Time For Gunsmith?

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spinconn

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Got a Savage 12 in .223 and had some reloading issues, mostly with a particular primer, but early in my education I had pressure issues due to my errors. Mostly, my initial problem was I assumed I was safe with a COAL of 2.300, which is far short of my magazine length. While chasing down another problem I checked the length it took to touch the lands and it turned out to be about 2.259. Before discovering that I shot a number of rounds through it that had a pressure problem because I was crushing the lands.

I am only interested in shooting hand loads and I have several very good loads, with many more to try and they are all under 2.250. I can even go to 2.245 with great results so I do not find it a problem to load these shorter cartridges.

My first question is whether there is any safety concern with a chamber this short as long as I am content to shoot only the shorter rounds?

Second, the rifle works great as is and is very accurate and I don't want to change anything if I don't have to as I am afraid any change could cost me accuracy.
However, the fact is that I did fire a number of rounds that were over pressure. Am I OK as long as the rifle is in good working order with no apparent damage or should I have a gunsmith look at it due to the firing of high pressure loads?

Mostly, I noticed a bit of difficulty closing the bolt with those cartridges but on one occasion I had a hard time getting the bolt open.
 
223 COAL max is 2.260"
you do not have a short chamber.
where did you ever find the 2.300 number ??


( magazine is not a chamber gauge)

spinconn said:
is any safety concern with a chamber this short
.
Click to expand...
 
If your brass stayed in one piece, and your primers did not fall out of the cases when the bolt was opened, I doubt that your rifle's strength was compromised. I will caution you about a couple of things, the first being assuming. Don't....ever. The second is that I suggest that you go over every step of your reloading and load development with someone who is an advanced rifle reloader, to make sure that you do not have any gaps in your understanding of this subject, and to fill in any that are discovered.
 
CMaier said:
223 COAL max is 2.260"
you do not have a short chamber.
where did you ever find the 2.300 number ??


( magazine is not a chamber gauge)
Click to expand...

I have been cautioned not to assume, but I did assume that since the max COAL is 2.260 the chamber would have to be at least a little larger than that. I just used smoke and magic marker to stain bullets and adjusted seating length until I saw rifling marks, I do not have a measuring tool. Based on that it seemed I needed to be shorter than that to not touch the rifling, so I thought that meant the chamber was short.

I got that number from my Lyman Load Data pamphlet that lists 2.390 OAL for the 75 gr Jacketed A Max, which is what I was loading, so I figured I was being conservative by going shorter with 2.300.
 
Boyd Allen said:
If your brass stayed in one piece, and your primers did not fall out of the cases when the bolt was opened, I doubt that your rifle's strength was compromised. I will caution you about a couple of things, the first being assuming. Don't....ever. The second is that I suggest that you go over every step of your reloading and load development with someone who is an advanced rifle reloader, to make sure that you do not have any gaps in your understanding of this subject, and to fill in any that are discovered.
Click to expand...

I had resistance closing the bolt on the longer rounds, but not when opening the bolt, and the recoil and report were sharper than factory rounds. On one round the bolt froze shut until the brass cooled down. I had one blown primer for sure, and maybe two but they did not fall out of the cases.

I appreciate your suggestions, thank you for the assistance.
 
as politely as boyd tried to point out..
you are in over your head!

loads longer than 2.26 ARE FOR SPECIAL NON-STANDARD CHAMBERS.

YOU ARE WAY OVER YOUR HEAD.
 
CMaier said:
as politely as boyd tried to point out..
you are in over your head!

loads longer than 2.26 ARE FOR SPECIAL NON-STANDARD CHAMBERS.

YOU ARE WAY OVER YOUR HEAD.
Click to expand...

OK, understood. Thanks again.
 
Cmaier - Boyd put this in a way that most anybody can understand. You're last comment was completely unnecessary.
 
Never hurts to mention where you are located. You might have someone near by that can stop by and give you a hand.
 
If you've done any damage that might affect the rifle from a safety standpoint it will change the headspace by setting the lugs back - unlikely, but worth a 'field check'. If you have GO or NO-GO gauges, or can borrow some, that's the way to go. If not, then strip the bolt (remove firing pin and ejector, so they don't add force) and insert a factory round, or a round that you are certain is sized to factory (SAAMI) specs. The bolt should close with no force. Now add a layer of scotch tape to the back of the case. If that doesn't increase the force, add a second layer. If two layers of tape on the back of a round don't make the bolt harder to close then you have enough headspace that you should have it checked with 'real' gauges. If it gets hard to close with one or two layers it hasn't been damaged. I doubt you damaged it just by seating loads long (that will increase pressure, but normally it takes a significant over charge) - always worth a quick check though.)

Good luck!

GsT
 
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