Coned bolt face for repeaters

[Guest]

For a repeating rifle (Remington 700) used for hunting (but built with extreme accuracy in mind), how reliable is a coned bolt face for feeding out of the magazine? I have had some people say to stay with a flat bolt face, while others swear by the coned bolt face with sliding extractor. I am getting a replacement bolt body and have a choice of bolt faces and extractors (even a standard totally enclosed Remington extractor).

 

[daveosok]

Berkhouse
I did a coned bolt face for a guy a while back on a 243. His problem was he couldn't use it as a repeater but not because of magazine length but because his bullets seated so far out when he chambered them in original configuration they would hit the mouth counter bore.
So he wanted it coned. I coned it and he wanted a chamfer where the chamber meats the counter bore for the bolt head at .032 thou. It turned out good and he was pleased right up until the point of he couldn't use once fired brass (as if you remember that small chamfer) required him to full length size with small base dies. Well he wasn't to pleased course you cant please someone who told you to do it in the first place when they thought it would work.
Well he fired a few rounds and ended up having to get a sako style extractor because the lip of the bolt head cracked. So it works now but he still cant use once fired brass and neck size only.
I've decided I wont be doing anymore coned bolt faces as they are time consuming compared to the regular style and in my case created more problems than they solved.
From this point on I wont take a customers advice on how he wants something done if it seems out of the normal realm of gunsmithing.
I would cone my own bolt if I needed it, it's a nice looking feature and I'm sure helps in chambering.
Just my thoughts on the subject.
Dave

 

[Switchbarrel]

TB-

I specified a coned bolt on my Nesika Bay repeater. I wanted a long action magazine for my 6.5 X .284. Even with the rebated rim of the .284 brass, feeding from the magazine is no problem. This is with an H-S Precision det. mag. and not a Remington BDL set-up. I wanted the coned bolt more for the taper on the barrel leading into the chamber though, as the second barrel for this rifle is a 6PPC that I set the round on the front of the magazine and single feed.

-Rick