Changing The Caliber On A Remington 700

MontanaAardvark

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Can anyone give me a little advice on what it would take to rechamber a .30-06 Remington 700 into a .308?

I think it's complicated because of the "long action" vs. "short action" distinction between the two rounds. Mine is an older 700BDL - L for long action. I put a new stock on it a few years ago and had to learn about long vs short.

What all is involved? Just swap the barrel? Is the bolt the same? Big job or small job?

Aside from finishing an 80% AR lower into a full gun, and some small repairs, I have zero gunsmithing experience.


Bob
 
Just needs a barrel change. Bolt face is the same. I'm not guaranteeing perfect feeding through the magazine, but if you seat the rounds to the rear of the magazine, I think it will likely work fine. My question would be why change a .30-06 to a .308? They're both fine cartridges.
 
If you have zero gunsmithing experience, perhaps you might want to try an adapter.

You can turn a shoulder adapter that converts the chamber of the .30-06 into .308. Or in metric terms 7.62 x 59 into 7.62 x 51. The sole difference is the cartridge length and shoulder height. These used to be available in an ad in the back of Shotgun News for decades. Might still be.. i just haven't picked up a copy in a long time.

The adapter goes in the chamber and stays there. Years ago, some shooters would use these to run .308 in a Garand, even for competition.

That way, you can decide in advance if you think a barrel swap would be the way to go. You could check you feeding and all the other twiddly bits with making it into a .308 and compare that with the option of just selling it and get a medium length action in .308 and skip the whole 'smithing step.


Wrat
 
Thanks, DPB. I'm interested mainly because they are ballistically virtually identical and I have another couple of rifles in .308. Fewer kinds of ammo to inventory. I've been thinking of making a long range .308 gun and since the 700 is such an established platform, I'm guessing there are lots of parts available for it.

Around here, the longest range I can get to without an overnight road trip is 600 yards.

Wrat, if the difference is the 8mm length between 51 and 59, would I just cut that off on the lathe? This where I don't have a clue. I've heard of chamber reamers before, and I thought this is what they're for. Shorten the barrel by 8mm and then run the chamber reamer into it.

(I know. The worst words in the world are "all you gotta do is"...)
 
because they are ballistically virtually identical

These two are not even close to 'ballistically identical'. The bullet is exactly the same, yes, but the .30-06 is capable of far more power. Think ".38spec vs. .357magnum." Yes, at the same flying speed, the bullet, being identical, is identical, but the .357 is capable of considerably hotter loadings. Same with the .30-06.



would I just cut that off on the lathe? This where I don't have a clue.

The adapter does that, only at the other end where it doesn't matter. That's why i said to use the adapter. If you cut it off at the primer end, then you're down to re-chambering because your diameter and taper are now too small. Look up the adapter and get an idea of that. If you have a lathe and are willing to cut off barrels, you can make the adapter much easier and not ruin a good gun.


Wrat
 
These two are not even close to 'ballistically identical'. The bullet is exactly the same, yes, but the .30-06 is capable of far more power. Think ".38spec vs. .357magnum." Yes, at the same flying speed, the bullet, being identical, is identical, but the .357 is capable of considerably hotter loadings. Same with the .30-06.





The adapter does that, only at the other end where it doesn't matter. That's why i said to use the adapter. If you cut it off at the primer end, then you're down to re-chambering because your diameter and taper are now too small. Look up the adapter and get an idea of that. If you have a lathe and are willing to cut off barrels, you can make the adapter much easier and not ruin a good gun.


Wrat

My "ballistically virtually identical" remark comes from using several ballistics apps that show factory loads. Winchester, Federal and the Nikon app. When I compare the same size bullets in those situations, the calculated paths are very similar. While I do reload, I've never spent time trying to load more powder into the bigger case to get more out of .30-06 and have never even asked the question if I could get hotter loads out of the bigger cartridge.

Thanks for the tip on the adapter, though. I'll go sit down with the search engine and see if I can find one.
 
Couple things if you go the insert route. The bullet is going to have a big jump before it gets to the rifling, maybe this is not a concern just wanted to bring it up. You need to be careful that the insert does not come out when firing the rifle, this would create an excessive headspace situation, dangerous if the rifle was fire like this.
If you have some meat on the barrel shank I would cut off enough to clean out the 30-06 chamber with the 308 reamer. reset the headspace and redo the tennon as needed
 
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