I'm having a brain fart, can you help me remember something?

[Trey45]

Many years ago when I was 1st getting into shooting, I had an Astra 9mm, which i traded for some synthetic stocked Savage 30-06 rifle.(The rifle is long gone now) The guy who owned the rifle had a device in the breech that allowed it to use 308 ammunition. Can anyone remember what those doohickies are called? Can they still be found? Are they/were they unsafe?
Thanks.

[Jim]

http://www.mcace.com/adapters.htm

[oldhickory]

Chamber adapter, .30/06-.308. They're safe, but leave a very long free bore, (if thats the right term). A shooting pal had one in his M1 for a while, seemed to work o.k.

[Jim]

The outfit linked has many adapters. I can see quite a few good uses for a having a selection laying around. For $95 and $6 S&H, you can get an 18" 12 Ga./.45-70 adaptor. This might be a bit on the goofy side, but you could put a pair of those in a legally "shortened" 12 ga. SXS and effectively create a .45-70 double rifle. How 'bout a 12 ga. O/U fitted with rifle sights and a .45-70 adaptor in the top barrel? Man, that would be a fun gun!

[stillwell]

anyone used the rimfire ones???

[yondering]

The outfit linked has many adapters. I can see quite a few good uses for a having a selection laying around. For $95 and $6 S&H, you can get an 18" 12 Ga./.45-70 adaptor. This might be a bit on the goofy side, but you could put a pair of those in a legally "shortened" 12 ga. SXS and effectively create a .45-70 double rifle. How 'bout a 12 ga. O/U fitted with rifle sights and a .45-70 adaptor in the top barrel? Man, that would be a fun gun!

Yes, that would be sweet. I'm officially on the lookout for a double barrel 12 gauge now. Maybe one of those cheap Stoeger coach guns?

[mroliver77]

I put one in a FR7 small ring mauser that was chambered in .308. It adapted to 7.62X39. I shot long full diameter cast in it with some success. Milsurp did not shoot for beans though. I want one in .32 something for my springfields. Jay

[Cadillo]

I just don't get it. Reloadable '06 brass is so much easier to come by than .308. I love my .308's, but the brass is not very common, while '06 is easy to find and pick up at the range every hunting season. And now that all the surplus 7.62x51 has dried up, Why? I think it's another answer in search of a question.

[Hardcast416taylor]

A few years ago, I was talking to a gunsmith about these adapters. He didn`t have much to say on the good side about them. The adapters in question was the .30-06 down to .308. Seems you couldn`t shoot them alot without removing them and doing a thorough chamber cleaning. The adapters then could seize in the chamber and would need professional removal. Also, they tended to make a "ring" in the chamber where they sat after alot of firing. So, a few shots for fun may be alright but not being used long term. IFC there was a question about these things in the NRA magazine concerning just these very problems.Robert

[GrizzLeeBear]

The guy who owned the rifle had a device in the breech that allowed it to use 308 ammunition. .

It had to be something other than .308, like 30-30, etc. You cannot chamber a .308 in a .30-06 gun. The .308 is bigger around at the shoulder than the same place on and 06 chamber/case. So there is no way you could make an adapter from 30-06 to .308. If you can chamber a .308 (without a LOT of effort anyway) in a 30-06 rifle, there's something wrong with the rifle.

[Ricochet]

I'm pretty sure I remember reading about Garands being converted to use .308s with a more or less permanent adapter insert. Might have involved some chamber reaming as well, though.

[BruceB]

The story about a .30-06-to-7.62NATO adapter is true.

When the M-14 was adopted for Army service, the US Navy was desirous of finding a way to use the new cartridge in their Garands.......in other words, an inexpensive way to get by without using scarce budget dollars to buy the new M-14 rifles. The Navy, after all, has only limited use for rifles.

The adapter was coated with some form of Loctite, inserted into the CLEAN chamber of a .30-06 Garand, and the rifle fired with three 7.62 NATO rounds to seat the adapter.

It was not a very successful process. Tests showed that the adapter would be ejected from the rifle at more-or-less random times. The Navy finally re-barreled their M1s with new 7.62 barrels, and added a magazine spacer to both improve feeding and positively prevent the loading of .30-06 rounds into that particular rifle. In addition, the rifles were plainly marked "7.62".

Latter-day civilian conversions of M1 Garands to 7.62 NATO work fairly well, but only with new 7.62 barrels and magazine spacer blocks much like the Navy used. It's often necessary to enlarge the gas-port diameter (to larger-than-.30-06 diameter) to give decent function.

[Linstrum]

BruceB has the story! They did have trouble with the adapters ejecting, so it was not a battle reliable conversion.

When I tried it, though, what GrizzLeeBear says is what I experienced when I got an adapter for my Remington 700ADL .30-06. I couldn't get the .308 Win/7.62 NATO cartridges to chamber in my .30-06 no how, no way. The .308 Win/7.62 NATO are several thousandths of an inch fatter since the tapers of the .30-06 and .308 Win/7.62 NATO are different. I ran some .308 Win/7.62 NATO ammo into a .30-06 sizing die with the primer punch removed and then those would chamber, but going through all that extra bulloney wasn't the idea I had in being able to shoot .308 Win/7.62 NATO in my .30-06. Some rifles with a real strong camming action to close the bolt will squish a .308 Win/7.62 NATO cartridge into the chamber.

Now, with all that said, I keep my chamber adapter in a safe place and I will hang onto it since the day may come when I need to use it. The billions of 7.62 NATO cartridges made in the last 58 or so years make owning a rifle capable of shooting that cartridge desirable because it will be a long time before all that brass disappears.

