Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Remington 760 Re-Barrel?

What is the re-barrel process like for a 760? Pretty straightforward? Local shop has a pretty rough 300 Savage that I'm considering taking in as a project gun. It's rough enough that I don't trust the bore for a JES job. Would rather just have a brand new spout.

The receiver on the 740/742/7400/760/7600 series rifles is just a bolt carrier, the barrel screws into a "barrel bracket". The job is more involved that rebarreling a bolt action rifle, but not overly so, after all these were a regular production rifle. Very few 'smiths work on 760s, so finding one who isn't learning about this on your dime might be a challenge.

A pump action Remington you describe could be up to three quarters century old with all the liabilities of wear & tear, replacement parts problems and gunsmiths familiar as Remguy suggests. The statistical risks probably exceed the returns! Decent ones are 'out there' and I doubt they are particularly expensive! It would seem better to start from such position than where you're self-described as just now! I have a 1957, intro year for the .308 chambering, it functions fine & looks 'minty'. Even then, I'd not invest the likely toll for your plan of work, much less the unknowns of 'well used'.
Just my take!
Best!
John

You are somewhat limited, but I doubt its bad enough that it couldn't be rebored to a .338 Federal or .358 Winchester. Otherwise, a rebarrel is likely going to get expensive...assuming you can find someone to take on the job.

Ahlmans gun shop in Minnesota works on Remington 740s and 760s

Probably decent odds a take off from EBay would headspace. You could swap it on yourself with just the wrench for the action tube.

Accuracy systems of Byers Colorado does barrel replacements on Remington 7600's. I don't know just how much difference there is between the 760 and the 7600. It might be worth a telephone call to them to find out. They have a long list of barrels to include the .338 and the .358. (303) 822-6849

kwg

I recently sold my last two 760’s, probably for less than your cost to buy that 760 and the work you have planned. I’d suggest look around a bit before doing what you’re considering, especially if the 760 is rough.

I re-barreled one of mine. It was the worst grouping 270 Win. I have ever seen. I installed a Shilen barrel and made the rifle a 260 Rem. It is not difficult to do and it is not some sort of rocket surgery, but it does take some doing to get the headspace dead on. It has to be done a little at a time and then assembled and checked. If you go too far you have to start over.
This is why most smith's charge more, there's just no way to turn the reamer in the chamber with the barrel installed. Pretty straight forward until you get to the part of setting the headspace. Then it takes about twice as long {or a little longer} as a bolt gun.
One good thing is that they are all long actions, so to speak, so with the 260 I can seat my bullets out where they shoot best. It shoots about 3/4 MOA and maybe a higher end barrel might have worked better, but for deer/bear hunting it is fine and I am happy. Been a while ago, but I am pretty sure I had to get either a 243, 7mm-08, or 308 magazine to get it to feed the 260 with 100% reliability. Magazines are available, but not quite as cheap as they once were for these guns. A previous post mentioned 760 vs. 7600....the main difference between the 7600 and the 760 was the locking lugs. The 760 used 9 smaller lugs, the 7600 series used 3 larger ones. This doesn't affect re-barreling, however.
These are neat, handy, accurate old rifles with good looking lines and great ergonomics.....I say go for it and make it the caliber you want. You won't have any trouble selling it either. Everyone that looks at mine tries to buy it. Best of luck, M

Edit: before someone jumps on here and tells me the 270 shot bad because the barrel assembly was "loose" .....nope, that was the first thing I checked. I do know that will do it, but in this case a bore scope revealed that the barrel was very poorly made and had a lot of imperfections.

Didn't realize this thread had received this many responses. Appreciate all the leads and insight.

I've been in contact with Hillbilly Custom Rifles and Mr. Chesney upon receiving pictures said that he is pretty sure he can slick it up a bit.

My plans for the gun are replacing the walnut furniture with synthetic, installing a new Hart barrel and having it chambered in .308 Win and finished at 20", metal work cerekoted, keeping the Lyman rear sight, adding a fiber optic front with a hood, and having all of the screw holes plugged. Having the trigger worked if possible wouldn't suck either.

