I am in need of a gunsmith who has the chamber reamer in 8mm/06 AI. I am building a rifle on a VZ24 action with a 24" Shilen barrel. If anyone can put me in contact with a source to have this done I would appreciate it.

I'm looking for the same guy, although, I just heard today from a well-respected rifle 'smith that a standard, non-heat treated VZ24 barrel is not something he'd take on for rechambering in 8mm-06 AI. "Too much liability."

If true--and I'd hate to match wits with this guy and be wrong (he knows a TON more than I do)--then it's probably just cheaper for me to see if I could buy a new barrel and have it mated to the action. Barrel, mating, blue print action (square bolt face, lap lugs, etc), some tinkering on feeding maybe.....I'm probably looking at $600-$1000 (depending on what I have done and with whom). Ouch :(

I'm looking for the same guy, although, I just heard today from a well-respected rifle 'smith that a standard, non-heat treated VZ24 barrel is not something he'd take on for rechambering in 8mm-06 AI. "Too much liability."

If true--and I'd hate to match wits with this guy and be wrong (he knows a TON more than I do)--then it's probably just cheaper for me to see if I could buy a new barrel and have it mated to the action. Barrel, mating, blue print action (square bolt face, lap lugs, etc), some tinkering on feeding maybe.....I'm probably looking at $600-$1000 (depending what I have done and with whom). Ouch :(

I have a prewae brno vz24 the gunsmith said it would be no
problem ro rechamber it to 8x60 js or 8x64 . this way factory ammo is avaliable and you dont have to rely on hand loading

I'm looking for the same guy, although, I just heard today from a well-respected rifle 'smith that a standard, non-heat treated VZ24 barrel is not something he'd take on for rechambering in 8mm-06 AI. "Too much liability."

If true--and I'd hate to match wits with this guy and be wrong (he knows a TON more than I do)--then it's probably just cheaper for me to see if I could buy a new barrel and have it mated to the action. Barrel, mating, blue print action (square bolt face, lap lugs, etc), some tinkering on feeding maybe.....I'm probably looking at $600-$1000 (depending on what I have done and with whom). Ouch :(


Sarco has 8mm/06 blanks available for $60 or so. They are Swedish made and great shooters. A friend used one and the rifle is a 1/2" shooter all day long. I may take that option until I can find someone to ream it out to AI. I also have a gunsmith who does great action work and it would run right around $200 to blueprint,, lap lugs, Install barrel, crown, contour, drill & tap, ect.. Pretty much everything except bolt handle and safety.

Sarco has 8mm/06 blanks available for $60 or so. They are Swedish made and great shooters. A friend used one and the rifle is a 1/2" shooter all day long. I may take that option until I can find someone to ream it out to AI. I also have a gunsmith who does great action work and it would run right around $200 to blueprint,, lap lugs, Install barrel, crown, contour, drill & tap, ect.. Pretty much everything except bolt handle and safety.
If you have a gunsmith who can do that work competently, then it should be no big deal for him to rechamber and headspace your existing barrel after doing the action work. You can rent the necessary reamer and headspace gauge from Shawney for 3 days for about $60 more or less. One word of caution. If you have the lugs lapped there exists the possibility that the surface hardening in the receiver lug area may be removed or reduced to the extent that lug setback could occur using normal 50K CUP loads. When I did that work I would send the receiver and bolt to Industrial Heat Treating in Salt Lake City for reheat treating. Parker Ackley recommended them to me years ago. They are still in business so you can give them a call at 801-972-5540. Shawney can be reached at 541-471-9150. There have been 1000's of 8X57 barrels rechambered to 8mm-06 in standard and AI form. Unless some gink screwed up putting powder in the case none of them failed under normal use. German and Czech barrel steel was as good as that used in the 03, yet people were rechambering the 06 A3 barrel to 308 Norma Magnum without any problems. I owned 2 8mm-06 AI's on standard K98 actions. They were sure fire 1 shot stoppers using the old Speer 8mm 225 gr bullet long discontinued. That was the best cup and core bullet ever made for the 8mm next to the old Barnes bullets.

Dear Tanker and others,
I have done quite a few of these conversions [8mm/06AI] and also the standard 8mm/06 and never had a bad one[knock on wood] I have only done the AI on actions/barrels like the VZs and others noted for their strength etc. I have turned down the Spanish ones like the "La Corunas" although I saw one recently that had no problems that was done many years ago by someone else. As F DeHaas` book 'Bolt Action Rifles" says. "The strength of the Mauser seems to be more related to design rather than metallurgy"[not a direct quote.]
Barrels are usually very hard to remove and that takes a bit of doing. Other than that it is an easy chambering. I am on my third[fourth?] reamer now. Unfortunately Shawnee is in a reorganization status and reamers are not coming out from her. I hope she is up and running soon as it`s a real bear trying to find a wildcat or seldom used chambering reamer for a special job. Sure runs the price up when you gotta shell out 165.00 +- for a reamer for a one shot deal. I chamber for over 100 different chambers from the 14/221 Walker to the 470 NE and lots in between. The 8mm/06AI is a great case. One I made for a guy here locally ha eclipsed his 338 Win Mag as his primary Elk rifle. Dies are not too bad if ordered from Dave Davison @ CH4D dies. Anyone want a 8mm/06 AI done let me know.

Aloha, Mark[in Or]

I'm coming into this late, but I hope some are still watching the thread.

I have a Turkish Mauser that I'll be working on when I finish my current project. I am thinking about 8mm-06 AI for it and am wondering if the longer bullets will eject properly... that is a cartridge with longer bullets seated out nearly to touch the lands. Any experience here??

My current project is a 6.5-06 AI on a 96 Swede action (original barrel throat was eroded, so I needed a longer cartridge). I used a homemade "snap-ring" shim to center the cartridges for fireforming, which worked a treat, sorta to my surprise :-) Oh, yes, fireforming is done with the extractor out, cases being pushed out with a plastic coated cleaning rod.

Anyway, I haven't yet tried to eject a loaded round, but while feeding them, it looks close. I'm wondering if I'll have to cut back the extractor to allow the bolt to come farther back before the cartridge moves to the right.

Thanks for listening/buffler