Rebarrelling a K-31 ?

[mr humble]

I have a minty K-31 I bought a few years ago for top dollar as it was described as having a "10/10 bore". I finally sprung for a bore scope, cleaned it to bare metal AND it's more like a 6/10, having throat erosion and pitting in the first 12". I have read that K-31s can be rebarrelld by cutting off the breech end of the barrel and rethreading it for the new bbl. OR finding a new K-31 bbl. Have no idea who does this work. Appreciate suggestions.

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[tiriaq]

A gunsmith in New England used to install .308 barrels by using the original barrel stump as a bushing, so that is a possibility.
I suppose a new barrel could be installed, if one could be found.
Have you shot it? Is the performance poor enough to warrant the effort and expense of rebarrelling?

[Eaglelord17]

A gunsmith in New England used to install .308 barrels by using the original barrel stump as a bushing, so that is a possibility.
I suppose a new barrel could be installed, if one could be found.
Have you shot it? Is the performance poor enough to warrant the effort and expense of rebarrelling?

And is it worth the expense and effort when you could sell this rifle and get one in better condition ready to go?

[tiriaq]

That would be a much more practical solution.
The rifles being rebarrelled to .308 were being set up for NM target shooting, using either altered original stocks, or new commercial ones. At the time they were probably cost effective competition rifles.

[Frank46]

I believe Larry Racine not quite sure about the spelling did use the K-31 action to make up match rifles in 308 for those folks who wanted one on the K-31 action. But I believe he passed away some years back. He did use part of the K-31 barrel when he installed the new barrel. I've seen some of the older Swiss rifles such as advertised in Shotgun News that had the barrel set back and rechambered in 308. Even saw one that had been reworked to fire the 30-30 cartridge. Bought my Swiss K-31 at a local gun show here in Louisiana for the magnificent sum of $135 bucks. By the price alone you can tell it was a long time ago. I hoard my limited stock of GP 11 and the K-31 is a great platform for cast bullets. I have an old Lyman bullet mold for the 311291 and 31141. Both molds cast the bore riding portion of the bullet at .298 or slightly less. While not the .300 or .301-.302 normally wanted for the standard 30 caliber rifles, just might work in the K-31 with it's tight bore dimensions. With the covid virus now closing all the local ranges it may be sometime before I can try those two bullets out. Stay safe. Frank

[tiriaq]

Larry's website is still active.

[Pierre]

Larry did pass away, and I remember calling shortly after that and I don't believe anyone was going to take over that process for him.
Probably just a lack of interest.

[Frederick303]

Wow, I did not know Larry was dead.

He was one of the greats in Palma shooting. Great Guy to talk too, knew a great deal about LR shooting.

Helped me restore a 1972 Canadian Palma rifle lacking the rear PH sight bridge.

We are diminished.

308 manually operated NRA match rifles with wood stocks are totally obsolete these days. Have been since the day of the AR match rifle taking over around the turn of the millennium. There really is no demand for these any more.

[Daan Kemp]

The OP hasn't been back since Oct 2019.

[Bruce_in_Oz]

If your K-31 barrel is shabby and you cannot find a NOS replacement, any good gun-plumber could run up a replacement in blued or stainless. I might cost more than a whole new K-31, but them's the breaks.

The only other caveat is rim size. the smaller diameter of the .308Win rim WILL cause a certain amount of annoyance because of ejection "failures". I had similar issues with my K-11, using .284Win brass, before all that Serbian stuff turned up.

A little "adjustment" of the travel of the extractor improved it, a little, and it was OK for "slow-fire" matches. Rapid? Not so much. Converting to .308Win without altering the bolt-face AND the extractor is fraught with adventure.

If your barrel is in good condition, just stick with the original cartridge. The biggest challenge, then, is to find a source of GP-11 bullets or a similarly profiled bullet. K-31 barrel have short throats and Sierra Match Kings are a problem because of their tangent ogive. You could get that friendly local gunsmith to CAREFULLY lengthen the throat do accept 168gn SMKs, or similar, or find a bullet with a secant ogive.

Cheers from Oz.