Remington bolt problem

[mrjdasr]

i have a mod 700 that has a notch worn in the bolt handle where it contacts the receiver at the very top of its lift. on the angled surface that cams the empty out of the chamber. so much for remington quality, the rifle is only 3 years old with less than
1000 rnds thru it
i don't have the ability or equiptment to brase a new bolt handle on it is it possible to drill & tap a new handle on using handened 8-32 screws or will they shear off from the torque

 

[Cheechako]

mrj

It's not clear exactly where this worn notch is that you are referring to. There is only one point on a Rem bolt handle that contacts the receiver and it is the same point throughout the bolt throw.

Maybe a photo?

Ray

 

[mrjdasr]

not computer literate enough for pictures anyway i gently applied a file to the spot and removed the groove that was worn in handle
the spot in question is right at the very top of the bolt throw maybe it isn't supposed to contact there???

 

[Cheechako]

It's still not clear to me where the notch was, but if you've taken care of it I suppose it doesn't matter.

Ray

 

[AlNyhus]

It sounds like you're talking about the cam angle on the bolt handle where it meets the angle on the back of the reciever. You need to be very careful messing with this, as the interface between this angle on the handle and the cooresponding angle on the reciever is what determines how much mechanical camming you have for primary extraction of the case.

This point on the bolt handle suffers from very sloppy q.c. at the factory that is further compounded by gun owners that never lube this area. Pretty soon, the angles are mismatched due to wear...this often appears as a raised burr on the handle cam angle.

Be aware that when you file this down to smooth it up, you are also moving the contact surface rearward and decreasing the amount of primary cam...this makes the primary cam work over a shorter amount of travel and on a shorter amount of contact surface...both will increase the bolt 'feel' as you open it. Additionally, this increased loading of the cam angles accelerates the wear at these points, leadng to more of the same problems. Pretty soon, you've got a sticky bolt with loads that aren't too hot...eventually, you'll have no mechanical camming left. Then, the bolt handle comes off as the silver soldered joint between the handle and the bolt body takes all the load. This is one of the reasons that 700 bolt handles come off....though it's not usually diagnosed as the actual problem.

This situation also occurs when the lugs and the reciever lug abuttments are faced off during truing of the reciever. Metal gets removed, the handle moves further back and pretty soon you've got trouble. Sharp 'smiths will relocate the handle foward and maximize the cam angle for you. This can also be done on non-trued actions that simply have the bolt handle mispositioned from the factory, have incurred wear at the cam angle from improper lubrication, or a combination of the two.

I would recommend finding a 'smith to that really understands this aspect of the 700's and have him take a good look. This is an area that is poorly understood by even some experienced barrel fitters, so make sure you're working with a someone that really understands this.

Good shootin'. -Al

 

[M700]

Al, that's some great info. Thanks! I've wondered a bit about this in the past myself.

Regards, Guy

 

[mrjdasr]

Al you understand the problem to a tee. it appears that the handle never was correctly positioned. I'll take your advice and look for a smith to install a new bolt handle [ one who knows what he is doing]

 

[JayIdaho]

Yes, you can attach a bolt handle with screws. A couple of my friends do it using socket head cap screws, either two or three screws. Location is critical, though.
As Al so well stated, the extraction cam is often ignored by gunsmiths. The mismatch of the surfaces by Remington from the factory is probably the biggest negative of the M700 actions. I like to move the bol hadle forward to maximize the extraction effort for the reasons stated by Al.

 

[mrjdasr]

anybody make a fixture for fastening the handle to the bolt or is there a drawing available that shows the correct position

 

[Preacher]

Brownells has that jig.......

 

[AlNyhus]

It's impossible to correctly locate the handle,for maximum cam) without fitting it individually to the reciever. Make sure that any jig you buy allows for the handle to be moved foward or back as needed. A 'universal fits all' setup is unacceptable for best results. -Al

 

[mrjdasr]

machine shop will be fired up this morning to make a jig
i borrowed a torch to relocate the bolt

 

[mrjdasr]

many thanks to Alnyhus for the good coaching made a bolt holding fixture, relocated the bolt handle did a little fine tuning with the dremel tool and hurray it works the way it was designed to work
cams those empty's out slick as greased lightning
sure pi--es me off to have to do all that to a $700 rifle
John Anderson sr

 

[AlNyhus]

Glad to hear it worked out for you. Good shootin' -Al

 

[BillDorsey]

Glad your handle replacement worked out...the reason for this is mass production and the smith paying little attention to action timing when installing the handles at Remington.

Our fix for this is a Panda bolt handle. Our jig consists of a small pair of vice grips properly modified to not mess up any threaded surface on the bolt body and more importantly, knowing what the proper timing should be for full lug contact when closed and proper camming when opened or extracting fired cases. This is without the aggravating Remington "Click" at the top of bolt handle lift.

I mention full lug contact here because we had a customer that lapped his own lugs and got a bit too agressive and it required the bolt handle to be replaced as well as moved forward .030 to get it right again.

Likewise, the necessity to grab the bolt handle and wrench it up out of fired position has been replaced with a slight lifting with my right index finger.

We've done many this way, and it's the first thing I would do to any Remington action I was building for myself.

Bill Dorsey