By the way, the .308 Win/7.62 NATO cartridge design has been around since at least 1951 that I know of since I have fifty rounds of unfired Frankford Arsenal T93E ammo with a 1951 headstamp date, T93E was the original designation before either .308 Win or 7.62 NATO. The cartridge was based on the .300 Savage rifle round. Sort of like an "Ackley Improved" .300 savage.


rl681

[Jim]

It had to be something other than .308, like 30-30, etc. You cannot chamber a .308 in a .30-06 gun. The .308 is bigger around at the shoulder than the same place on and 06 chamber/case. So there is no way you could make an adapter from 30-06 to .308. If you can chamber a .308 (without a LOT of effort anyway) in a 30-06 rifle, there's something wrong with the rifle.

That outfit that I posted the link to has a .30-06 X .308 adapter on their list.

[GrizzLeeBear]

I don't doubt the existence of the .308/30-06 adapters. I just don't see how they can work. I tried chambering a .308 case in my Rem. 700 30-06. The bolt won't go forward enough for the locking lugs to even come close to engaging, let alone the bolt closing. I don't see how adding an adapter between the case and the chamber could even come close to allowing a .308 into a 30-06 without somehow resizing the .308 like Linstrum said.
I would image that the .308 being so tight in these was a contributing factor to the failure of the adapters in the Garand as well. Basically the brass became locked in the adapter so tight when fired that the bond between the adapter and case became stronger than any adhesive could resist when the extractor pulled on it.

[Jim]

Well, I guess experience is better than claim, ain't it?

[Trey45]

Grizz, don't know what to tell you, I had a 30-06 with a 308 adaptor in it, and fired many 308 cartridges in it before selling it. It wasn't a 30-30 or some other cartridge, it was .308.

[Ricochet]

Not all chambers are cut the same.

[Gerry N.]

I have one of Ace Dube's adapters for shooting .30 carbine in .308. It's a hoot shooting carbine ammo in my .308 Ruger #1. I tried it in my M12/61 Chilean Mauser in 7.62 NATO. It is a P I A as trying to get what is essentially an empty case to function through the magazine is a nightmare and single loading is not supremely easy. I'll stick with the #1.

Ace hasn't answered my emails for more than a year. I wonder if he's still in business. His website still functions.

Gerry N.

[Linstrum]

Ricochet has the correct answer about why some of us have successfully chambered .308Win/7.62 NATO cartridges in an adapter modified .30-06 chamber while some of have not. This is like the blind men describing an elephant where each one contradicted the others but in actuality none of them were wrong.

I have cut more than a few chambers, and with the .30-06 there can be a bit of leeway in chamber size, even from the same reamer when the depth of cut is not properly controlled, plus many military rifles have larger chambers than commercial hunting rifles in order for battle rifles to accomodate extremely dirty ammo in the heat of battle. The family of British .303 Enfield rifles are a notable example of military rifles that have greatly over-sized chambers. The Garand was not as extreme as the .303 Enfields, but I did notice a bit of variation in chamber dimensions in the three Garands I own when they still had their military issue barrels. I'm sure that the Remington 700 rifles that GrizzLeeBear and I own have tighter chambers than original mil spec Garands.


rl682

[Rick N Bama]

I'm pretty sure I remember reading about Garands being converted to use .308s with a more or less permanent adapter insert. Might have involved some chamber reaming as well, though.

I had one of those Garands several years ago.

Rick

[Linstrum]

Enlarging on BruceB's and Ricochet's info, I recall reading that the procedure for modifying the Garands to 7.62 NATO involved cleaning the chamber very well with Hoppe's #9 and steel wool, setting the adapter with either Loc-Tite or Epon-6 epoxy, firing some rounds to seat it, AND THEN RE-REAMING THE CHAMBER.

So the Garand .30-06 chambers WERE modified to accept the fatter cartridge.

I also recall that some of the Garands had the adapters set in with 37/63 eutectic soft solder that melts at a low temperature so as not to destroy the heat treat of the barrel steel. But because they had to do hundreds of rifles it was too time-consuming to do a good solder job way down inside a hole at the shoulder. So to save time they went to using glue instead. If I wanted to set an adapter so it wouldn't come out, I'd do it right and use the eutectic solder.


rl683

[TAWILDCATT]

I have several adapters.mine use 32acp.I have 30/40 and 303 brit.those are winchester and date to 1898.also 30/06 and 8 mm.which ar newer.
sportsmans guide has adapters for $14.**

[GrizzLeeBear]

Hey Wildcat, how does the 32 acp adapter for the .303 and 30-06 work? What kind of accuracy do you get with them? I've been thinking of getting one for my Rem. 700 30-06 and Rossi single shot .303 and reaming them to .32 S&W long. I already load the S&W long for a little H&R revolver and it would be great for plinking and small game hunting in the rifles too.

[JIMinPHX]

Just off the top of my head...Doesn't a .308 have a higher working pressure than a 30-06?

That would seem like it might make a .308 to .30-06 adapter a bad idea.

Besides, What is the advantage to shooting a .308 out of a .30-06 rifle? The ammo is about the same price, isn't is? The performance isn't a whole lot different. I can see using an adapter for .22LR to .223 or something like that, because it gives good economy & quiet operation. I could even see putting a .30 carbine or .30-30 adapter in a .30-06, but the difference between .308 & the 06 just doesn't seem worth it to me, especially with the price of those adapters. Am I missing something here?