Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Ruger American with a shallow chamber

You aren't in the New Orleans area by chance are you?

No Sir,

Georgia.

Well boxed and hauled to the UPS hub prepaid label attached mine is on the road back to NC up to Ruger now... mb

Update-

LGS has a delivery & Norma 7mm-08 was in it. I bought a box & it does cycle in this rifle.

It seems the shoulder of my .260 brass needs bumping back but the die I have is
1. bottomed out against the shelf holder per the instructions,
2. Offers no further adjustment to bump the shoulder back farther.

I stuck a case trying to bottom out/ max the travel: luckily I had a stuck case remover kit on hand but now I’m in search of how to bump the shoulder back to a length that will function in this rifle.

This still doesn’t explain why a L-N-L case won’t allow the bolt to close but a Norma case will.

LNL tool is not designed to act like a headspace gauge . Glad you did not waste Ruger's time . This one was obvious from post number one . No real brass,should have waited until you had ammo. Shoot some proper ammo and work with that to get some proper measurements . Put that 260 brass aside until you know what you are dealing with as far as chamber dimensions.

In the time I’ve been reloading I’ve always had proper brass: the last 18 months have changed things considerably.

I’d love to buy 100 pieces of Lapua 7mm-08 Brass but that’s not an option right now due to the shortages so I was attempting to make do with what I had.

That being said, I’ve now got spent Norma cases from this rifle & I’m having a hard time determining what is different between the fired 7mm-08 cases & the resized to 7mm cases.

I’d like to use all of my brass not just the 20 pieces that I paid $2/a piece for.

Based on the facts of this situation, it looks like your thread title is in error.

Not a darn thing wrong with that rifle.

I apologize for intervening in this thread.

Just trying to help.

My recommendation is to pitch the 260 brass; it is the wrong headstamp anyway. But if you have a lot of it that is already modified, you can have the top of the shell holder milled down whatever it needs to get the 260 shoulder pushed back far enough. I know about 2021 but it has to ease up sooner or later. I still say pitch the wrong headstamped brass; it is not a wildcat. The proper brass or ammo will appear someday.

Thank You.

Without reading all 7 pages of the thread, my first thought was you bumped the shoulder a little too far back and you have a minor bulge there, that is stopping it chambering..
easy to tell.... just size one case and try to chamber it without any primer or powder and bullet...

before that, try to chamber an unsized 260 Case...

If you have a 308 die, you can take the spindle out and just use the sized rounds that won't chamber, and resize it like you would using a body die...

it will straighten out that bulged shoulder, without having to disassemble.. if you have the 308 die set right.

I've experienced falling into that trap more than once with a variety of cartridges, especially trying to get them to fit a removable mag....

Nothing wrong with the headstamp, why toss good brass ? I take it you have never reformed or fire-formed brass before ? He can make it work once he gets more experience .

I am not a fan of mismatched headstamps when the proper brass is or will soon be available. There is not vey much difference between a 7-08 and a 260 Rem. Somewhere down the road someone will end up with his 7-08 rounds formed from 260 and think it is a 260 round. That is the problem. Obsoletes and wildcats require making this from that. It is bad practice to do that with readily available cartridges.

There are too many new whiz bang flavor of the month cartridges these days. The ammo makers used to not make anything too close to something else, i.e. the 270 Win vs the 280 Rem. They moved the shoulder on the 280 so that it could not be chambered into a 270 gun by mistake. That safety factor is out the window now. It started going by the wayside with the WSM line.

That’s sound advice. If you’re the sort of person who can’t find their ass with both hands.

Also...the advice on how to set up dies from the manufacturer, is best avoided. Took me a bit to learn that too.

I have to agree with that . Strange to me a person would suggest to not use it for fear of someone down the road not knowing what they have .

Oh they are out there, loads of them. I live in a "Destination" area; prior to 2000 this was the go to place in PA to hunt. My friend owns a gun shop. I can't tell you how many times guys have bought 7mm-08 or 7mm Mauser ammo and then came back in complaining that it would not chamber or would not fire. They would bring the gun in and it would be a 7mm Rem Mag. Some guys complaining of poor accuracy and it ended up being from shooting 25-06 in their 270. A friend mistakenly grabbed 243 ammo and shot it in a shooting match in a 6mm Improved or 6mm-06 Improved chambered gun, I can't remember the exact details. That was some odd looking brass that came out of the gun. True story he won the match!

I once walked up on a guy in the woods and he told me that he just bought this gun and would I help him load it? I told him no way. I told him he should get out of the woods and learn to use the gun and then come back.

Let us not forget that the 280 was originally called the 7mm Express. Too many people were confusing it with the 7mm Rem Mag, and that was in the 1960's. It was not changed as a marketing deal like the 6mm Rem became the 244 or vice versa. They also speeded up the twist to be able to shoot heavier bullets and compete with the 243 Win a little better.

Can't resist this! Over thinkers at its best thread! Went through every scenario, possible for a short chamber, to finally trying the correct cartridge! Shazam sgt. Carter it worked. LMAO

Unbelievable

The 280 Remington (1957) was originally called... the 280 Remington. Remington renamed it exactly as a marketing deal to give the cartridge a new life after the original anemic 280 loadings couldn't compete with the 270 or the 7mm Rem.Mag. In 1978 R-P was about to rename it the 7mm-06, but thought better of the name calling it the 7mm Express instead. The velocity was upped by around 100 fps in the 7mm Express loading &, I believe, specified for bolt action only on the box end flap, but they didn't function well in 7mm Rem.Mag. The Express designation lasted only about a year, or two. The confusion among people with poor reading comprehension obfuscated Big Green's marketing efforts & the cartridge reverted to its original name & was discontinued from the 700 series in 1982. It was again chambered in 700s starting with the 1986 Mountain Rifles.