218 Bee question

[Aggiecubpilot]

I have an older Model 92 with a 218 barrel on it (not original). I shot some factory ammunition through it this weekend for the first time. It sounds like a lot of 30-30 rifles I've heard of in that the primers back out some and there is a slight but noticeable expansion towards the base of the case. Should I be concerned about the chamber, or do I just have fire formed brass? The kicker is the rifle shoots really well! I'd never shot a Bee before and really enjoy it.

Thanks

C Parker

[earlmck]

That sounds an awful lot like my m92 25-20, which I have shot for many years in just the condition you describe. So we know the primers wouldn't be able to back out if the rifle didn't have some excess headspace. What I have done, instead of actually fixing the gun, is use the brass as "fireformed" as you are suggesting. When I get new brass I like to load my favorite cast bullet a little long for the first shot, so it jams into the rifling a bit and essentially we have the case "headspaced" on the bullet rather than the rim. After this first shot the case is now headspaced on the shoulder. I make sure never to full-length size far enough to set the shoulder back. For some reason which I don't really understand, just firing the 25-20 round without headspacing it on something (I used a piece of monofilament fish line in front of the rim for my first tries before coming up with the bullet idea as much simpler) didn't seem to work as well and I got case failures within 3 or 4 reloads.

The bad news: I have never got real good case life even with this technique. About 8 to 10 reloads and I'll start getting the occasional failure. And the failures are case-head separations which are a nuisance 'cause you have to fish a case out of the chamber with no head attached to grab onto. So I watch the cases and when I see a stress-line developing around the case about a quarter of an inch ahead of the rim I consider tossing that batch of cases. Of course being a cheapskate I don't actually toss the cases until I get that first failure... Just saying I should toss the cases!

Now my guess is that your bee, having a more pronounced shoulder, would work better with the "fireforming" technique than my 25-20, which has a puny little sloped shoulder for headspacing on. Cheapskate Earl would go with the "fireforming" unless it proved very unsatisfactory. A smarter fellow might go for fixing the gun's headspace right away.

Fishing out a case without a head? Well usually a brass brush run in from the muzzle will take the case remnant on out. But sometimes it doesn't. I have a piece of bailing wire that I bent and ground a skinny little lip on the end that will slip into the gap between the case mouth and the front of the chamber and pull the case out. So far that has always worked if the brass brush didn't.

[JFE]

I saw a guy at the range using a Contender in 22 Hornet that he was pushing fairly hard. Hornet brass is weak and only lasted around 6 reloads before separating. What he had as a removal tool was an EZ-out brazed on to a T bar and removed the stuck cases that way. Obviously in a levergun you need to remove the bolt to access the chamber.

Another way I'd heard about, but never tried it, is to cool the brass case down using CO2. The brass shrinks more than steel and is (apparently) easily removed.

[earlmck]

That's an interesting tip on using the CO2, JFE. Thanks! I'll file that away, but hope I never need to use it. I'd also say the fellow with the Hornet must have also had some headspace problem. I've got a couple of hornets and have never lost a case to head separation. My losses there are neck splits after many many reloads.

My thinking is, if you have head separations it is a headspace problem, or possibly a "springy-action" problem which I have read about but not experienced, unless possibly our old model 92s are doing some "action-springing"? This "action-springing" is attributed to guns that lock their bolts in the rear, which is certainly true of our levers. I know it is not an issue with really good steel, but maybe some of the old stuff has more "spring" to it.