Long Action vs Short Action.

[Mike Matteson]

Not sure what this has to do with choice of action length. If you want a long action it will work with a short action round. A short action will not generally work with long action cartridges.

What I thought the point of the OP's thread was about is using a long action for a short action round and net gain. A few already touched on the net benefit if ANY. For example in the PRC it comes in a .188 freebore generally from the factory and most custom shops spec a .188 freebore reamer. IF you choose a long action the gained ground would be to use a .240 freebore and seat 150 class bullets way out. In this case, you could probably see a performance gain. For those like me running a saami chamber, there is little benefit if any.

It was kind of off the subject.

 

[Idaho Lefty]

The problem with a WSM in a true long action is not whether it will shoot, but it's if you can get it to feed correctly from the magazine. This is the reason a few have mentioned they built there WSM long action as a single shot hand feed.

All of, the WSM Cart's, FEED very, "well" out of, Single Stack Magazines from,.. TIKKA actions.
Just buy the APPROPIATE,. magazine

 

[JAYgs8163]

All of, the WSM Cart's, FEED very, "well" out of, Single Stack Magazines from,.. TIKKA actions.
Just buy the APPROPIATE,. magazine

Not a issue I need to deal with and I don't own a TIKKA.

 

[Turpentine21]

I am looking at getting 2-700Rem action in 30/06 those type of length actions. 1 to set up a new 25/280AI built, and the other to set up to do my fireforming for my case in different rifles. So off to the smith to see what older barrels he has on hand. To see what kind of trouble that I am getting into. I don't care if the barrels rifling is bad. Just as long I can have them rechamber for the cases I am going to use and the correct caliber. I have 1 reamer, and will be gettng a new reamer. So I'll have the barrels set up for each different case I want to fire form. So all I have to do is change out barrel to that chamber to fire form. So off to the pawnshops to look for actions.
Where I am going wrong?

Sort of off topic but have you ever looked at Hydroforming? I researched it a little bit when I was thinking about adding an Ackley. Whidden makes the dies based on the dimensions of 3 of your fireformed rounds.

 

[Turpentine21]

All of, the WSM Cart's, FEED very, "well" out of, Single Stack Magazines from,.. TIKKA actions.
Just buy the APPROPIATE,. magazine

I like the way the single stack mags feed though I don't own a Tikka either. But I'm feeding standard diameter cartridges, 65-06 and 308

 

[koja]

I probably need to just go search for it, but has anyone done a definitive test with the same cartridge and projectile and comparing short vs long action speeds with comparable loading?

In both you would want to load close to lands while using the longest OAL possible while still maintaining neck contact with projectile.

For example, I'm using a 7 WSM in impact action and hawkins hunter magazine at about 2.91" OAL. I'm getting 2875 fps very easily with 175 ABLR and RL26 on a 24" barrel. Pretty sure I can hit mid 2900s without an issue but I don't want to inflate my numbers.

For the sake of conversation, if I rebuilt it with a long action what would I expect as a FPS gain here by adding powder capacity and OAL?

Long vs short action.......,Not much change on wsm,your throat limits ya with some longer bullets.On a wsm you have to add some throat,I added .129 to mine.

 

[nralifer]

I did some extensive testing with bullet seating depth many years back and pretty sure the report was posted here on LRH. The test was with my 338 Allen Xpress which is my version of an improved 338 lapua. Now this is not a short action but the reason for the testing was because some were saying they could seat the 300 gr berger to well over 4" in their 338 edge rifles and easily match the 338 Allen Xpress……. i knew this was not correct, especially when considering brass life. The results however really did surprise me.

tested this bullet with a seating depth of 3.650" for use in detachable magazines such as the HS Precision, 3.820" for use in the extended mag lengths and then at 4.100" for single shot use which should have produced a HUGE advantage in velocity.

to start the test, i started with Retumbo which at the time was one of the better powders for the 338 Allen Xpress with the 300 gr berger. the test barrel was a 26" finish length, simply tested cutting throat lengths to different lengths.

