Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Savage Collectors Savage 170B 30-30 - NEED HELP

Visit to the local Gun Shop today, guy there had the aforementioned that has an issue.

The shop owner had been test firing it, and they were done when I came in..

The gun fired, one primer blew out, one primer seemed to be pierced, or nearly so. Extraction was 'hard'.

ALL fired cases had the shoulder moved forward, substantially IMHUnderstanding.

There appears to be NO 'bubba-smithing' done to the gun, rounds fired were factory Federal.

I'll get some pics up later of the fired cases.

QUESTION:

Anyone seen such with this make and model before??

Thoughts??

I bought it and can part it out for the money I have in it if need be, I think.

That is all for now.

Did somebody run a 307 WIN reamer into the 30-30 chamber?

I've owned several Savage 170s, 7 or 8 in 30-30, plus 2 in 35 REM, and have never had any problems like that. The only problem with them that I've had have been a couple of broken extractors.

EDIT - The Savage 170 is not what I would consider to be a particularly strong action, since it is based on the Savage 30 pump action .410 shotgun. The shoulder moving forward "sounds" like it may have been rechambered to 307 WIN, a change that I would consider to be a potentially dangerous modification.

Time to do a chamber cast to see what it really looks like. Definitely sounds like it's been punched out to a different cartridge.

Some pics:

The beast =


the problem:




One primer blown out.

Two primers pierced, you can see daylight through them.

Distance from the base to the shoulder, such as it is, is definitely longer on the fired cases, and consistent.
Distance from the base to the junction of neck and shoulder is virtually the same as an unfired case..

Pondering someone may have run a 30-30 AI reamer in the hole...

I might try loading some rounds loaded long, engaging the lands, and see what happens....

Appreciate any thoughts!

There looks to be a considerable difference between the fired and unfired cases and I don’t think seating a bullet further out is going to do any good. It looks to me like you basically are fire forming a new case with each shot.

It should headspace from the rim. put some tape on the base of a cartridge and see how much you can add and still have it close to see if the whole chambered is to deep.

Doesn't look like an AI case to me. With the primers blowing I'd suspect something wrong with the headspace. As suggested, check headspace and if it's excessive take a look at the back of the bolt and recess in the receiver where it locks in for wear or peening. If that checks out okay, then it's a chamber problem. Would make a great candidate to send to JES to turn into a .38-55 pump thumper.

I think there is something wonky about the chamber beyond head space. Look at the fired case. The left side is pushed forward farther than the right. It maybe an optical confusion, but it looks like, if you put a straight edge on the left side of the case, the gap between the neck is way less than the right side.

The fired cases look more like the 307 WIN than the 30-30AI to me, as the 30-30AI would have less taper to the bottom of the shoulder, a sharper shoulder angle, and a shorter neck. I have a 307 WIN, a Marlin 336 SC that was rechambered from 30-30, and I have had a Marlin 336 that was rechambered to 30-30AI, so I have worked with both cartridges.

I'd suggest measuring the case diameter ahead of the rim and compare that number to the SAAMI specs for the 307 WIN and 30-30.

Have you measured a fired case and compared the results to the specs for the 30-30 AI or other modified 30-30s?

I'd re-barrel it or part it out.

I may have it figured out.

Tore it apart today. do NOT believe there is anything wrong with the chamber.

It has 'features', we'll call them parts, that do not show up in any of the schematics from Numrich.

Found where someone must have had it apart, found a hole that they thought should have a spring in it, and put one in.... Seems to me it messed up the geometry between the bolt and the slide...........

Looks to me like it was either not fully locked up when they fired it or it was coming out of lock on firing....

Anyway will give it a test run in a day or so.

Not a bad little gun, cheaply made, dirty like In have never seen before...

more later.

Hope that sorted it out for you🤞

Good for you for digging in and working through it. Not everyone has the mechanical aptitude to see those things.

If it's that dirty maybe that also contributed to insufficient lockup. If it turns out to be a case of insufficient lockup and yet still fires, that capability of the gun alone would have me sending it down the road. "What could possibly go wrong?"

Seems to be more of an issue with pumps more than any other action type in my admittedly small experience compared to most of you guys.

I had a little Rossi 22 pump (Win knockoff) that would fire without being fully locked up. That'd get your attention with the blowback out of the open top 💀That rifle was a lemon in general, though. It shot great, but had a lot of problems and breakages, mostly related to the elevator mechanism.

I've seen the out of battery firing happen with antique pump shotguns a couple times too, neither of which was mine.

Finally test fired it, it still has issues, so it will be moved on as a 'parts gun'........ full disclosure of course!

Sounds like fun. As in "I had a Savage 12 gauge sawed off pump shotgun that fired when you closed the action fun".

And like the fun I had when the disconnector in a Colt 1911 broke on the first shot of a full magazine. Last 6 shots went full auto, ended with the muzzle pointing straight up. So much fun that, of course, I had to do it again. Oh, the hubris of youth. (Colt fixed for free and had it back to me in like a week.)

As a yute, one could make the claim, this is not a flaw, but a feature....

YMMV