SmallCaliberCentral

I bought a Rem 700 SPS Varmint last winter. I fired 200 factory loads through it with minimal feeding problems. I ran into feeding problems with once fired cases. I could load and fire a factory load with no problem, eject that case, load that case and close the bolt. When I would close the bolt, the extractor would shave a fairly large piece of brass off the case rim. The bolt also closed hard, obviously. I neck sized a few rounds and trimmed them, same problem. I noticed that all of my once fired cases had 2 marks on them; they look like small cuts in the case. They are deep enough so that my fingernail catches on them. My twice fired cases show 4 marks.
My conclusion: My chamber must have 2 burrs in it. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to remove the burrs? Is polishing the way to go? I have heard negative things about polishing.
When I said that I had minimal feeding problems with factory ammo, I am refering to the fact that I cannot load rounds smoothly without actually pushing the round into the chamber. When I try loading them one at a time from the magazine (I have a single shot follower) they bind up in the chamber and required a lot of force to chamber.
Thanks for your help.
I do have a picture showing one case mark if anyone wants to see it. I could email it out.

Yes...check varmint al's website.

I use a shotgun or 38 cal bore mop with metal polish. You MUST get ALL of the metal polish out of the action and barrel. I removed my action from the stock, removed the bolt, cleaned the chamber, polished the chamber, and then flushed everything with carburetor cleaner. After that, clean the chamber and barrel again with your normal gun cleaning solvents.

http://www.varmintal.com/arelo.htm

Did they look like this?

I took it in and had the chamber polished, all better now.

This was from a 700 SPS Varmint in 17 Remington Fireball.


http://wrzwaldo.org/KoolAid/17FB/Brass_Eater.html

That is EXACTLY how my cases look. Do you think I should polish the chamber myself or bring it to someone? I have read VarmintAl's procedure; it sounds pretty easy.

I would have done mine myself but the shop where I buy most of my firearms and such did it as a warranty repair.

The folks at Kesselrings Gun Shop rock!

My first "varmint" rifle was a Winchester Heavy Varmint .22/250, nice rifle and it shot very well, but it had a burr on it that scratched the cases as they entered and extracted from the chamber. I wasn't happy about it, so I looked it over very carefully and finally figured out where the burr was, then I went after it with a file, it only took a couple of licks with the file to smooth it out and make a great rifle out of it . I was pretty put out at having to operate on a fancy new rifle, but then again, I was an IPSC shooter, and NO IPSC shooter can leave his equally expensive pistols alone, either . I shudder to think of how much I spent on the pistols over the years............
Use some empty cases and slide them in slowly, and try to see where the "bad" place is, you might be able to "fix" it with a couple of file strokes. Go slow..............

I located the burrs in mine by marking the case with a sharpie marker then chambering the round by hand with the mark at 12 o'clock. Closed the bolt, pulled the trigger, ejected and seen where the scratch/gouge was in relationship to the mark. I did that a couple times to confirm.

On my last savage barrel the chamber had horizontal indentations/scratches. Not exactly what yours must look like. Yours must be raised I'd quess. Close enough for government work though.
I never fired a round through it in that condition. Before I installed it I took a piece of fireformed brass from another barrel, coated it with 600 grit lapping compound and spun it in the chamber. Started out by hand (very rough) then inserted a flat point screwdriver blade in the primer hole and spun it with a cordless drill.
When I had removed as much metal as I dared I chucked in an old .30 cal bronze brush with a genourous amount of 0000 steel wool wrapped around it. Spun that for awhile.
The indentations are still visible in the chamber but nothing like before. Never saw a mark on my brass and zero extraction problems with sane loads.

On a fixed headspace rifle like your Remy there may be concern about moving the shoulders forward. Personally I would'nt worry about that at all. Removing as little as .001 of steel is not an easy thing to do with a fine abrasive.
There should be no need to get the abrasive up near the shoulders anyway.

I had the same type marks in the Rem xr-100 I bought. I took it back where I bought it, and the gunsmith polished the chamber, and no more problems. It shoots great. It's too bad; this should not be happening. Jim

hoegebear wrote:I had the same type marks in the Rem xr-100 I bought. I took it back where I bought it, and the gunsmith polished the chamber, and no more problems. It shoots great. It's too bad; this should not be happening. Jim

Yep, exactly what I was thinking!

I decided to bring it in to a gunsmith. He is going to remove the barrel and do some work on the chamber. This gun never did load ammo right. He thought he could get it perfect.