frnkeore
posted this
25 February 2019
Regarding the bolt face issue.......
Remington's bolt is advertised to be one that encloses the cartridge head for "safety". It must by necessity leave part of the cartridge head, unsupported by the barrel.
ALL modern cartridges have a solid head of at least .200 and most are no longer than .220. All boxer type primers for both L & S are about .175 long so, you have to have that .200 to hold them and bottom out. Most will bottom at least .005 below the surface.
Now, back to the Max. The 357 Maximum was designed, right from the start, to be a 50 K CUP cartridge! It will hold at least as much, if not more pressure than the 223 family of cases.
I don't do it in my LW but, I can shoot loads in my DW revolver that completely flatten the primers. The case is supported better in the revolver but, the chamber walls are MUCH thinner than a rifle.
Remember, in a a single shot, you have a extractor cut that usually has to be about .150 deep, leaving that area, unsupported. It's the weakest point of a SS barrel and if one fails, that is where it will start.
I've only fitted a few bolt action barrels but, as a matter of doing those, I thread them to within .002 - .010 of the bolt face, just because that is the way I think it should be done. I single load so, I have no issues with ramps to feed from magazines BUT, I built a Mauser with a 8.15 x 46R barrel and had to have a push feed. The bolt face was no issue, I used 225 Win cases. To get it to push feed over the rim, I reduced the extractor width to (from memory) about .15 wide. It works well.
Frank