Howa barrel removal

[pklin1297]

Hello all,

I had a first hand experience watching my smith trying to remove a blued Howa barrel from a blued action yesterday... A proper barrel bushing was used, including an almost four feet long cheater bar on a action wrench, and at the end no barrel was removed and we ended up just cut the barrel down as far as the lathe would allow to shorten it, re-crown it, and fit a muzzle brake.

The question I had was, for those smiths who have successfully removed a Howa barrel before, did you notice whether or not the threads had locktite on it? My smith said he only encountered one other rifle that the barrel just wouldn't come off and that was a Tikka, and Tikka uses locktite on their barrels where you would have to torch it.

By successfully removing the Howa barrel I don't mean cutting it to relieve pressure and just replacing it with new barrel.

I know Pete Lincoln works on these a lot, and Mark from SAC has done it... Any thoughts gentlemen?

Thanks much.

 

[Hateca]

Re: Howa barrel removal

I don't think its Loc-Tite per-say. During WWII and before some foreign manufactures would put a type of acid on the barrel threads before they screwed that barrel on. The acid would kind of fuse the barrel and receiver together. Had an old time salty rifle builder say that Howa did something similar. Never seen it in the Howas but I have no reason to doubt him since I do have first hand experience with the WWII rifles and have seen this first hand.

Taken a few of WWII rifles apart and when the barrel let go it sounded like a rifle shot going off. Some were so hard to get off we would heat the barrel and bend it at a 90 degree so we could slip a very long bar over the barrel and twist it off holding the receiver in a fixture. If it wasn't done this way and you tried holding the barrel you could twist the action making a paperweight.

Know from experience that the Howa barrels are a huge PITA to get off and will not touch them. If Mark wants to work on them I’m more then happy to recommend him every time.

 

[GUNNER75]

Re: Howa barrel removal

I haven't done the work, but have witnessed cutting a relief just forward the receiver to lesson the tension. Barrels were very very easily unscrewed once this was done (almost by hand).

Sure didn't appear to have anything on the threads such as a locking aid, etc.

These were barreled actions only and or very late model Houge stocked rifles (package rifles)

 

[pklin1297]

Re: Howa barrel removal

Thanks guys, your experiences mirror those of what I've read or heard elsewhere.

It'll be a while before I will rebarrel this rifle and when that happens I'll just let whoever wants to work on them cut the relief to remove the barrel anyway.

Per Mark this PITA operation seems to only apply to Howa blued barreled actions and their stainless variants were much easier to remove...

 

[Alderleet]

Re: Howa barrel removal

I've heard that the issue with the blued models is they blue the receiver and barrel as 1 piece, so the blueing agents makes its way to the threads, and adds to the friction.

Not sure if its true, but its what i've heard repeated half a billion times.

I'll find out when i rebarrel my 223 to 300 whisper...