savage 99 ackley improved headspace

wolfpack

Purchased a savage 99 that has a 250 savage ackley improved 40 degree chamber. Not knowing who did this work I wanted the rifle checked out. Took to a reputable smith who has some background in Ackley chambers. He did a chamber cast and used ackley go and no go headspace gauges. Barrel was not set back originally and the smith said it was .003 excessive. He test fired rifle and it showed no signs of being unsafe, with no gas blowback and said chamber was sealing good. Recomended to use as is. Thoughts on this?

rufe-snow

You don't mention, if you reload or not? If you reload, just neck size the fire formed brass and your good to go.

If the Savage doesn't lock up tight enough, to just neck size the brass? Buy a box of 250 Savage commercial loaded cartridges. Tie the rifle to a tire with bungee cords. Attach a 20' cord to the trigger and fire all 20 rounds. Check them out real good, for incipient brass failure. If the fired brass is OK. Send 3 to RCBS, to have them make 250 Savage A.I., reloading dies for your specific chamber.

wolfpack

Reload some calibers, will reload for this. Rifle has been test fired and does lock up tight. The cases show no signs of failure on first firing. No case separation rings, primers all look good, everything seems to check out ok. Bolt closed on the no go Ackley gauge and smith said chamber was .003 out. Smith said rifle was safe and he would not invest the extra money to set the barrel back the .003. The chamber cast did show a 40 degree shoulder. Most everything I have read recommends setting the barrel back .004 when doing an ackley chamber to get the crush fit for fireforming.

Horse Plains Drifter

I'd run it.

spirits

If you reload for the 250 IMP and are worried about headspace problems - you also need to get a case gauge (e.g., Wilson case gauge for the 250 IMP). Neck sizing sometimes isn't enough. Your reloaded cases can get shorter between the datum point on the case shoulder and the case base. For example, if the case fits loose to begin with, the impact of the firing pin can shorten the case length between the datum point on the shoulder and the case base causing even more headspace. I've had it happen reloading for a Mannlicher Schoenauer 1950 in 257R. I had to first run new 257R cases through a 7X57mm FL die then through a 257R FL die to just get a bump at the junction of the case's neck and shoulder. This worked 90% of the time - there were two cases out of twenty that did shorten a little the rest fit the chamber perfectly.

charliemeyer007

It's my experience that lever guns are usually cut on the loose side to make them easy to operate, which is why they don't respond well to neck sizing only.

I would get some new brass. For firing forming I'd use a medium loaded cast bullet seated into the rifling's to center the front of the case. I would also use one layer, narrow band, of tape with the proper thickness or something (no overlap) near the rim to center the back of the cartridge. This should provide the most concentric brass that might just let you neck size only for 5 or more firings (depends on the chamber) before you need to FL and repeat the process.

I like Loverin design cast bullets for shooting but for this type of fire forming a long pointy bullet would work.