Gunsmithing how to tell if receiver was trued?

Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

some of the work you would have to remove the barrel to see. but the bolt face and rear of bolt lugs should look like they were machined. Pic's would help on this one.
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

savagebolt-1.jpg
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

looks like a savage bolt, which has a floating head, and doesn't need to be trued at all. If this is a Savage and still uses the same barrel nut, then the only thing that may have been done is facing the action and truing the interal bolt locking lugs. You would need to take the barrel off to tell if either of those things had been done.

I would ask the 'smith what exactly truing entailed, and then we would have a better idea to tell you how to determine if that had been done or not.

DD
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

yeah, just not sure what you would even do to a savage if employing the barrel nut. Truing the face wouldn't be worthwhile as the barrel is seated against the threads of the action. That only leaves truing the interior lugs, which I think would be a waste of time on an action like the savage. I would think a custom barrel chambered properly would be all you need to rock and roll, but I am not a savage smith either.
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

not sure why you would lap lugs in a floating bolt head action, and I am not sure why you would face the action when using a barrel nut (that is likely not surface ground), or to even face it at all when using a barrel nut. Like I said, I am not a savage smith, so I am only speculating as to what makes sense to me.

Might be difficult to tell if the action was faced or not, but you would need to pull the barrel nut off in order to tell. You can look at the rear of your bolt lugs and see if there is anything that looks to be lapped. But, if there is no finish on them, it might be tough to determine that as well.

DD
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

I've done a few Savages and i personly di it just like a remington , indicate off the bolt bore , recut threads , face reciever and internal lugs. The bolthead gets the same just done differatly than a Rem. , I face the bolt lugs on the back , the face of the bolt and the front of the bolt also , I think that the bolt face being concentric with the bolt lugs can only make things better.

I can't prove if any of this actualy benifits in the accuracy depertment but i don't think it can hurt
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

JJ, I can see that, but you are talking a total truing job. When the threads aren't re-cut, then what would be the point of facing the action on this? The only thing that seats on the face is the barrel nut, which pulls the barrel tight to the threads, it will do the same job on an un-trued face. And lapping the lugs, that only ensures you are getting full contact, so not sure what the point of that would be on a floating bolt head.

Doesn't make sense to me in this situation...

DD
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

Uh no.

The height stand is Brown and Sharp. It's an oldie but a goodie. New it was over $7K.

The rock (surface plate) runs about $500 for a Class A. (little one like mine) Big one's get really carried away. A starret cystal pink is super nice and super spendy.

Gauge blocks and what not are available from any industrial supply like MSC, McMaster, Bass tool, etc. Mine are Brown and Sharps so they weren't very cheap. There are import brands though that are much more reasonable in price and still plenty good for gun work.

Brownells is good for some things, like tools and materials specific to the industry. They are very over priced though for things a guy would find in any mainstream machine shop. You are far better off getting a hold of the industrial suppliers I mentioned. Their selection/prices on taps for instance is just unreasonable and the quality isn't near as good as what I can buy elsewhere.

Good luck.

C
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: DebosDave</div><div class="ubbcode-body">JJ, I can see that, but you are talking a total truing job. When the threads aren't re-cut, then what would be the point of facing the action on this? The only thing that seats on the face is the barrel nut, which pulls the barrel tight to the threads, it will do the same job on an un-trued face. And lapping the lugs, that only ensures you are getting full contact, so not sure what the point of that would be on a floating bolt head.

Doesn't make sense to me in this situation...

DD </div></div>

If the barrel nut face and the receiver face are not true to each other you will get contact at one point before the rest, then under torque it will straighten things out. This "straightening" will cause undue stresses in the tenon ring that don't need to be there if things are true. That would be my reason for cutting the receiver face AND the barrel nut true to wherever the factory threads are.

If you're going to go through all that work to get it setup for this though, why not just do the whole thing right? It doesn't take very long to recut the threads, lug abutments and receiver face and do the job right.
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

I agree and in reguard to cutting the bolt haed , my line of thought was to make sure that the rear of the lugs and the bolt face were concentric , not so much concentric with the bolt body. I figured that if they were not when the lugs engaged under the pressure of the round going off that the case may not come out strait.

The few Savages I've done were actualy small ring action that i converted to large ring actions , I figure the added OD of the larger shank and reduced depth of the finer thread could only be positive in the strength department and it also allows for a better action to barrel fit.

Personaly I don't like the barrel nut setup and would prefer to set it up with a shoulder like a remington again added meat around the chamber
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

"how to tell if receiver was trued?"

Simple, get a smith whose word you can trust
wink.gif
All kidding aside, if you're not 100% sure he did what you paid him for, you should get a new smith. Gunsmithing is on the level with having a good mechanic, you need to be able to trust what they are telling you they did.

-matt
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

Well apparently I was on a different page than the smith. To me blueprinting a savage was truing everything, to him it was just truing a couple of things. But I am not interested in having him fix it and taking another 11 months. So, I am going to see how it shoots, likely pretty good, if not it is going to a savage specialist. And guys don't make fun of me for dropping a lot of coin on a savage, lol.
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

their is absolutly nothing wrong with a Savage , their just not the "sexy" thing to have now days.

Contact Kevin Rayhill , he is probably one of the few guys I'd send a savage to
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

Jim shot Savages for years, and the reason was because they are just about as good as they can be right out of the box. By design there is little to be done by a basic smith to improve its performance. I hate to hear about guys that hang out their shingle and will sell a load of shit to anyone they can. We had a guy bring us his Rem 700 that he had the "action worked" by a local "smith" that was a buddy of a buddy. His complaint was hard chambering and wanted Jim to check his headspace. Well, it was super tight on a go gage. So we pulled the barrel to checked out they guys action truing and what did we see on the action face? FRIGGING FILE MARKS!!! Apparently draw filing is a new technique we haven't heard of. But the good news is we can sell our lathe and just go to Harbor Freight and buy a bunch of chinese files for receiver work!

Know who your sending your stick to and if they know what they're doing. A hack can ruin your action best case, or build you a nice grenade worst case.
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

one thing Fred at SSS does on his T&T is change the angle of the cocking ramp, its easy to see that mod by comparing it to a stock bolt.i like my savage as it came from the factory, LRPV 223 ,i have on occasion put 3 rds. in one hole at 100yds with factory match ammo .
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

I had a buddy that sent his Savage to a guy that accurized them. His guy told him he would remove the bbl, clean up threads than reinstall bbl to its most accurate position.
His rifle came back with the timing off as well. It did shoot good so I guess he got his moneys worth.
SScott
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

I think in the future Kevin Rayhill will be the smith on the case. He does excellent work and is trustworthy. I talked to him on the phone for 20 minutes about it. His opinion is that you must true everything. His reasons were very technical so I can't really explain them, but none the less, for ultimate savage accuracy, true everything.
 
Re: how to tell if receiver was trued?

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: JWV</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I think in the future Kevin Rayhill will be the smith on the case. He does excellent work and is trustworthy. I talked to him on the phone for 20 minutes about it. His opinion is that you must true everything. His reasons were very technical so I can't really explain them, but none the less, for ultimate savage accuracy, true everything. </div></div>

Kevin is a great guy and always willing to talk a while and explain everything as best he can.
He can build a hell of an AR too !!