'95 Chilean In .35 Remington?

[Jeff H]

So, I have this '95 Chilean, in very nice shape, with a '94 Swede barrel and '93 Spanish bottom metal (hinged floorplate with button inside the guard) and no wood. I had a Choate stoc on it but sold it. I know it will shoot with the Swede barrel, but I have been wanting to make it into a .35 Remington but the budget is tight, since I gave up my "real" job and went into teaching at a local community college. Shilen has a short-chambered barrel for $225. I can install it and rent a reamer and do all the rest of the work myself. This will actually be used primarily with cast bullet ans iron sight.

 

Any ideas on how well that Shilen will perform? Anyone know of another alternative? Is the '94 Swede barrel worth anything? The sights were heated and turned 180 degrees to prevent setting back and rechambering. It headspaced when seated, but the sights were upside down.

 

Thanks.

 

Jeff

[pacrat]

At the very least there will be bolt face/extractor issues. The 35 rem base is .460" dia and the original 7x57 your rifle was when new is .473".

 

You said,...... "The sights were heated and turned 180 degrees to prevent setting back and rechambering. It headspaced when seated, but the sights were upside down."......

 

Am I reading this wrong or missing something because? Changing the sight location would have nothing to do with the headspace being correct. Nor prevent the need to set back and reheadspace. But if the barrel was set back and rechambered that could cause the sights to clock at 180 out.

[z1r]

Me, I'd forego the .35 Remin Favor of either the 9x57 or .358 Win. Either can be handloaded to duplicate the Rem's performance with 100% feeding & extracting reliability.

 

Yea, not quite sure what's going on with teh 6,5 barrel????

[Larry Gibson]

I've a Shilen .35 barrel I put on a M91 Argie in .35 Remington. The barrel was ordered from Brownell's. It is an excellent barrel and shoots MOA with J bullets and very close to that with cast bullets. The rifle has a Lyman SME receiver sight on it and a post front sight. I left the barrel at 26" because i like longer barrels and can still focus on the front sight when they are that far away. My rifle favors the RCBS 35-200-FN over a full case of 4895. Velocity is 2150 fps with excellent accuracy. I killed a very nice 8 point white tail down Texas way last November with it. My intenson origionally was to shorten a .35 Whelen die about .32" and then run the Whelen cases (or '06 cases) into the die and trim them back so the case neck is just short of the reamer neck. A standard .35 Whelen finish reamer is used to finish ream the chamber and headspace to the formed cases. The AOL then is perfect for the 3" magazine of the SR actions. The cartridge then is very similar to a 9x57 and will feed and extract without problems in Mauser actions. However, the 35 Remington is working so well in that M91 that i just have not got around to finishing the project. I suggest you try 5 rounds of .35 Remington through your M95 action and see if it feeds and extracts. They do just fine in my M95 which is still 7x57.

 

Larry Gibson

[Jeff H]

At the very least there will be bolt face/extractor issues. The 35 rem base is .460" dia and the original 7x57 your rifle was when new is .473".

 

You said,...... "The sights were heated and turned 180 degrees to prevent setting back and rechambering. It headspaced when seated, but the sights were upside down."......

 

Am I reading this wrong or missing something because? Changing the sight location would have nothing to do with the headspace being correct. Nor prevent the need to set back and reheadspace. But if the barrel was set back and rechambered that could cause the sights to clock at 180 out.

 

Yes, aware of the bolt face/extractor difference. I could replace the extractor with an oversized one as I sumble accross one that is "tight" from time to time. Better to save one like that and replace with one tha fites better. It can be trimmed a little with some stoning. The .35 R cases don't seem to slop around a lot in this bolt face, even though it's chambered for a 6.5x55. I have been using Remington brass in it and the bag of 100 that I got measures the same as my .257, 7x57, etc. brass. Go figure.

 

That did sound weird the way I said that. The 'smith who put the barrel on tried it without any machining, and when he had the barrel seated, it headspaced, but the sights were on the bottom, so instead of setting the barrel back and touching the chamber up, he rotated the sights.

[Jeff H]

Me, I'd forego the .35 Remin Favor of either the 9x57 or .358 Win. Either can be handloaded to duplicate the Rem's performance with 100% feeding & extracting reliability.

