Salmonson63
FNG
I have been doing so much research that my head is starting to spin so figured I would put up a post to see if anyone has any experience or gone down a similar path. I have been reading numerous threads both on this site and on others but i'm trying to find hunters who have actually had their Tikka (or other thin stainless barrel rifles) threaded. I'm looking at installing a brake on my Tikka T3x Lite Stainless 300WM. The main concern is due to the thin barrel profile I can have the barrel threaded at 1/2x28 which gives me a good shoulder or 9/16x24 which leaves me very little shoulder but slightly more wall thickness. Personally I feel both of these options don't leave enough thickness under the brake (not based on actual experience). Im not to concerned about pressure containment but more about mechanical integrity as like most of you I hunt in some nasty places and it wouldn't be completely out of place to assume the gun will get banged around every now and then.
To put some numbers to it if we assume the bore is 0.308" I would have the following remaining wall thickness in each case (i'm using the thunder beast drawing for barrel threading and referencing the undercut diameter which will be less than the minimum minor thread diameter)
1/2"x28 - (0.457-0.308)/2 = 0.0745"
9/16"x24- (0.512-0.308)/2 = 0.102"
Maybe it's just me but this seems really thin when gunsmiths on other forums have referenced 0.150 as a minimum wall thickness. The one thing that is telling me to go for it is Kimber threads their 30cal light mountain rifles at 7/16"x28 and I haven't been able to find any issues. But given it is a factory installation who knows if they are holding tighter tolerances and have a very tight fit. In the end all of this is leading me to possibly install a high quality aluminum clamp on brake from Grizzly and call it a day, but in my mind that brings other challenges. Such as what if the gun gets bumped and the brake comes off during a hunt or the timing gets tweaked, and not to mention they are huge. I have talked with a few local gunsmiths and it became clear they just thread the barrels and don't give much thought to this (which is possibly what I should do, LOL). Lastly please don't turn this in to a brake vs no brake discussion as I really want to reduce recoil to make this an enjoyable weekend shooter I am well aware of the pros and cons!
So who has gone down this path before? Im sure the engineer in me is way overthinking this but this gun was a gift from my father in law and will be used for many years to come. Thanks in advance for the feedback and taking the time to read this!
To put some numbers to it if we assume the bore is 0.308" I would have the following remaining wall thickness in each case (i'm using the thunder beast drawing for barrel threading and referencing the undercut diameter which will be less than the minimum minor thread diameter)
1/2"x28 - (0.457-0.308)/2 = 0.0745"
9/16"x24- (0.512-0.308)/2 = 0.102"
Maybe it's just me but this seems really thin when gunsmiths on other forums have referenced 0.150 as a minimum wall thickness. The one thing that is telling me to go for it is Kimber threads their 30cal light mountain rifles at 7/16"x28 and I haven't been able to find any issues. But given it is a factory installation who knows if they are holding tighter tolerances and have a very tight fit. In the end all of this is leading me to possibly install a high quality aluminum clamp on brake from Grizzly and call it a day, but in my mind that brings other challenges. Such as what if the gun gets bumped and the brake comes off during a hunt or the timing gets tweaked, and not to mention they are huge. I have talked with a few local gunsmiths and it became clear they just thread the barrels and don't give much thought to this (which is possibly what I should do, LOL). Lastly please don't turn this in to a brake vs no brake discussion as I really want to reduce recoil to make this an enjoyable weekend shooter I am well aware of the pros and cons!
So who has gone down this path before? Im sure the engineer in me is way overthinking this but this gun was a gift from my father in law and will be used for many years to come. Thanks in advance for the feedback and taking the time to read this!
