Oddball problem with a happy ending

[Boyd Allen]

We took two new rifles to the range yesterday, both customs on custom actions. One of them would not chamber a factory round or a case. (Yes, we should have checked it before we left.) The only thing that we could think of was that it had been somehow headspaced short. By looking at the bolt notch in the action it looked to be about .02. Later that day it was discovered that the plunger type ejector would not compress so that it was flush to the bolt face. It had what appeared to be blasting grit in the bottom of the ejector hole. Once it was cleaned out, everything worked fine. I would guess that the smith had taken the ejector out to check headspace and having confidence in his work, did not then chamber a round after it was put back together. I thought that posting this here might help someone else avoid the same mistake.

 

[Dennis Sorensen]

The plunger is a good thing to remember to check. I always do all of my fitting and checking with a stripped bolt, plunger removed. One should make sure an assembled bolt works too.

 

[John Kielly]

I have seen RPA range rifle actions with mechanical ejectors come up with that issue after less than assiduous cleaning. Users of similarly equipped BR actions might keep in mind that crud can get into open backed plungers.

 

[Mike Bryant]

On some custom actions, the ejector pin can be reinstalled upside down causing the ejector not to be able to fit down below the bolt face when the ejector pin bottoms out against the cross pin retainer. Taking it out and turning it over will solve the problem.