Bolt stuck down

[pmomd]

Had my fire failure it seems on the weekend in the .308

Shot a few dozen rounds problem, tried to life the bolt after a shot and it's stuck but good.

Impossible to lift from the normal seated position at the rifle. Standing over it pushing down with one hand on the action and pulling the bolt up I got it to move a mm slowly, but was putting in some serious elbow grease and wasn't sure if I should be forcing it so much.

Right now it's locked shut with a spent case in it.

Hitting it with a rubber mallet is mentioned on a few other pages Google turned up. Is that the way to go?

Ideas what happened?

[bigfellascott]

I take it you checked to make sure the safety hasn't been accidentally put on after firing? I think some of em lock the bolt when on?

[tom604]

handloads? give it a spray with innox and a bash with a rubber mallet and strap it down in a rest so that it cant move or slip

[Chronos]

Question 1

What brand if rifle is it?

If it's a REMINGTON or another with the bolt handle soldered/brazed to the action definitely do not hit the bolt handle with a mallet. It may snap clean off. As said spray it with a penetrating lube and carefully apply force.

Question 2

Was it handloads ammunition?

If so you may need to start from scratch with load testing. If not try s different brand of ammo, that brand may be too hot for your chamber

Question 3


Do you grease the locking lugs?

You should.

Good luck with it I hope you get it sorted.

Chronos

[Jack V]

Don't start hitting the bolt , as others have said it could be silver soldered on and break off real easy.

Check the safety is off. Get a steel drill rod that slips into a fired case a bit longer than the barrel . Lube up the chamber area with WD 40 etc. and down the barrel and the rear cocking cam. let it soak for a while. Insert the rod and get it inside the case. Then as one person pulls on the bolt normally. The other person strikes the rod with a mallet. keep lifting and striking but not enough to bend the rod. If the bolt come up a bit more each time it's moving. If it will not move at all then it's a gunsmiths job to remove the barrel. The idea is the rod pushes the case out and takes the load off the extractor and bolt cam. The rod will not hurt the rifling.

If you just belt away at the bolt handle it could come out and it could also break the bolt handle or extractor claw.

[RDobber]

I take it you checked to make sure the safety hasn't been accidentally put on after firing? I think some of em lock the bolt when on?

Tikka lock with the safety on but only when it's cocked. Can't engage the safety when it's not.

Dunno about the CZ but I see op has a Ruger. 3 position safety on those, 2nd position safety is on the pin but bolt can still be lifted.

Shorter answer yeah, some do

[pmomd]

I take it you checked to make sure the safety hasn't been accidentally put on after firing? I think some of em lock the bolt when on?

Safety most definitely off. Should be good to lift.

[pmomd]

handloads?

Yep. Same load been using for a while.

Nothing crazy hot, just under ADI data max.

[pmomd]

What brand if rifle is it?

My CZ 550.

Was it handloads ammunition?

Yep. As above near max hand loads.

Do you grease the locking lugs?

Not especially. Over all wipe down with solvent to clean then oiled for protection but no special attention paid to the lugs.

[Tiiger]

Ideas what happened?

There will have been some failure or near failure of a case.

I'm sure you'll get it open, when you do inspect the brass thoroughly. Not exactly scientific but put it through your sizing die and see how much force is required compared to other brass.

I expect you'll find something's a little off, if it hasn't failed obviously.

[Korkt]

Jarring force (hammer) potentially not good as mentioned.

If it does move with some elbow grease I'd continue that. If someone's knocking a rod on the inside at the same time all the better.

[brett1868]

Remove the scope & stock so you don't accidentally damage or break them while working on getting the case out. Look around the side of the chamber, you may find a small hole/s that are designed to vent pressure in the event of a case failure. Get some lube in there and let it soak for a while before trying again. It may also be possible to use some Brake Kleen and some tube to "freeze" the case which may shrink it enough to break whatever grip it has on the chamber. Impossible to tell with the limited information if it's a stuck case or a jammed bolt, solutions may vary depending on the cause.

[Jack V]

If the case head has failed then the bolt usually opens because the case is in two pieces or more . It seems to me the bolt will not open because the case is stuck but intact . There for the drill rod down the bore is the way to go. If the case head has failed to some degree and the rod opens the bolt but the case head comes away then the body of the shell is still in the chamber . At least you now have the bolt open . Then you can turn a thread tap into the case body and use the rod again on that .
What loads it may have been is irrelevant to fixing the issue.

[Oldbloke]

Now this is just an idea. No expert here. If brass has different coefficient of expansion to steel ( & I suspect it does) You could try removing the scope, stock & mag and placing just the action in the freezer for say an hour. If the brass contracts at a greater rate than the steel should just release. Its an old engineering trick. Same idea as warming a bearing to shrink it onto a cold axel. I cant see that it will do any harm. Any opinions out there?

[Oldbloke]

Just looked up the coefficient of thermal expansion of both.
Brass 10.6 and steel 6.7. Now I'm not sure what those numbers mean or if the difference is significant. Is there a mechanical engineer out there?

[brett1868]

Now this is just an idea. No expert here. If brass has different coefficient of expansion to steel ( & I suspect it does) You could try removing the scope, stock & mag and placing just the action in the freezer for say an hour. If the brass contracts at a greater rate than the steel should just release. Its an old engineering trick. Same idea as warming a bearing to shrink it onto a cold axel. I cant see that it will do any harm. Any opinions out there?

