Re-barreling a Remington 760.

Since 1962, my father has hunted with a Remington 760 pump in .30-06. Going back over a decade, it seemed to him that it did not shoot well when sighting in each year, but he put it down to him, his eyesight, and advancing age.

I finally had a chance to really get it on the workbench and the shooting bench this year and my conclusion is it wasn’t dad. I bore sighted it, took it to the range, and fired 50 rounds. Which was not all that much fun. Bottom line was regardless of load, it shoots about a 6-inch average group at 100 yards. And it’s wild. One shot low, one left, one high, one right. Totally random.

Conclusion: The barrel must be shot. My guess is the throat is blown out. Obviously, I realize that these rifles were often minute-of-tennis-ball accurate when new. That has been more or less dad’s standard for sighting it in for over 40 years. But it really seems to have gone to pot now. I understand that spending money on this makes no financial sense, it is only for sentimental reasons that I’d take this on, and the fact that dad does not like bolt actions and would really like his rifle back.

Now I’ll have the barrel scoped to confirm what’s going on, but my question is can these barrels be redone? Or is it down to fitting a new barrel if one can be found?

Anyone by chance ever done this to a 760?

Thanks.

Grouse

Grouse…

Given the terrain around your place up north, wouldn’t 100 yards be considered a long shot? And if so, wouldn’t a six inch group kill a deer?

S.R.

Unfortunately, Steve, I think the real world performance without a cement bench wouldn’t be good enough. I’d like to improve things if possible with a rebuild.

Grouse

I guessed I’m surprised that modern ammo could burn out a throat. And it’s a fairly tame load too. You’re sure something hasn’t rattled loose? A change in fore end pressure maybe?

My first high powered rifle was an old Enfield, .303 British. The barrel was shot out on that gun as every few shots the bullet would key-hole the paper. I wonder if that old gun saw cordite loads and corrosive primers?

S.R.

Do the 760’s have a similar issue as the 742’s where the rails the bolt slides on get worn out. The 742 also had headspace issues after awhile.

Steve Root wrote:

I guessed I’m surprised that modern ammo could burn out a throat. And it’s a fairly tame load too.

Well, there’s a Reloading Cautionary Tale involved here, possibly, as well. My father started handloading about the same time as he bought this rifle.

About 1970, he committed Reloading Cardinal Sin #4. He took reloading advice “from some guy” without verifying it in separate reliable sources. He fired about 20 rounds of a load that turned out to be 12 grains above the max for that powder/bullet combo. He learned his lesson, but this incident plays into my suspicion that he seriously shortened the throat life with these overloaded loads.

blackbay wrote:

Do the 760’s have a similar issue as the 742’s where the rails the bolt slides on get worn out. The 742 also had headspace issues after awhile.

Yes, I have read about these issues, but I don’t know how to reliably rule them in or out on my own. Also, I leave room for the fact that it could be a combination of the issues you mention, so I’m going to need a gunsmith to figure this out.

Grouse

Re-done? As in re-bored? The “06 is a large cartridge and 30 cal isn’t terribly huge but the only direction a guy could go on a re-bore is up. Then its a matter of whether whatever cartridge you’re considering will have enough barrel at the chamber end and whether the barrel will proof with a larger diameter bullet and less metal in the barrel. You need to consider as well that the action is not as strong as a bolt so cartridge options might be a bugger here too.

I’ve never seen either of the Remingtons, auto or pump, plant good groups regardless of caliber. 2″@100 is usually a darned tight group, even with hand loads. Which begs the question…..Have you tried loading for the gun to get groups tamed a little? This would be my first option. A re-barrel would be the second and a re-bore last, if possible at all.

I love the lines on the old autos and pumps and think they just look at home in the north woods much like a lever gun but they can be a struggle getting a group down to a decent size.

No, assuming I’m right and it’s throat erosion that’s causing the problem in this case, you are correct that re-boring alone wouldn’t work because there isn’t a suitable cartridge that would allow both re-boring to a larger barrel caliber AND re-chambering to a larger throat, plus all this has to feed reliably from the fixed dimensions of the magazine.

By “redone”, I was wondering if the barrel and chamber can be sleeved and rebored? I’ve had this done with a .22 of my great grandfather’s, but do not know can it be done on a larger caliber rifle?

I have tried to handload specifically for this rifle, but with a removable mag type rifle, seating options are limited to mag length. No results so far have given me any confidence that it’s a load issue alone. The groups just don’t improve to tell me I’m on track either with a given bullet or powder.

There is also the problem that the history is there and what shot well back in the day no longer shoots well now. Dad has reloading records going back to the 1960s that show old school loads that shot very well back then will no longer shoot well when replicated now. His best load was a 4895 load powering a 180 grain SP and that was the load I tested with this fall and it shot miserably.

The only other load that was his personal favorite was a massive 220 grain RN on top of nearly a max load of a powder I can’t recall right now. Anyway, I took one look at that load and said no way am I’m loading up those just to test with. They’d be like $2 a bang at today’s prices. And since he no longer hunts driven deer only with the Finnlanders up in the north woods, there’s no need to get back into the load that in his log books is called the “Finnlander Brushbuster”. Back in the Big Woods says, the Finnlanders drove ’em, and dad and the Michigan Machine Gun kept their freezers full. That was the deal and there were few who were better than dad at putting a stop to a running deer.

I don’t know what to do. I’d like to save the rifle but I’m also up against the reality that I can just go out and buy him a used pump like a 7600 for less than $500 and he’d be happy for the rest of his hunting career.

Grouse

TheFamousGrouse wrote:

I don’t know what to do. I’d like to save the rifle but I’m also up against the reality that I can just go out and buy him a used pump like a 7600 for less than $500 and he’d be happy for the rest of his hunting career.

Grouse

Honestly Grouse, I think this is your best option.

https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php/topics/3469464/Remington_760_30_06_Rebarrel

An old forum post I found on Google. Don’t know if it will help.

https://www.gunpartscorp.com/gun-manufacturer/remington/rifles-rem/760-2?page=2

And one of the better old gun parts places I have found.

You can not take your money with you when you die, with that said I would get it fixed up or replace the barrel if needed and maybe refinish the stock to make it look new again. Do it for a birthday gift or Christmas. The memories that gun can share are priceless.