 

Yea, not quite sure what's going on with teh 6,5 barrel????

 

 

The 6.5 barrel is fine - just the way I described what had to be done... Gave it another shot in my last post.

 

I won't put a .358 Win on it because when someone buys it at my estate sale, they could put factory stuff in it. Haven't looked up the pressure on the .358 though, so maybe.....

 

I am liking the 9x57 idea though. I will have to check the bore/groove dimensions and see if the mould I got for this project will work. It's an RDO and I have squeezed them a good bit but don't know the limit. 8x57 and 7x57 brass may be easier to locate that the .35 Remington too. Hmmmm.....

[Jeff H]

I've a Shilen .35 barrel I put on a M91 Argie in .35 Remington. The barrel was ordered from Brownell's. It is an excellent barrel and shoots MOA with J bullets and very close to that with cast bullets. The rifle has a Lyman SME receiver sight on it and a post front sight. I left the barrel at 26" because i like longer barrels and can still focus on the front sight when they are that far away. My rifle favors the RCBS 35-200-FN over a full case of 4895. Velocity is 2150 fps with excellent accuracy. I killed a very nice 8 point white tail down Texas way last November with it. My intenson origionally was to shorten a .35 Whelen die about .32" and then run the Whelen cases (or '06 cases) into the die and trim them back so the case neck is just short of the reamer neck. A standard .35 Whelen finish reamer is used to finish ream the chamber and headspace to the formed cases. The AOL then is perfect for the 3" magazine of the SR actions. The cartridge then is very similar to a 9x57 and will feed and extract without problems in Mauser actions. However, the 35 Remington is working so well in that M91 that i just have not got around to finishing the project. I suggest you try 5 rounds of .35 Remington through your M95 action and see if it feeds and extracts. They do just fine in my M95 which is still 7x57.

 

Larry Gibson

 

You're singing the siren's song with that post, Larry.

I have yet to run a case through it. What you did with yours sounds like what I was thinking but with a stubby barrel.

[pacrat]

Jeff,

 

If fitting a new claw extractor makes it work, go for it. Most 35 rems are strictly hunting guns. My concern with the head dia difference is this. In the field and you fire a shot and that is also the time that the rifle has an issue with sticky extraction and tears off a section of rim instead of extracting it you are left holding a club not a rifle.

 

I try to adhere to the KISS rule and leave bolt faces, as is, if possible.

 

JM2C

[Jeff H]

Jeff,

 

If fitting a new claw extractor makes it work, go for it. Most 35 rems are strictly hunting guns. My concern with the head dia difference is this. In the field and you fire a shot and that is also the time that the rifle has an issue with sticky extraction and tears off a section of rim instead of extracting it you are left holding a club not a rifle.

 

I try to adhere to the KISS rule and leave bolt faces, as is, if possible.

 

JM2C

 

 

Good point, but I wouldn't be loading the .35R to the point of sticky extraction.

I appreciate the input from everyone. I don't want to remove the barrel just to run a few through it but I will rlemove the barrel if I am pretty certain the cartridge change is viable with the above considerations.

[Jeff H]

Good point, but I wouldn't be loading the .35R to the point of sticky extraction.

I appreciate the input from everyone. I don't want to remove the barrel just to run a few through it but I will rlemove the barrel if I am pretty certain the cartridge change is viable with the above considerations.

 

I finally got my '95 back. I had trdaded it to a guy who wanted a "project" but the project never made it off the ground, do I traded him some stuff for it. Said he had 500 rounds of commercial ammo to throw int on the trade but showed up with 200 rounds of new/modern Bosian 139 gr. FMJ. Pulled one to make sure it was boxer primed, and it is, but the flash holes are tiny.

 

Anyway, will be trying to decide whether to remove the '94 Swede barrel and go for a project or just put a stock on it and use it. Could have sworn I D/T'd this one foe a reciever sight, but no holes anywhere.

 

The extractor is not allowing the Bosnian case heads to come into the bolt face recess because the edge that goes into the extracor groove is "long," so that extractor may work with the .35R case head.