Posted on 02/21/2011 7:37:41 PM PST by neverdem
Even better:
Mosin-Nagant -> 7.62x54R caliber.
My Remington bolt action “Police Special” has a
.308 chamber with a tight throat. You can’t
safely shoot a 7.62x51 NATO in it. There are
headspacing issues between the two specs.
Check the stampings on the BARREL.
Rock River Arms is known for using the Wylde chamber in their varmint rifles.
I agree, and was also aware of the accuracy issue. I bought this weapon for a training class in order to be comfortable and capable of “running the gun” should a serious situation arise.
Pretty simple, just trim your cases to specification to be sure you have no head space problems and work your loads up before trying to go for maximum velocity and watch for pressure problems before they occur. You can also check for case internal volume by measuring before you reload your cases to look for case wall thickness affects before setting up your specific load. I have found that the commercial Winchester brass loads pretty much the same as their military brass and the same as Lake City brass. Stay away from the Federal brass.
Oh, yeah. Gotta love those Mosins! I'm down to only 5 of them, because friends keep buying them from me.
I think they're too lazy to clean the cosmo off, so they go for mine. LOL.
Thanks for the ping 50!! Good article.
bump
It is our understanding that commercially available AR15s and M16s although some are stamped 5.56 Rem on the receiver are manufactured with .223 chambers.
Knew something like that was coming, was surprised how far down the page I had to read to find it.
Basic rule of precision consumer-market manufacturing: Do whatever’s cheapest or easiest, eh?. How many of our technologically/numerically illiterate customers are gonna discover or understand the difference?
My original Colt AR-15 is marked .223, but I know it will shoot 5.56 NATO rounds easily. I’ve put several thousand through it including ball, SS-109 and tracer.
While some of this is true, the important factor is head space in the barrel and the bolt. An improperly head spaced barrel/bolt for 5.56 is just as dangerous as a .223 with 5.56mm in it.
Bottom line is that any AR owner knows (or should) that they need to spend time measuring their parts if they assemble it themselves, check the head space, and the leade. Most completed guns are already head spaced in the factory and are set for 5.56.
Service parts are an issue that needs to be considered in an AR type rifle. A matched set barrel/bolt is significantly more expensive than either of the parts individually. Not that setting the headspace is that difficlut, and the gauge block is $15 or $20. Obviously, too long can be corrected (shaved to meet the spec), too short is dangerous and hard to determine even with the gauge.
They are one and the same. There is no difference.
The converse problem with putting .308 into a 7.62x51 NATO chamber is too much headspace. It might not fire reliably with the case head not resting properly on the bolt face. Gas may well escape around the shoulder of the brass too.
I reload my own .308 with the 100 gr Speer "Plinker" for punching paper targets. Less recoil, good accuracy and total control of the cartridge dimensions.
If you buy a top of the line Bushmaster or Colt from the factory set up the way you want it in the 5.56 it will be perfectly on the money. If you spend half as much and get a knock off AR you have no idea about headspace or where the parts came from. Bottom line is step up and spend $1,200 - $1,900 for a top grade weapon.
Our M-4 Bushmaster has matchgrade barrel and trigger and is stamped 5.56 on the barrel and the receiver. .223 in this weapon is not very accurate however when we use Lake City or Federal 109’s in 55 grain FMJ or 62 grain tracers we get a 2 inch group at 200 yards. Again this is what you get when you buy from the factory set up the way you want it.
If you want an off the shelf weapon get an Ak.
That’s why I am suspicious of this article’s premise.
Had a FReeper here tell me that he didn’t know anything about a ‘leade’ and .223 vs 5.56mm cautions because he’d never seen anything about it. I sent him a treatise on this very subject as a lesson. Never heard a word back from him.
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