increasing headspace on newly installed factory original fixed shouldered barrel

[1pocket]

i have not found much information here on this topic or much of anywhere else for that matter so thought to pose this question.

recently i removed a very tired 308 win barrel off my howa 1500 to replace with another brand new fixed shoulder factory barrel i had in my safe of the same caliber. what i have found is the barrel fits perfectly as expected but the headspace is tight and needs to be increased by .005

i do not not want to mess with the bolt and decided to shim the barrel increasing headspace by .005 using one 18-8 ss steel arbor shim with 1'' id (perfect for od barrel thread diameter) and 1.5'' od. the receiver od at point of barrel action contact is 1.34''. i plan to shave down the excess shim for a better smoother fit.

in doing so i have now perfect headspace after tightening the barrel to 35-40 psi (i never tighten beyond that as i have found it excessive and unnecessary).

my question here since i have never shimmed a barrel before on a bolt action of this caliber and have yet to fire the newly changed rifle have i made a grievous mistake which will potentially give me trouble?

typically aftermarket barrels come with a barrel nut allowing fine adjustment for headspace. how is this setup using a barrel nut to adjust barrel depth into action any different than shimming a fixed shouldered barrel?

 

[Darryle]

Following along, curious what the smiths and more experienced members thoughts are.

Personally, I wouldn't want a shim in there.

 

[FEENIX]

i have not found much information here on this topic or much of anywhere else for that matter so thought to pose this question.

recently i removed a very tired 308 win barrel off my howa 1500 to replace with another brand new fixed shoulder factory barrel i had in my safe of the same caliber. what i have found is the barrel fits perfectly as expected but the headspace is tight and needs to be increased by .005

i do not not want to mess with the bolt and decided to shim the barrel increasing headspace by .005 using one 18-8 ss steel arbor shim with 1'' id (perfect for od barrel thread diameter) and 1.5'' od. the receiver od at point of barrel action contact is 1.34''. i plan to shave down the excess shim for a better smoother fit.

in doing so i have now perfect headspace after tightening the barrel to 35-40 psi (i never tighten beyond that as i have found it excessive and unnecessary).

my question here since i have never shimmed a barrel before on a bolt action of this caliber and have yet to fire the newly changed rifle have i made a grievous mistake which will potentially give me trouble?

Sorry, but if you have to shim it, it was not done correctly - not in spec.

 

[AZShooter]

.005" isn't much. Wouldn't the shim act just like a thicker recoil lug that a Remington would use?

A friend and I just worked on a Remington with a short chambered 243 barrel using a reamer in a lathe. Depending on the torque in tightening the barrel and receiver, the headspace varied slightly. We were able to fine tune the headspace to perfection with the correct thickness recoil lug and quite a bit of torque. Can't see any issue doing this.

 

[Roughrice]

Custom machined lug to correct your headspace is what I’d try.
Then you won’t have to worry about your die not bumping the shoulder back enough.

 

[1pocket]

Sorry, but if you have to shim it, it was not done correctly - not in spec.

fyi:

i can not speak for all rifles but howas of which i own half a dozen are inexpensive yet excellent accuracy guns with butter smooth bolt action however because they are mass produced they do not hold the spec (barrel to receiver) over the course of 1000's of rifles produced so headspace is not perfect each and everytime.

on the bolt on all howas i have seen is an engraved number which from my understanding corresponds to the machinist who fine tunes the headspace once given the barrel, bolt and receiver to assemble. in effect no 2 are exactly the same because the precise tolerance can not be held in the mass production.

this is why the brand new factory barrel i installed required tweaking (headspace increased). there is nothing wrong with the barrel or the way it was machined and it was built within the factory tolerances i have seen for these barrels.

for a 600 dollar rifle i have no reason to complain. this gun has been and does everything i would expect from a much higher priced firearm.

 

[Darryle]

Custom machined lug to correct your headspace is what I’d try.
Then you won’t have to worry about your die not bumping the shoulder back enough.

Howa uses an integral lug

 

[1pocket]

.005" isn't much. Wouldn't the shim act just like a thicker recoil lug that a Remington would use?

A friend and I just worked on a Remington with a short chambered 243 barrel using a reamer in a lathe. Depending on the torque in tightening the barrel and receiver, the headspace varied slightly. We were able to fine tune the headspace to perfection with the correct thickness recoil lug and quite a bit of torque. Can't see any issue doing this.

these were my exact thoughts. my only concern was the thickness consistency tolerance of the shim and of course the metal. i did not want to use brass or aluminum because of heat build up so stainless steel was the perfect component

 

[Roughrice]

Howa uses an integral lug

Ah…ok
I don’t have any Howa’s

 

[akdad]

I don’t own any howa rifles but on any rifle I’ve ever had the numbers etched on bolt will be the last 4 of serial number for firearm.

 

[FEENIX]

fyi:

i can not speak for all rifles but howas of which i own half a dozen are inexpensive yet excellent accuracy guns with butter smooth bolt action however because they are mass produced they do not hold the spec (barrel to receiver) over the course of 1000's of rifles produced so headspace is not perfect each and everytime.

on the bolt on all howas i have seen is an engraved number which from my understanding corresponds to the machinist who fine tunes the headspace once given the barrel, bolt and receiver to assemble. in effect no 2 are exactly the same because the precise tolerance can not be held in the mass production.

this is why the brand new factory barrel i installed required tweaking (headspace increased). there is nothing wrong with the barrel or the way it was machined and it was built within the factory tolerances i have seen for these barrels.

for a 600 dollar rifle i have no reason to complain. this gun has been and does everything i would expect from a much higher priced firearm.

That’s why I use barrel nut pre-fits, instead of shoulder fit. All my DIYs are with Savage actions and all of them are with barrel nut, except for one.

 

[akdad]

If I’m understanding the op correctly on issue the most common correction method as a DIY would be to rent/buy a reamer and headspace guages. For auto loaders you can also get a pull-thru reamer that acts as its own headspace gauge.

 

[Tiny Tim]

^^^^^^^^THIS

 

[Bravo 4]

Can I ask what you checked headspace with?