Chamber reamer?
- Thread starter Ducksoup
- Start date
EddieHarren
New member
There are many types of reamers. Those, most commonly used for chambering rifle barrels, are roughing and finishing reamers. A roughing reamer is not ground to the precise tolerances as a finish reamer. It is used to remove the bulk of the metal and then a finish reamer is used to clean the chamber up to its final dimensions and headspace. Using a rougher reduces the wear and tear on a good finish reamer. The only roughing reamers, that I use, are for 300 Win. Mag.and 308 Win. as I chamber a lot of these for law enforcement rifles. I also recently purchased one for the 6PPC.
dtech
New member
Eddie is spot on. The finish reamers that I use are about 10% smaller than the finish reamer. They also have no throat, only the body and neck. I have mine ground out of solid carbide, and as you may be able to see from the image, the rougher has only three flutes and they are serrated. You should also be able to see the area of the finish reamer that will cut the throat of the chamber.
If you look at both the reamers in the image, you will see the bushings have slots ground into them. These slots are for the cutting oil to flow through, flushing the chips out as you cut the chamber. I feed high-pressure oil through from the muzzle end while roughing and finishing the chamber to increase reamer life, avoid chips in the throat and bore that may cause scratches or tool-marks, and to speed the process.
If you use a finish reamer to remove all of the metal from the chamber, it will dull much more quickly. As you can imagine, sharpening a reamer will change it's dimensions and quite quickly force you to purchase a replacement.
On top: 6 X 45 solid carbide finish reamer.
On bottom: solid carbide roughing reamer.
If you look at both the reamers in the image, you will see the bushings have slots ground into them. These slots are for the cutting oil to flow through, flushing the chips out as you cut the chamber. I feed high-pressure oil through from the muzzle end while roughing and finishing the chamber to increase reamer life, avoid chips in the throat and bore that may cause scratches or tool-marks, and to speed the process.
If you use a finish reamer to remove all of the metal from the chamber, it will dull much more quickly. As you can imagine, sharpening a reamer will change it's dimensions and quite quickly force you to purchase a replacement.
On top: 6 X 45 solid carbide finish reamer.
On bottom: solid carbide roughing reamer.