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today while pulling a couple barrels,,
customer sent me a Winchester with the ears removed with a sweet barrel he wants installed on his Remington.
when i get ready to set it up, i notice a small crack.
i look closer, its cracked in 2 places, and not all the way through more like a surface crack.
ill get the ok from the owner and share a pic or 2.
A Winny you say? Breaks the mould, for sure. Didn't Winchester barrel these by hand? As opposed to a mechanical device.
oh im sure, my eyes are old, and bad from blue salts, but i know a crack when i see it,
also, notice that its the original blue finish, rifle had never beed rebuilt, and some yahoo cut the ears off.
nice early start Winchester.
for the record, iv been told all 17,s had the barrels hand fitted, not slip fitted as we all thought, fact??dont know.
this one was in well over 200 lbs. 80 is all thats needed with squared threads.
notice the locking lug ways worn, from super hot loads, or case head failure,
im thinking at this time is when the reciever cracked, and not when the barrel was installed.
17,s are only surfaced hardened, the cracks only follow the surface, and dont go below the surface.
annealed, as there seems to be a semi-circle area right dead center of the photo.
Also there a D&T hole on the left.
sharp eyes chuck and jjroth. without a release agent applied at the time of original barrel installation, i wouldnt be surprised that it may take 2-3X the initial clamping torque to break the barrel free. the receiver/barrel assembly has gone through many heat cycles during its service life, and may have "grown" tighter. john
yes,
some dingdong sporterized this, as posted.
the cracks are not likey from barrrel installation, or removal, it was cracked before i received it, and are likely from a bad hand load or case head failure.
you can see the lug ways with unusall wear.
all 17,s were annealed buy dipping in hot lead, front and rear. before they were surfaced harnedned.
contrary to popular belief, 17,s are ver soft and bend easy.
i know,,iv bent them. they drill easy, and weld like a dream.
years ago, i tried my hand at welding sight ears back on a 17.
turned out awesome, had this receiver not been cracked, it would have been a good one to weld ears on.
however, to do so , would cost more then a receiver is worth.
i did it ,to show that it can be done.
good point, chuck. the bolt bearing surfaces do seem galled. interesting project, welding on "ears". did you have to use a rod with high nickle content for a good weld? i am thinking about 40amps with the correct rod. john
i use a gas wire feed, with 3% nickle wire.
notch the side, tack a couple places, and let it rip.
the welder i have is really over size for gunwork, but since i have other larger hobbys, it will weld, sheetmetal to 3/4 inch plate.
i welded a Winchester 1876 tang back together, and posted pics.
nice clean weld chuck, minimal impurities. it must have blended and machined nicely. best, john
lol, i got lucky.
You have great eyes. How did the Criterion Barrel do?
the 17 barrels are awesome. iv installed a few, with a snap, min, reaming needed,
got great range reports back.
much better then the 03 barrels...poopoo.
No pics?
had pics posted for a few weeks...cleaned up all my old pics, to make room for more
I think I would have that one Magnafluxed. No reason to wonder at all.
Dye penetrant (spot check) will work here, as well, if you have trouble finding a cooperative machine shop or engine rebuilder/speedshop. Yiu will likely get some bleed from the rough finish and join lines, but if you follow the direction exactly it works well enough to find even small fractures. Photograph promptly- the dye will continue to bleed into the developer over time.
old post, but great pics...id say its done....looks like barrel was installed by someone other then the military, notice the finish differance in the barrel and reciever,
id take Jims advise and see if you can get a crankshaft reuilder to magnufux check it...you will have to completely take the rifle down.
most car guys like guns as well, and will be happy to help.
id like to save that pic for my arcives if i may...
so far 3 1917,s have surfaced in the last year with fractures from barrel installations....{not done by the military}
thanks for sharing the info.
I'm the first to admit that I know nothing about re-barrelling M.17's, but I do recollect back in the late 1960's when I had some 40 M.17's converted to .308W by taking out the original 30/06 barrel, shortening the threaded end, then running a .308W reamer in to cut a new chamber, and then re-fitting the original barrel.
Two things were observed; firstly the barrels were extremely hard to remove, so much so that the barrels in most instances had to be "relieved" by hack-sawing around the barrel where it abutted the receiver. Once that was done, the barrels came out easily. The cutting did not affect the barrels, as the re-chambering meant that the barrels' external face was moved forward anyway.
Now for the interesting part. On relieving the face of the barrel, three of the actions developed cracks.
It was thought that the cracks occurred following the "relieving" and removal of the barrels.
With the British .303" rifle,(No. 1 Mk III SMLE), the barrel is screwed up onto the face of the inside of the receiver. With the P.14, M.17 and the No.4 .303" rifle however, the barrel is screwed up to the outside face of the receiver.
