AusVarmint

I've had my Parker Hale .243 M 98 sporter for about 15 years. And recently have been having trouble with reloaded cases refusing to load after neck sizing. They have been fired in this rifle before.
Nothing more frustrating than cycling the bolt only to have it stop 15-20mm from being able to close completely. The cases have been length trimmed and the projies seated 15thou off the lands
On the odd occasion I am able to chamber the round by pushing the round back into the magazine and getting it to rotate in the mag with my finger tips thereby loading it in a different position than it fed originally.
To combat this issue I've resorted to fls the cases and they feed no probs.

To my mind it makes me think that the chamber is not perfectly cylindrical therefore the case expands slightly more one side than the other just up from the head of the case. So that the next time it's chambered and the case isn't in the exact same alignment the tolerance shuts down causing the case to stick and not go any further.

Any thoughts ?

You may have a bit of brass that has picked up on the chamber wall.

I've had a look inside the chamber and I can't see anything that is out of the ordinary.

But why has it shown up now and not the previous 15 years?
Cheers...
Con

Vermingone wrote:I've had my Parker Hale .243 M 98 sporter for about 15 years. And recently have been having trouble with reloaded cases refusing to load after neck sizing. They have been fired in this rifle before.
Nothing more frustrating than cycling the bolt only to have it stop 15-20mm from being able to close completely. The cases have been length trimmed and the projies seated 15thou off the lands
On the odd occasion I am able to chamber the round by pushing the round back into the magazine and getting it to rotate in the mag with my finger tips thereby loading it in a different position than it fed originally.
To combat this issue I've resorted to fls the cases and they feed no probs.

To my mind it makes me think that the chamber is not perfectly cylindrical therefore the case expands slightly more one side than the other just up from the head of the case. So that the next time it's chambered and the case isn't in the exact same alignment the tolerance shuts down causing the case to stick and not go any further.

Any thoughts ?

An interesting one.

I received some loaded rounds with my first PH .243, and some were very difficult to chamber. The previous owner had been using Super Simplex dies and only sizing the first 2/3 of the neck. The remaining neck had bulged slightly and made the cartridge fit very tight. Adjustment of the die to size the full neck length fixed the problem.

If you are able to rotate the case and it then chambers OK sounds like a different cause.

Marcus

how could your chamber get out of shape if its worked properly for 15 years?

Good questions by Con and Trevort, but as you have solved the problem by full length sizing and it is a hunting rifle, I would just keep doing that, it isn't going to make any difference, and as has been proven years ago, your cases may even last longer.

Maybe the length of the neck has grown sufficient to not let it chamber. Have you checked the case lengths?

Case lengths trimmed. Seems to get outta round down near the head of the case. FLS seems to fix it.

Vermingone wrote:Case lengths trimmed. Seems to get outta round down near the head of the case. FLS seems to fix it.

Have you tried putting the verniers around the case and rotating, any variation should be pretty obvious?

The bolt face isn't square?

I've seen a rifle where the bolt face was not square to the chamber and when fired- the cartridge becomes lop sided. FLS squishes the "stretched side" back down.

Stand a fired case up on a piece of glass and use an engineers square, or spin a fired case in a drill/lathe/v-block and check the cartridge head is square.

Tex.

If you have run a few hot loads through it might have chamber damage. i would drop it a a gun smith and get them to do a dry run with the reamer and make sure there is no deforming. even rework the chamber.

The chamber is larger than the cartridge,the cartridge lies in the bottom of the chamber,on firing the brass expands upward as that is the only way to go,if you check once fired cases you will note that one side is bulging a trifle.The tighter the chamber,the less noticeable it is.