Tips for sticky chamber.

[DeanWinchester]

Any tips for a sticky chamber?
An old lever gun I picked up from a member here has a bit of a sticky chamber. Its a Savage 99 in 30/30. Here's the rub; I've had a rifle or two that had a bit of,a sticky chamber. Not like this.

The chamber sparkles. The action is smooth as butter, opens and closes better than many new rifles. With standard pressure jacketed loads, a quick flip of the lever and out they go. No issues. With a 180g plain base boolit over 10.0g of Unique though, it requires me to use two hands. Not good. The fired brass does NOT fit all the way back in the chamber either, not freely. If its pushed back in, extraction is equally difficult.

A 150g JHP over Varget does NOT do this. A couple of factory RP corelokts did NOT do this. Hmmm, well there's something I'm overlooking.
It has a roomy throat, easily chambering a load that's actually too long for the magazine. My cast loads chamber easily. No resistance. They just won't extract without a good bit of effort. All cases were full length sized, trimmed, MDie and I close the bell with a factory crimp die ( NO crimp)

It's been a long day and my head hurts. What am I missing?

The rifle has just received a through enema. All parts gone over with a fine tooth comb. For its age the guts were all in great shape. I cleaned EVERYTHING stoned off all burrs, greased everything that slides with red grease, oiled everything else with Mobil 1 synthetic. I'm actually surprised how smooth it is.

Taking a piece of brass that sticks, I only have to size about half way to get it to chamber easily. I'm nowhere near the shoulder and they extract just fine.

I almost acts like the brass isn't shrinking back after firing.

[Blue2]

Savage 99's have a weak extraction motion. They work better with a loose chamber as in will close almost on a field gauge. Higher pressure loads with the Varget and jacketed bullets are probably expanding and gripping the chamber walls and then after the pressure drops they contract and break away from their grip on the chamber and are easily extracted. The lead bullet loads may not create enough expansion to properly grip the chamber walls and then retract back to the bolt face.They are probably sliding back against the bolt face and jamming against the bolt and then they don't have the inclination to contract enough to relieve the pressure against the bolt face so they can be extracted. Basically loose headspace allows the entire case to be pushed forward by the firing pin and then the case fires but the case will expand into the looser headspace and then have room enough to contract and loosen up. A hotter load would probably correct the problem or if you had the barrel off a light polish with green scotch-brite in the chamber to cross-hatch" it may provide enough traction to allow it to work properly with low pressure loads. I have seen tghis before when I first rebarreled a few 99 Savages and had the headspace too tight as if I were building a bolt rifle. They like loose in order to work reliably.

[DeanWinchester]

Thanks.

That makes perfect sense. I will say I am a touch disappointed by the notion of not shooting really light cast loads but its not the end of the world.

[John Taylor]

Sounds like you have a bit to much pressure. Try using a slower powder.

[DeanWinchester]

From 10g of Unique? I wouldn't think too much pressure come from Unique loads.

[MBTcustom]

Sounds to me like your sparkly chamber is a little too sparkly.
If it has a mirror finish or close to it, then the brass can stick in there like a morse taper.
Put some scotchbright or 400 grit emery paper on a cleaning rod and lay a crosshatch in there like on an engine cylinder, but stay away from the lead!
See if that helps.
Mirror polishes are only good on the outside of firearms.

[John Taylor]

From 10g of Unique? I wouldn't think too much pressure come from Unique loads.
If factory loads are not sticking and your loads of unique are, then it shows there is to much pressure. The pressure curve may be to fast with the faster powder. For some reason the brass is expanding more than a factory load and not springing back. I wouldn't think 10 grains would cause a problem ether.

[Reg]

You might want to run a chamber cast and do some careful measuring. Could be someone ran some hot stuff through it and expanded the chamber a bit. We could be only talking a thousand or so here and with a normal load it won't be any kind of a problem but for any reason pressures are developed that get a bit above normal just that small amount extra would swell the brass in such a way it won't eject or go back into the chamber.
Just a thought.

[DeanWinchester]

Knowing that it will eject properly with certain loads complicates things a touch but does present a solution that requires no modifications. I just have to replicate what I have found that ejects smoothly and try to find accuracy in that.

I'm definitely going to try a scotch brite though. Lightly.

[MtGun44]

try 16 gr 2400, good alternative to 10 gr Unique, similar performance, but different
pressure curve.

Bill