Must have had the same idea at the same time...I was more thinking of a spray that gets friggen cold fast. Don't think we can buy Freon spray cans these days but it was my go to spray for freezing things in the old days. I use the same trick for changing bearings in the 2 stroke race engines I use in the R/C cars but that's a whole different forum

[Oldbloke]

Yep, providing the brass shrinks more than steel it will be worth a try. I would be reticent using a mallet in this case. I would put it in the freezer for say an hour,if that didnt work put it back in for say another 2 hrs. Also since the brass is inside, the chamber the steel would warm up fairly quick once out side the freezer, so just letting it sit at room temperature for a few minutes might just do the trick. Come, where are the mechanical engineers, right up your alley?

[Warrigul]

Brass doesn't really move much at varying temperatures. Steel does and it usually doesn't do any harm to gently warm things with the action out of the stock (less than 100 degrees), if nothing else it gets oil moving.

It could be as simple as a piece of primer gone down alongside the firing pin jamming things up(i've seen that before). I would keep working it up and down until it comes free. A few moderate taps with a soft faced hammer shouldn't do much harm, being a CZ it would probably pull a piece off the rim before it damaged the extractor, lots of camming in a mauser type action.

I've seen a few locked bolts over the years and with the exception of one that was in a bent action(guess the reason) they all came loose in the end.

[sbd3927]

Electronic supplies have freeze sprays of a sort, for fault finding on circuit boards, maybe Jaycar? Another idea would be dry ice pellets, can buy that by the kilo CIG, Supagas (might be 2kg minimum ~$16), or invert a large CO2 cylinder and purge into a blanket for CO2 snow. (muzzle load the CO2 powder?)
Any expanding gas causes chilling, trick is can you plumb something down the barrel into the chamber.

[KWhorenet]

a can of 'CO2 Contact cleaner' using the nozzle will squirt it in liquid form down the barrel and run into the case. It is cold enough to frost bite your finger so cold enough to shrink the case before it shrinks the surrounding chamber.

[bigfellascott]

Just take it to a gunshop and let them sort it out.

[Jack V]

They will do exactly what I advised but they also have the advantage of, if it don't work they can then go ahead and remove the barrel anyway.

You generally only have to get the case to move slightly with the rod and it will come out.

The problem is the FEAR of putting steel rod down a bore. People think it will damage the bore. IT WILL NOT. I have done it several times to no ill effect. It actually has less chance of damaging the bore than constantly using a cleaning rod.

Sh*t I did one for a farmer once with a piece of rod I cut out of one of his farm gates, worked perfect.

[pmomd]

Fixed the bugger

Got a mate with a cleaning rod in there, took a herculean effort to lift the bolt but it did move slowly. Each tap of the rod jumped it forward.

Took a 15-20 taps and it suddenly sprung free. Very happy.

Can't really see anything wrong with the brass, nothing has split or separated.

It could be swelled but I'm not game to push it back in to see where it sticks.

Anyway, sorted. Thanks to all.

[Warrigul]

Fixed the bugger

Got a mate with a cleaning rod in there, took a herculean effort to lift the bolt but it did move slowly. Each tap of the rod jumped it forward.

Took a 15-20 taps and it suddenly sprung free. Very happy.

Can't really see anything wrong with the brass, nothing has split or separated.

It could be swelled but I'm not game to push it back in to see where it sticks.

Anyway, sorted. Thanks to all.

Just to be totally certain you could pull the bolt totally apart and check to be sure there is nothing in there and that the firing pin and spring are intact, a stuck case is sometimes incorrectly blamed until it occurs again down the track(sometimes there is nothing to blame but the case). Is the primer on that case and the previous rounds complete?

[Westy]

I'd try the opposite and use a heat gun to heat up the surrounding action and see if you cant loosen the bolt with a little bit of heat..... Also I'm a Wildman and have used a piece of timber (4x2) Hardwood as a drift to help move the bolt more than once worked for me but hell I'm a balls and all type of guy !!!!!! Sure use the lubes but I also like jacks idea should work ????

[bigfellascott]

I'd try the opposite and use a heat gun to heat up the surrounding action and see if you cant loosen the bolt with a little bit of heat..... Also I'm a Wildman and have used a piece of timber (4x2) Hardwood as a drift to help move the bolt more than once worked for me but hell I'm a balls and all type of guy !!!!!! Sure use the lubes but I also like jacks idea should work ????

Ya too late again Westy!

[Oldbloke]

Well glad that worked out. Having thought more about it because of the large volume of steel compared to brass westy could be right and heating the barrel may have been a better way to go. We wont find out now, good to see its out.

[Jack V]

Fixed the bugger

Got a mate with a cleaning rod in there, took a herculean effort to lift the bolt but it did move slowly. Each tap of the rod jumped it forward.

Took a 15-20 taps and it suddenly sprung free. Very happy.

Can't really see anything wrong with the brass, nothing has split or separated.

It could be swelled but I'm not game to push it back in to see where it sticks.

Anyway, sorted. Thanks to all.

Hang on there buddy I gave that advise no one else . Have the decency to thank me separately .

[Jack V]

Well glad that worked out. Having thought more about it because of the large volume of steel compared to brass westy could be right and heating the barrel may have been a better way to go. We wont find out now, good to see its out.

You don't put heat any place if you don't have to. It is to easy to upset the colour of bluing or you may have to dismantle more because of synthetic parts , wooden stocks , scopes etc. The rod is the right way first and then go from there . A cleaning rod is not the top choice but it worked.

[pmomd]

Just to be totally certain you could pull the bolt totally apart and check to be sure there is nothing in there and that the firing pin and spring are intact, a stuck case is sometimes incorrectly blamed until it occurs again down the track(sometimes there is nothing to blame but the case). Is the primer on that case and the previous rounds complete?

I'll strip and clean the bolt, hadn't thought of doing that after - just in case.

Primer looks like any other spent primer.