Necks & Shoulders Splitting...

[BCB]

A friend of mine just purchased a new 7-30 Waters barrel for his Contender.  He is having trouble with the necks splitting, the shoulder splitting, and sometimes just a small (1/32") split at the shoulder/body junction.  No pattern to the splits.  The primers are moving slightly out of the pocket after firing.  The loads are well within data for H-335 and Win-748 powders.  I even annealed some cases and fireformed them in my Waters barrel and gave to him.  A couple of them split also.  These were once-fired brass.  Accuracy for his barrel has been just so-so at best.  Any thoughts?  Headspace--Yet none of the cases separate in front of the rim.  I have never seen this before.  I have brass that has been fired nearly 20 times in my Waters barrel.  Help is needed.  Thanks...BCB

[jgalar]

The best bet is to contact TC and let them make it right.

[skb2706]

I would think that unless the chamber was way out of spec that it is more of a brass problem than a chamber problem. Even when making drastic case changes by fireforming I rarely get splits unless I did not anneal it correctly first.

[BCB]

I don't think it is a brass problem either as we have at least 3 different types and lots of brass being split.  The 20 rounds I gave him to try were annealed and fire-formed in my Waters barrel.  They looked perfect.  I suspect it is a chamber problem.  He may have to send it back to T/C after our hunting season this year.  Too late to send it back now!  This is certainly not the first problem with chambers that I have seen with Thompson.  It may be a bit more common that one might suspect.  Yea, they will replace the barrel, but there is expense sending it back and inconvenience.  Although I am a Contender fan, it remains my opinion that the popularity of T/C arms is the ease of changing barrels, thus different cartridges.  Otherwise, they may have gone by the wayside some time ago...BCB