Rusty chamber in 1903

[Chimerix]

Back in October, I participated in a 2-day "precision tactical rifle" class, which was great fun. I used a family heirloom m1903a4 that I had glass-bedded into a Boyds laminate stock and crowned with a Bushnell Elite 10x tactical scope. And I used Greek M2 ball ammo that I had purchased from the CMP.

The results were fantastic, and I found that if I did my job, that rifle would hold 1 MOA out to 400 yards.

True to form, I put cleaning off for a week or two. When I did clean her, I didn't do a great job, because I was trying to protect the stock that I had spent a day sanding and refinishing.

a couple of weeks later, I took her to the range. Fired one shot, then had to take a hammer to the bolt to open it, and a hammer and ramrod to the cartridge to extract it. Peeked inside, the whole chamber was red.

I took it home, and using both .357 and .45 bronze brushes chucked in a cordless drill, tried to remove the rust. I got it clean to the eye, but still couldn't chamber a spent round. SO I took it to my gunsmith friend, who got me operating again.

So, my question is, why did this happen? The bore wasn't rusty, it stayed bright, which implies to me it wasn't the ammo. What would make a chamber decide to rust?

[Little Eddie]

Chimerix:

1) My first question can probably be better answered by you: I know that the Springfield bores are chrome plated. Are the chambers chrome plated as well? If not, I think the problem may be corrosive primers in the Greek ammo.

2) When using M2 ammo, I usually figure that they might be loaded with corrosive primers, even when they are of recent manufacture. I do know that some American match ammo was purposefully loaded with corrosive primers at least until the late 1960s. Many of the old timey competition shooters believed that the corrosive primers gave more consistent ignition than did the newfangled non-corrosive primers.

3) I have a quart of that old black gunk which was used by the U.S. Army for bore cleaner. Even when I am up at the Ranch hunting, when I shoot the '06, if only one shot, I run a sloppy patch through the bore (using the black gunk) and set the rifle in the corner on its muzzle (resting on a rag or folded newspaper) when I come in at the end of the day. I have had commercial rifles (not lined with chrome) turn red overnight with M2 ammo which I thought was loaded with non-corrosive primers. I have not had that happen when I was faithful using the black gunk.

I often put off cleaning the rifle several days after arriving home from a hunt; but the rifle has always had that one treatment with the black army gunk after it was fired -- to tide it over until I get up the energy to give it a thorough cleaning. Maverick is using my '06 now and using the WRA ammo loaded for Haiti in 1947 -- it is accurate and dependable, and it has non-corrosive primers in it.

Oh, by the way, since the salts deposited by the corrosive primers are not oil soluble; the old timers used hot soapy water to clean their Springfields. I am not fond of the soapy water solution; so besides the old black army bore cleaner, I have used the liquid "black powder solvent" which one can purchase reasonably from Cabela's. I have a 1/2 gallon jug of it in the closet off the loading room. I figure that if the stuff works with black powder, it certainly ought to work to clean corrosive primer residue out of a 30-06. The Cabela's bore cleaner is also more gentle to your health than is the black gunk (which has carbon tetrachloride in it).

I hope some of my rambling may help you with a solution.

-- Little Eddie