where to begin, so the conversion has been working great in most of the demo rifles. Except Morgans rifle, Selena, shes been fighting up the entire way. We now have the CNC bolts up and running, the other demos all used handturned bolt heads and have been performing flawlessly. Well the CNC is turning so bolts are identical, faster and just look pretty. But we found out that not all rifles are identical, Selena being on one of the spectrum, Feeding was perfect with her, you could hardly tell you were feeding a round, but extraction was finicky. Also on cam to close was tight. The bolt would start to cam before the plunger on rear of firing pin housing was fully depressed so it would sometimes have a small catch. Tweaked the camming to be in the center instead of on the tight end and that fixed that issue. Then a different brand/style/thickness of extractor was made to fix the extraction. Ran around 200rds of random 223 on the range last week, then this past sunday ran Selena at the Sotex match, she was perfect in every way as witnessed by David, Morgan, Larry & myself, we all stamped it as good to go.
While i was testing extraction on my conversion I decided to test proof loads to ensure the hardness and tolerances of the metal. We're using hardened 4140 then sending it for hardening and corrosion resistance gets to mid 60's. 5 proof loads were shot and opening, extraction were as normal with slight heavier on initial lift. Primers were way over flattened and cases were almost split. Measured the bolt lugs and no noticeable setback up to .0000". Ran 10 factory loaded rounds then measured shoulders to see if anything changed pre proof and post proof. Could not pick up a difference as best i could measure with my mitutoyo caliper and hornady gauges, caliper measures +-.0005". So i labeled that as a good.
I have another conversion with a member of team Ai to test & evaluate. We tweaked a few minor things to ensure drop-in and compatibility across all AT & AX's. He states feeding is smooth af, extraction is working and is going to run tac class in a few of next years PRS matches.
Still havent gotten a blessing from a certain individual at a certain company so planning on calling monday to open a dialogue in hopes that I can source 1 item i will need for the conversion.
I hope to release some more conversions before the new year then full ramp up of production in early 2020.
Almost forgot to add, PRC/WSM conversion is working excellent, 300WSM will be my primary hunting caliber during this season. Magazine feeds excellent, extraction is perfect and holy hell does it pack a punch in such a small case.
Will try to update sooner, just got tied up with other headaches and testing.
Gilbert