I've swapped a barrel on an early style 110 from 30/06 to 264 magnum. I have swapped the bolthead and extractor to magnum style, and the extractor does not seem to want to grab the go/no go gauges to pull them out. I'm guessing it will do the same with cases and this will be a problem.

Also, the barrel indexes almost 90 degrees off (this model has sights) when headspace is set correctly. Is there a way a guy w/o machinery can deepen a chamber to get a Savage 110 barrel to index correctly? It would need to go about 85 degrees further. I rented headspace gauges from Elk Ridge Reamers in my hometown. Is there such a thing as reamers that I can use to deepen a chamber by hand or is this a gunsmith only show at this point???

Thanks for any help.

You can deepen the chamber with a reamer which should be available from the rental outfit, but there is also the issue of the clearance between the bolt nose and the barrel. As you screw the barrel in another quarter turn, this clearance will decrease by about ..015". This amount should be faced off the back of the barrel. Or you could just live with the writing in the wrong place.

It's not just the writing on the barrel, it's the sights being on the side of the barrel.

You guys need to understand I don't have any professional equipment other than a barrel vice here, so is it possible for me to deepen the chamber?

If you want to keep the sights you'll need to get it to a smith.

He'll have to clock the sights properly, turn the butt end of the barrel off to play nice with the bolt and cut the chamber deeper.

It's beyond my barrel swapping skills too.

Good luck

That sort of defeats the whole beauty of the swap system there I think.

I'd remove the sights and plug the holes with fillers and drive on Airborne!!

Mike

Not only does the thing need to index but the rear sight boss needs to fit the stock. I don't know if these photos are any good, but here it is headspaced right. The action is almost a full quarter turn off.

I’ve done a few of my own but they were barrels without sights. Yours seems to be one of the older 110s. Might want to checkout savage shooters site.

[quote=Fireball2]It's not just the writing on the barrel, it's the sights being on the side of the barrel.
/quote]

Good Lord, man! Haven't you seen those Gangstas holding their SA's sideways? Don't you want to seem "cool"?

Even the deer will die laughing..... saves ammo!

That's too funny! a vise in a vise.

been swapping/building Salvage rifles nearly 20 yrs.....

bought the barrel vise...action wrench from Brownell's

nut wrench from Midway.....yes smooth nut ? pipe wrench & replace nut

we've always used FL sized brass to set head space....have 3 pcs.FL'd...trimmed

trial & error as far as bolt closure resistance......always works......still have all my

fingers & face....... your issue.......never set up a barrel with sights....

pull the sights...plug holes....forget the indexing..scope it.....good luck !

use mostly all Salvage target actions now for dog/target guns.......

The original question that hasn't been answered is can a chamber be deepened with hand tools?

yes

Not exactly the same situation but shows had reaming.

He would get more answers if the dipstick had fewer people on ignore.
Seriously, Roy. You couldn't Google this up or figure it out from looking at Brownells or a Midway catalog?

Thank you ready on the right.

You are welcome Sir good luck getting it finished up.

Mike

When it's clocked correctly is the chamber short?
When clocked correctly is the bolt clearance correct?

If the answer to both of these questions is in the affirmative then you can ream this by hand no lathe needed.
get your headspace and timing correct then address the extraction problem. Good luck

Not sure I got this one right in my mind.

So when you index the barrel on the reciever without the bolt in place (sights clocked properly) can you put the bolt in the receiver and close it?

Chris, it depends on how many turns I go in with the receiver.

But, if I turn the receiver over the 85 degrees or so it's short, with the bolt out, the bolt will not quite go in once it's indexed. It's close but I have to back the receiver off a few degrees to get the bolt to close.

What's different about this 110 compared to the 99's I've played with is that the barrel doesn't bottom out on the receiver like a 99 does. It seems to come down, headspace and index, and then lock with the lock ring rather than bottom out on the receiver.

First thing I would do is remove the ejector and extractor. Extractor at a minimum. Just to be sure the case or gauge is sitting flat on the face of the bolt.

I did and it is.

That means the bolt is hitting the barrel when indexed and it needs to be shortened. If I were setting it up I would provide .010 of clearance from the bolt or extractor whichever is longer. Then of course head space.
With the barrel indexed correctly does it fit right in your stock?

Yes.

The stock inlet is not likely to be an issue give or take 1 turn of the barrel (.05"~), none of mine have been fitted that close.

I assume if you back the barrel out so your sights are clocked correctly then the bolt will close on your no-go gauge.

I think the issue can be addressed with the bolt-head instead

Thank you gentleman for your patience, this is not something I've done before and am thankful for all your help. I was having trouble reaching my headspace gauge rental guy and days were slipping by. I came and asked here because his wife is sick and he is taking care of her, so I didn't want to bug him. He did finally respond that he had a reamer and T handle, but there was some communication gaps I suspect because his mind was on his wife's care. I stopped by today and picked up a reamer and handle. I was able to spend an hour just now working on evening up the interface between the bolthead and barrel. The lugs were carefully hand polished back a bit, marked, polished some more, etc until I got the action and barrel indexed properly with the right amount of tension on bolt closing.

Now all I have left to do is run that reamer in until I get depth and tighten it up, relieve the barrel channel on the stock and reassemble. I'll need to figure out the extractor too. I'll let the forum know how it turns out and thanks a million, I appreciate all the advice and patience.

Fireball2,
You don’t need to rent a headspace gauge. Go-no-go gauge is the best route to go. You can also use a loaded factory case.

Sorry, my mistake. That's what I have, go no go.

So your good-to-go
Sorry had to

Ha. Now if I could just pry my chunt off the couch as they say and get it done.

Got the chamber cut and headspace set. Thanks again for the help guys. I really appreciate it. I'll work on the extractor next.

So you're using an old pre 64 M-70 barrel on that correct?

No it's an early Savage 110 barrel. The 1958/9-64 Savage 110's look like a pre 64 WInchester but they added a grip cap which dresses it up in my mind. They shoot very well as a rule. I have one in 243 that shoots less than 1/2" with Nosler Partitions.

Interesting factoid there.
Thanks, it looks like a fun project.

Well, I couldn't figure out why the extractor wouldn't work so I pulled out another old style 110 I have in 7mm mag. These have a snap-on C shaped extractor. Comparing the extractor to the 7mm it looks identical, but apparently the bolthead I bought from Numrich for this conversion has been ground on and some of the rim removed, which allows the extractor to walk around when it shouldn't. I feel better, at least it wasn't me being stupid! I'll call them tomorrow.

Rifle is chambered and indexed, fitted to barrel channel. Followers are different between the 30/06 donor rifle and 7mm mag I have here but the 06 follower works in the 7 mag so that's ok, should work fine with the 264 cartridge, but the opening in the bottom of the receiver where the cartridges go down into the magazine will have to be widened a little on the donor rifle for magnum cartridges. Waiting on a Numrich replacement bolt head to replace the buggered up one they sent me. Getting close.

I am going of memory here, which can be shakey, but isn't there different bolt heads for a Savage? Aren't the lugs on the WSM bolt head larger than a normal mag bolt head? Might be worth a look.

Micky, these old style Savage 110's are a different animal than the post 1966 ones. They do have different boltheads but the old ones have an extractor that looks like a C clip, and the ejector is at the rear of the bolt throw, basically a dog that sticks up and throws the cartridge out, in a perfect world.

Sounds like a few guys aren't familiar with the earliest Savage 110's. Here's one that's been rebarreled to 260. Beautiful rifles.

???

Headspace gauges = go, no-go, and field gauges. Same thing, different name.