Here's how it currently looks. Not bad, but not what I have a vision of.






dutch sheets ministries

What a sweet old rifle! In 300 Sav to boot!

I'd leave it as is. A 308 with plastic hardware wont do anything it can't do as it sits.

Unless you’re planning on shooting cast bullets, the existing barrel may surprise you. Ross Seyfried once wrote, or maybe more than once, “let the barrel speak”.

On the other hand, as mentioned above, there are oodles of good used ones for sale, so no need to take on an expensive, maybe difficult project unless you have a real stiffy for the .300, which I don’t. The rebarreled rifle wouldn’t be original, so that’s not a draw either.

The Model 6 and 7600 have 4-lug bolts, unlike the multi-lug (9?) of the original, so probably simpler to futz with.

It's not about how well it may or may not shoot. It's current configuration isn't what I want. The price of 760s have sky rocketed, this one was priced right and is the perfect candidate for the project. I see zero appeal to the 300savage. I've been shooting 308s for the last 20 years. Have a wide assortment of dies, brass, bullets, etc. Seems very silly to me to invest money into reloading equipment for a slight decrease in performance.

I've wanted to clone this 760 since the first time I saw it. The time is now.

I think that you're going to need a newer style of forearm hanger to use any of the synthetic forearms that I've seen.

You could be right. All I know is I sent the pic of the gun in its current state and told him what I wanted and he said he could work with it.

It doesn't have to be 110% clone correct. Just close enough.

As others have said its fairly easy to swap barrels. Your cheapest source for a barrel is a 742. Shave the gas block of and Tig the gas port closed. The underiug needs a little machine work as well as it has sharper edges of the 760. If pretty don't matter a file works and cold blue after. A lot of 742's had bad receivers but the barrels where still good. The two I had done head spaced with no issues. I was able to find the barrels locally for $40.00 each. With the price of 300 savage brass and ammo it may pay for itself to swap it out. They only chambered the 760 the first year of production in the 300 Savage.

The magazine is probably worth $100 bucks. I don't think it will work with .308.

Translation: Don’t lose it…..

I would be interested in the magazine and the butt stock if you want to sell them after the makeover.

Not being a smart aleck, but stuff on the internet stays there, and the highlighted part of your post is not correct. Whether meaning the 300 Savage was only chambered for one yr, that being the first yr, or meaning that in the first yr of 760 production the only chambering offered was 300 Savage. Neither is correct.

300 Savage was chambered for 9 yrs, and the first yr of production there were 3 chamber offerings with the 30-06 outpacing them all in production.

the magazine in his picture isn't worth $0.10 to anyone who's tried one.

And it's hideous.

I Missed that. You are right very hideous. My remarks were for a period correct .300 Savage magazine.

No worries. Rifle has been shipped and I have no doubts it's gonna come back as a pig killing machine.

Back in the 90's, a friend of mine had a 760 or 7600 re-barreled to .25-06 Rem by one of the more well-known 'smiths or barrel shops at that time - somebody like E. R. Shaw or Douglas. The barrel was stainless, medium contour (like #3), and 26 inches. It was very accurate. He was the crop depredation control officer in our county then, and that was his weapon of choice. He was phenomenally successful with that rifle, often shooting out to around 600 yds, if necessary. He killed hundreds of deer and quite a few hogs/pigs every year with it. He always carried at least six magazines with him when he was working.

Point of the story is that you should end up with a pig killing machine (or Amish machine gun) that you'll be happy with.

The last one I messed with with a friend bought on close out. We cut the barrel to 16", modified the stock to a straight grip like a shotgun. 2 1/2 Leupold scope in low mounts. He had a crop depreciation permit and I think he killed over 100 deer the first year he had it. No idea how many by now. It was in 35Rem.

Crop depreciation? Look that one up.