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Post by omegahunter on Apr 17, 2018 8:57:37 GMT -5
I ordered a 6.5 G upper from Bear Creek Arsenal that had a short throat.
Nosler lists COL of 2.245" for their 120 BT. The bullet was touching the rifling at 2.234".
Sent that upper back (which fit beautifully to my lower) and got a warranty upper that the same bullet touches the rifling at 2.205"!!! and loose fit on the lower. That upper is on its way back to North Carolina now also.
In addition, the original upper was ordered with conventional rifling and the warranty replacement was 5R.
So instead of lengthening the throat out to accept SAAMI loaded ammo, they just grabbed another upper after three weeks and shipped it.
I would not recommend BCA unless they dropped their price so that you could replace the barrel for free!!!
I am far from confident that the next one I receive will be correct. So do I find someone that I can send the barrel to and get it chambered correctly or just order a barrel from another maker and make a barrel swap? I have two uppers from Hardened Arms that shoot great and they offer the 6.5 G barrel in 20" for $150.
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Post by deadeer on Apr 17, 2018 9:33:28 GMT -5
That sounds like my kind of luck!
I would think that any gunsmith with that reamer could lengthen the throat for minimal money. I would check around first, that wouldnt cost anything.
Only other thing that comes to mind, and its no fix, is to try Hdy sst. The ogive is back further so you can seat the bullet out longer. This is my experience in a 260rem I shot for years.
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Post by esshup on Apr 17, 2018 10:05:07 GMT -5
I'd call them back up, demand that they ship the orig upper back and have them credit you $75 for the hassle. Then go here reamer rental rent the reamer and fix it yourself. You can cut that little bit by hand, no special tools needed other than the reamer itself and cutting oil. |
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Post by bullseye69 on Apr 17, 2018 11:49:35 GMT -5
Probably you needed to specify that the throat needs lengthened and not the chamber.
They check the chamber with a head space gauge and that has nothing to do with the throat.
A chamber reamer wont fix the problem but making the chamber longer will create bad head space.
You need a throating reamer for 6.5 cal..
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Post by omegahunter on Apr 17, 2018 11:57:07 GMT -5
Probably you needed to specify that the throat needs lengthened and not the chamber. They check the chamber with a head space gauge and that has nothing to do with the throat. A chamber reamer wont fix the problem but making the chamber longer will create bad head space. You need a throating reamer for 6.5 cal.. I wrote them a very precise letter explaining that the throat needed lengthening by about 0.025" on the first upper to make it acceptable. 100% incompetence on the part of their gunsmith. Or just laziness. |
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Post by bullseye69 on Apr 17, 2018 11:58:45 GMT -5
Probably you needed to specify that the throat needs lengthened and not the chamber. They check the chamber with a head space gauge and that has nothing to do with the throat. A chamber reamer wont fix the problem but making the chamber longer will create bad head space. You need a throating reamer for 6.5 cal.. I wrote them a very precise letter explaining that the throat needed lengthening by about 0.025" on the first upper to make it acceptable. 100% incompetence on the part of their gunsmith. Or just laziness. well that's just horse poop!! |
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Post by omegahunter on May 11, 2018 9:50:01 GMT -5
Got another warranty BCA upper delivered yesterday. Using the same bullet (Nosler 120 BT with a Nosler recommended 2.245" COL) that I have used all along, the max COL for this chamber/throat is still only 2.222". Guess sending along the SAAMI spec sheet didn't help.  Strike 3!!! However, fit and finish of this complete upper is the best so far, so I am going to load up some shorty Nosler 120 BT rounds and give it a whirl. I am also going to try some Nosler 129 ABLR because they will be able to be loaded to a COL of 2.274" (still fits my C Products mag) for this chamber and is the bullet that I would like to deer hunt with if I can get acceptable accuracy with it. In the end I may just have to get another barrel, but we shall see. |
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Post by omegahunter on May 17, 2018 6:47:47 GMT -5
Got one update!
Well, the third upper seems to have an appropriate throat at least. First measuring did not turn out well, so I gave it a good cleaning and tried to measure again. The Nosler 120 BT just does have a light scuff ring around it when loaded to 2.250" and when seated at recommended 2.245" does not touch the throat or rifling at all. I was lead to believe that they had the Grendel 2 throat that was parallel instead of compound, but there is a complete ring around the bullet ogive and not just rifling scuffs on it. Maybe when I requested a SAAMI throat that they actually put one in it.