going off memory, the short length produced around 2850 fps. mid length was a bit over 2900 and the long length was in the 2975 fps range so there was a 125 fps increase in velocity. This was as expected and it proved that a long seated 338 AX in a relatively short barrel was easily matching a long seated 338 Edge but doing it with 4" shorter barrel length….

anyway, after this test and reviewing the results, the short seated rounds ran out of capacity relatively quickly. So just for curiosity i decided to try some ramshot magnum which is a ball powder in similar burn rate to retumbo. Just to see, i through a same weight powder charge as the one used for retumbo and found that there was plenty of excess space in the case with same weight powder charge. This was simply due to magnum being a ball powder with much higher load density then the stick powder retumbo.

gave magnum powder a full work up and to my amazement, this powder topped out at the exact same 2975 fps as the very long loaded 4.100" version with retumbo…… i could actually use slightly more Magnum in the short 3.650" oal then retumbo used on the long seated version…..

so whats the point. Well, with the selection of powders we have today, there is very likely a combo that will work with a higher load density powder that will produce basically the same velocity as a different powder in a long seated application.

now if your using one specific powder, yes there will be a preferred oal to get the most velocity for a given situation but in a short seated application, there will be a best powder and there will be a totally different BEST powder for a long seated application. In the end, they often are extremely similar in end resulting performance.

as far as safety, we have heard often its dangerous to deep seat bullets….. not sure where this came from. I have never seen any danger at all in doing this. In all honesty, even a deeply seated bullet will have passed through the throat and into the bore before peak chamber pressure is reached. Never seen any issues over many thousands of rounds testing my super magnum wildcats or any other conventional chamberings.

if you want to use a standard receiver for a short action round, if it feeds, no problem at all. There are extended mags for most of the most common SA receivers which offer good oal that work well.

simply put, dont get to hung up on thinking you need to seat the bullets out as far as possible to get top performance numbers. That is not actually the case. Unfortunately today, getting any powder we want is a bit tricky for sure though.

I agree with everything thing you say. The point of using the longer action for short action cases is to be able to use long ogive high BC bullets to hunt with and mag feed them. Bullets impinging on the powder space in my experience does not increase pressure necessarily but it does decrease powder capacity especially when using stick powders. Clearly using tighter compacting ball powders can compensate as a generality but may not be possible in specific situations. I have realized huge gains in performance in my 300 WSM using a longer action and a ball powder that accommodates our higher BC 30 cal bullets over using Barnes in the short action Savage. Very nice account of your testing, by the way. Enjoyed reading it.

 

[Lee7588]

Not a issue I need to deal with and I don't own a TIKKA.

.

 

[Mike Matteson]

I don't have any of these type cases. I do see a possible problem with the double base powder being more heat sensitive than single base powders. I would take care in areas where the temper change 100+ degrees from below -0 to +100 degrees. I am not trying to beat anybody up, just saying be careful.

 

[JAYgs8163]

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[BrentM]

I don't have any of these type cases. I do see a possible problem with the double base powder being more heat sensitive than single base powders. I would take care in areas where the temper change 100+ degrees from below -0 to +100 degrees. I am not trying to beat anybody up, just saying be careful.

It's a problem regardless of case fill etc. If someone is squeezing out the most performance of the case, pretty sure that's all of us, then a sensitive powder is going to potentially cause pressure spikes. Going to a long action for a short action case means you'll be filling it more to try and get more pressure therefore speed. You are right back to square 1.

 

[RockyMtnUT]

The problem with a WSM in a true long action is not whether it will shoot, but it's if you can get it to feed correctly from the magazine. This is the reason a few have mentioned they built there WSM long action as a single shot hand feed.

I build 100% of mine on long actions. Mine are all repeaters. No issues..
I won't build on on a short.

 

[myshootinstinks]

I have often used a long action on cartridges normally using a short action. EX: 6mm Rem., 257 Roberts. In those calibers a long is easier to load for, more flexible. With the trend toward faster twists and long, high BC bullets there is even more reason to go long.

 

[nralifer]

I don't have any of these type cases. I do see a possible problem with the double base powder being more heat sensitive than single base powders. I would take care in areas where the temper change 100+ degrees from below -0 to +100 degrees. I am not trying to beat anybody up, just saying be careful.

What problems have you had with double base powders?