In the mid 1960's we were advised by our Small Arms Factory Lithgow that because the No.4 rifle barrel screwed up to the outside of the receiver, a torsion wrench should be used on fitting replacement barrels, set at 125 foot pounds maximum, to ensure that the ends of the No.4 receivers were not placed under undue tension, as we were told that THERE WAS A STRONG POSSIBILITY THAT THE RECEIVERS MAY CRACK WHEN REMOVING THE BARRELS LATER.
Although there was no reference to either the P.14 .303" rifle, or the M.17 30/06 rifle having this problem, we came to the conclusion that as the M.17 barrel breeched up on the face of the receiver, like the .303" No.4 rifle, and if both the receiver, and barrel shoulder were at maximum dimensions, undue pressure would be put on the receiver face, and when relieved, that's when the receiver cracked.
Fitting a replacement barrel would make this crack more apparent, I assume. Our cracked receivers were all Eddystone-made.
An observation made from first-hand experience back in the 1960's, but I would be interested to know, just for the record, what was the torque applied to those barrels at the factory all those years ago when fitting the original barrels.
Eddystone used air guns to install barrels. Both Winchester and Remington installed barrels by hand. Most likely both WRA and RA "tried" a barrel prior to installing them. Very doubtful Eddystone "tried" anything, they most likely grabbed barrel from the pile and on it went. Also note Eddystone made the huge majority of finished rifles and their quality control people were over-worked to say the least.
Steve? though i cant see the maker on the barrel, id guess that it was rebarreled at sometime, notice that the rifle is parked, and that the barrel is much lighter color then the action, done seperate from the action...
what iv seen over the years, when i parkerize the barrel and action at the same time {together} the barrel turns out darker, as its not a heat treated steel, and the action is a bit lighter, even on 17,s with the ends annealed ..
i could be wrong, but im saying that someone other then out military changed that barrel, likely it cracked during removal of the original barrel, not real sure,...
although....
it may not have cracked at all, untill it was fired, sometime down the road,,,,case head failure, hot load, bolt lug wear, ect...all could have helped crack the action.
hard to say for sure,
iv had some 17,s that just fell loose,,,,others that took all i could muster to loosten them, from all 3 manufactures, worse ones seem to be early Winchesters, mc Guilla Gorrilla must have worked at Winchester back then..
i have found that the 1917 though very strong is actually very soft as compared to say a 1903, or Jap Type 99..
the last 10 years iv been doing some research on rifles that have failed, and some of the reasons why... so this poor girl goes into my log as a cracked 17...unknown why as of yet..
i have a couple 700 Remingtons with cracks, in the same area, both had case head failures, and had vented hot gases out in places you should push gas through,,,the 17 doesnt really have a gas excape area, one small hole, and back in the shooters face, heck a popped primer would ruin your day,,,most 17,s will blow the mag well down, and fracture the stock as well..
i think more then just a barrel install, made that action crack,...any shooter history??
Chuck: these receivers were made of 3 1/2% nickel steel. How hard should NS actually be? When Springfield finally got around to making NS receivers, I believe they were made of 2% NS. Have to wonder about Eddystone's barreling process. Seems they tend to be the receivers of note.
It's a JA barrel. I believe I read somewhere that a lot of the JA barrels were installed "in the white."
No, no. JA barrels were factory parkerized.
JA barrrels not used had a special anti rust coating, like a wax oil of some sort.. iv delt with them in the past, and learned to hot tank them before finishing or installing...
if this barrel is a parkerized JA...that adds even more to the delema...oh well, if she could talk id bet she would give you a heck of a story.
as for the steels...
i noticed that SA nickle steel is a tad more hard then the 1917,s maybe they learned from the 17,s that you really didnt need that much NS to make them strong,
iv actually crushed a 17 receiver ring at one time, and straightened ot out without a problem. and one of the reasons i find it rare that you could actually crack one by installing a barrel by hand..
id say in my opinion that more would have to be involved other then a hand tool, case head failure, using a machine to install, ect,.to crack on... but it can be done. as we have seen a couple on the last few months posted here on this forum...gotta love the net...
Chuck: Good point about comparing SA nickel steel with Eddystone nickel steel. Never seen that before. An interesting topic all by itself, this comparasion deserves exploring. I have a very nice Eddystone with original WWI barrel, near mint. The NS bolt runs "sticky" SO, I found Springfield Sporters has/had "K" bolts for sale. They are WWII replacements, and I reasoned they would be made of high grade steel, with no nickel. I was right(!) This particular rifle now runs very well in competition. Only wished it had windage on the rear sight.
learned something.,...never knew that Keefer bolts were C steel...ill log that in my gotta try sometime list.
Probably not legal for competition, but I have a Parker Hale micrometer rear sight mounted on my OTHER Eddystone. Boy, talk about a slick set-up!Quote:
Originally Posted by Calif-Steve