I always wanted a .35 Remington Contender rifle and I bought one at a gun show about a year ago. Nice blue 21" (I think) barrel and nice frame. Has a thumbhole walnut stock that never had a finish applied so I took care of that. Got it pretty cheap. Turned out real nice and just what I wanted but...
You got it! It won't shoot. Firing pin is there and it makes a very, very slight ding in the primer but not enough to set it off. I tried it with handloads and two types of factory loads and none of them will fire. I looked at Mr. Bellm's page and read all he had to say about fixing a problem like this and the problems in general with Contenders and I still don't know what to do. I could take some brass and neck it up and put a false shoulder on it and fire form some cases and go on but I would rather fix it. I have been intending to put another barrel on it to make sure it will work but haven't done it yet. I know that a .35 Remington does not have much of a shoulder and the barrel I have is not headspaced properly. Or at least the way it fits on this frame the headspace is excessive. Does anyone have a simple approach to fixing this problem? This may be an age old problem but it is new to me. No wonder I bought it cheap.
Thanks!
