre-64 Model 70 collector - I thought to myself they have now discontinued this Rifle and I better lay in a supply of firing pin assemblies for future needs.
I bought 7 of them over the next few years.
I still have 7 of them!
I have talked to gunsmiths, competitive shooters and Riflesmiths all across this country and I normally always quietly inquire if they have ever come across a pre-64 Model 70 that had a broken firing pin in it.
None have ever seen a pre-64 Model 70 with a broken firing pin!
I, have never seen a Model 70 with a broken firing pin.
I wish the same could be said for many other brands of Rifles I have owned!
If you want a strongly built, safe, valuable and reliable Rifle (let alone handsome!) then the Riflemans Rifle should be your choice.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

I bet at least part of the problem Winchester had with the pre 64 is the amount of coddling they got by skilled hands. It must have been tough to replace those people as years went by.

Read Rule. It's apparent the rifle got a lot of hands on attention before they left the factory,not to make them"fancy" but to make the shoot and work as a unit.

Despite its virtues you simply do not get this with current manufactured rifles and even with the Classics and post 64's, and even if they did with the Classics,they still did not work at the same level as the pre 64.

I recall something I was told recently,that when the Classic in 416 Remington was being developed,Winchester had to hire two skilled smiths as outside consultants to get the rifles to feed(!!)

You heard it....Winchester workers could not get the rifles to feed and I recall most of tis work started in the Custom shop. I was astonished that there was not enough rifle savy within the 4 walls of Winchester to get a 416 Remington to feed from a M70 action.

But after years with enough Classics, looking back I understand why.

Contrast this to the old engineers and workers at Winchester who were able to get flawless feeding from one action length modified to feed everything from the 22 Hornet to the 375H&h and 458 Winchester, with at least a few odd ball cartridges along the way.

No wonder they work....it ain't nostalgia.

Bsa1917hunter: I have been shooting and Hunting (both Varmints and Big Game) with my pre-64 Winchester Model 70's for 50 years now and have as yet to experience my first "failure" or "malfunction"!
When I was a young (dumb!) pre-64 Model 70 collector - I thought to myself they have now discontinued this Rifle and I better lay in a supply of firing pin assemblies for future needs.
I bought 7 of them over the next few years.
I still have 7 of them!
I have talked to gunsmiths, competitive shooters and Riflesmiths all across this country and I normally always quietly inquire if they have ever come across a pre-64 Model 70 that had a broken firing pin in it.
None have ever seen a pre-64 Model 70 with a broken firing pin!
I, have never seen a Model 70 with a broken firing pin.
I wish the same could be said for many other brands of Rifles I have owned!
If you want a strongly built, safe, valuable and reliable Rifle (let alone handsome!) then the Riflemans Rifle should be your choice.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

Your search is over. Here is the pin from my pre-64 270. Happened last week:



Best,

Chet

At my age I am not worried about outlasting a clean pre 64 M70.


This one has been sitting around for a couple of years and I finally got it scope mounted and may hunt it this year.

You know....it's one of those safe queens that bugs those hard charging Alaskans so much...LOL

BobinNH wanted someone to start this thread. I've had one extractor go bad on my 270 fwt, but that's been it. Easily pulled the bad one off and put the new one on. Anyone else have any issues with a pre 64 model 70 rifle? All of mine function flawlessly, triggers work perfectly and tuned to 2.5 pounds, safety's work great, bolt stops work, they extract, eject, feed perfectly and smoothly, bolt handles haven't fallen off or anything like that. Let's hear about your failures. Thanks...

Mine is accurate, but not very reliable rifle. Quite often when chambering cartridge from fully loaded magazine the bolt just glides over first cartridge without chambering it. That is hard to understand because the action when I bought the gun showed almost no use or signs of bering fired a lot. If I ever had to defend myself against attacking animal chances are better than average I would get injured or killed.

M70's don't handle escaping gas worth a chit... apart from that, I doubt there's a better hunting rife platform.

My only gripe is the pre-64's bolt, which doesn't clear low-mounted scopes well... but a little scalloping and a re-blue cures that.

speaking of grinding bolt handels, I bought a nice pre64 7MM carbine where someone cut the bolt knob in half and then checkered it! My smith fixed the problem and you can't tell it was ever done.

Damn, good on your smith. Cutting or grinding on a pre 64 model 70 bolt handle is sacrilege as far as I'm concerned. Unless it's done for a custom like some of the Biesens etc...

Back in the day they were $150.00 guns....