UpNorthMI
AH veteran
After 2 years I'm still getting used to the R8. I have a lot of barrels, mag inserts and scopes for the R8 setup. Over the last couple of months I've been getting in some practice for an upcoming Africa trip in May with my son to South Africa for Buffalo & plains game. We have been doing a lot of swapping between 375 H&H mag barrels to 300 win mag barrels while getting in some practice shooting these calibers. With little other shooting going on I decided that our .308 barrels (deer use) could go for threading for future sound moderator use.
I just picked up the .308 barrels and decided that I needed some trigger time as I had another scope to fit on my .308 barrel that needed to be zeroed. I had some loads to test and a couple of other rifles to shoot, so it was time to hit my practice range, 2 hours away in Northern Michigan.
After the first shot on the range, the first sign of a problem was that the trusty straight pull bolt does not extract the .308 case. My first thought was immediately, should I be taking this gun to Africa as my first shot is likely to be on a Cape Buffalo, apparently I heard that they don’t always fall over with just one shot and I feel that at 60 years old I’m probably passed my prime when it comes to Buffalo wrestling!
I start to look for the cause of the problem. After getting the case out of the gun with a short section metal rod, I examine the fired case, no marks on the rim or base, I’m thinking that maybe I put the rifle together wrong and there is an issue between alignment or fit of the barrel and bolt. Then I pull the bolt to examine if there is a problem with the extractor. As I fit the case base back on the bolt face, I immediately see why the extractor is not working, my gun still has its magnum bolt head fitted, the owner operator, ME had failed to swap it to the standard bolt head that is required for use with the .308 barrel.
Hopefully this little issue will be the bit I’m laughing about as I ensure that I have the right parts for my Blaser as I’m hunting in the far off corners of the world over the next 10 years, maybe I need to print up a laminated reminder and tape it to my gun stock.
The flexibility of the R8 is a great feature but can be prone to operator error on occasions. I hope to pay more attention in the future! I sure got lucky that this was not an important trip.
I just picked up the .308 barrels and decided that I needed some trigger time as I had another scope to fit on my .308 barrel that needed to be zeroed. I had some loads to test and a couple of other rifles to shoot, so it was time to hit my practice range, 2 hours away in Northern Michigan.
After the first shot on the range, the first sign of a problem was that the trusty straight pull bolt does not extract the .308 case. My first thought was immediately, should I be taking this gun to Africa as my first shot is likely to be on a Cape Buffalo, apparently I heard that they don’t always fall over with just one shot and I feel that at 60 years old I’m probably passed my prime when it comes to Buffalo wrestling!
I start to look for the cause of the problem. After getting the case out of the gun with a short section metal rod, I examine the fired case, no marks on the rim or base, I’m thinking that maybe I put the rifle together wrong and there is an issue between alignment or fit of the barrel and bolt. Then I pull the bolt to examine if there is a problem with the extractor. As I fit the case base back on the bolt face, I immediately see why the extractor is not working, my gun still has its magnum bolt head fitted, the owner operator, ME had failed to swap it to the standard bolt head that is required for use with the .308 barrel.
Hopefully this little issue will be the bit I’m laughing about as I ensure that I have the right parts for my Blaser as I’m hunting in the far off corners of the world over the next 10 years, maybe I need to print up a laminated reminder and tape it to my gun stock.
The flexibility of the R8 is a great feature but can be prone to operator error on occasions. I hope to pay more attention in the future! I sure got lucky that this was not an important trip.
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