Now to just get some free time to give it a test run.
The only thing that is not to order spec is the receiver is no longer BCA branded and has no branding marks whatsoever, but at this point I don't care about that. It fits my lower very well; no wiggle at all.
As a side note, the three steel Wolf cases that came with the upper have three different extractor marks on the rim and only one has a dent in the body of the case. I do NOT believe that two of these were test-fired in this upper if, in fact, any of the three were. I am thinking that they crack off three rounds and just pick up three empties and put in a baggie.
Gonna keep my fingers crossed.
With all of this back and forth with BCA, I would recommend nobody roll the dice with this company. I had previously got two uppers (5.56 and .300 BLK) from Hardened Arms and they were both top notch. There was one issue with the 5.56 bolt having an out of spec firing pin hole, but HA swapped that out with me pronto. I should have just ponied up a little more $ and ordered the Grendel from them to begin with!!
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Post by lawrencecountyhunter on May 17, 2018 10:35:40 GMT -5
Glad you got it sorted out. Let us know how it shoots!
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Post by omegahunter on Jun 1, 2018 10:00:59 GMT -5
Been slow going with gradeschool sports and the weather.
Only got out to shoot three times with the newest replacement. Trips have been mainly with nearer to starting loads of 8208 powder and Nosler 120 BT, 129 Accubond LR, and Hornady 129 SP. Groups had been disappointing with all three bullets. So not getting anywhere with lower loads, last time out I bumped the charge for the Hornady 129 SP up a half a grain and it went from 2" groups to 0.79". Getting somewhere.
Now I am going to just do a normal ladder workup for the 129 SP and 129 ABLR to see just what I can wring out of these two options.
And I am thinking that the compound throat may not be quite up to SAAMI spec. The first 129 SP got stuck in the throat when loaded to the manual recommended 2.245". So I am seating deeper than I supposedly have to according to Hornady if I were to have a true SAAMI chamber/throat. I really need to get me some Cerrosafe so I can get a chamber cast to measure!!
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Post by omegahunter on Jun 12, 2018 7:41:25 GMT -5
Bought a box of Hornady Black Saturday just to see how a common factory round would chamber up. Ogive of the 123 ELD stuck in the throat enough that a very light mortar was required to assist the charging handle to pop the cartridge free.
Since I was happy with the rest of the upper components, I emailed BCA about just returning the barrel and asked if they would swap it out for a stainless instead of melonite/nitride coated. That way if the throat is still not up to spec, then I can get a throat reamer and open it up myself. Would not want to chance that with the hard coating and dulling a throat reamer. BCA complied and now comes the disassembly to ship the barrel back.
Hopefully the 4th time's the charm. One way or the other it will be the last time I have to deal with BCA!
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Post by omegahunter on Jul 14, 2018 9:12:59 GMT -5
Hallelujah! The stainless barrel measures 2.304" to the rifling for a 120 BT Nosler! And a Hornady Black will insert without any marks on the bullet.
I will report back once I have it fully assembled and shot some, but looking much better!!
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Post by esshup on Jul 15, 2018 8:39:40 GMT -5
That's good.
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Post by omegahunter on Aug 7, 2018 12:48:01 GMT -5
Well, didn't turn out so good anyway.
It shot so horribly that I replaced the scope with a new Nikon to find out that it still shot the same. It ended up throwing bullets everywhere. Moved the target in to 50 yards to keep them all on paper and it gave a 5.25" group with Hornady Black.
It hitched a ride with UPS last night as BCA says they are giving me a full refund after I have spent right at about $200 on four different attempts to get a good BCA chamber, neck, and now accuracy.
I GIVE!!!!!
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Aug 7, 2018 13:13:59 GMT -5
Bummer on the accuracy. It least some cost recovery, but never the time invested.
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Post by omegahunter on Aug 8, 2018 6:51:05 GMT -5
Bummer on the accuracy. It least some cost recovery, but never the time invested. This is literally the only time that I can ever say that pulling a trigger was a waste of time!! On the other hand, I have publicized this on three sites (two of which see international traffic) and I hope my wasted time is time invested in keeping people away from BCA (Bear Creek Arsenal). |
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Post by tomthreetoes on Aug 10, 2018 7:12:33 GMT -5
From what I've read from different sources, it's hit or miss with BCA, sounds like mostly misses.
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