Tikka hard bolt lift after dry firing. WTF

[RyanT26]

While dry firing today it developed an extremely hard bolt lift. After you cycle the action it is fine, smooth as always. You dry fire and you almost need two hands to lift the bolt handle up.

I took the bolt from my other Tikka and it runs in the gun just fine. I put the problem bolt in the other gun same thing so I assume it has to be something with the bolt I just can’t see what the hell it is.

I don’t know if I can attach a video but I’ll send it to whoever thinks they can help.

 

[Antares]

That sounds weird for sure. My first step would be to strip the bolt down, blow brake cleaner all over the place, compress the firing pin spring a few times to make sure it's running through that bushing the way it should, reassemble, and see what happens.

I'd grease the lugs while i was at it too.

Interested to hear how you get this resolved.

 

[SDHNTR]

There aren't may parts to a rifle bolt. Strip it down and I bet the problem becomes obvious.

 

[RyanT26]

Upon further review it appears the front of the both handle is rubbing against the rear of the receiver. I colored both surfaces with a black sharpie and then cycled the bolt and there were no rub marks, I dry fired and then cycled the bolt it removed the sharpie coloring from a small area on both the front of the bolt handle and the rear of the receiver.
I quickly tore down the bolt and did not see anything that seemed out of place or broken. I’m going to try to tear both bolts down side-by-side to see if I’m just missing something obvious but not seeing it just yet.

 

[J&A Outdoors]

Check the cocking cam/ramp on the bolt body, sounds like you may have a rough surface in that location.

It may need greased.

 

[Lawnboi]

Upon further review it appears the front of the both handle is rubbing against the rear of the receiver. I colored both surfaces with a black sharpie and then cycled the bolt and there were no rub marks, I dry fired and then cycled the bolt it removed the sharpie coloring from a small area on both the front of the bolt handle and the rear of the receiver.
I quickly tore down the bolt and did not see anything that seemed out of place or broken. I’m going to try to tear both bolts down side-by-side to see if I’m just missing something obvious but not seeing it just yet.

That’s how your bolt extracts a case and is completely normal.

I’d tear down the bolt, pull out the firing pin assembly. Firing pin should not have oil or grease on it per tikka. Make sure the interior of the bolt is clean. Make sure the bolt shroud rotates without much resistance. Check that the cocking ramp is clean.

After that clean the exterior of the bolt and the runway and where the pigs rotate of the action. Place some grease on the back of the lugs and where they contact the receiver and a dab on that part of the bolt handle that contacts the receiver.

See what it does after that.

 

[SDHNTR]

Upon further review it appears the front of the both handle is rubbing against the rear of the receiver. I colored both surfaces with a black sharpie and then cycled the bolt and there were no rub marks, I dry fired and then cycled the bolt it removed the sharpie coloring from a small area on both the front of the bolt handle and the rear of the receiver.
I quickly tore down the bolt and did not see anything that seemed out of place or broken. I’m going to try to tear both bolts down side-by-side to see if I’m just missing something obvious but not seeing it just yet.

It’s supposed to! That’s called primary extraction.

 

[SDHNTR]

Does it do it with no firing pin assembly in the bolt?

 

[RyanT26]

I’ll tell you here in about 30 minutes.

 

[RyanT26]

If you see anything Obvious let me know.

 

[RyanT26]

Lugs

 

[RyanT26]

Got everything back together seemed like it was good to go, on the 5th dry fire the bolt lift became very stiff again. Tore the bolt down again re-cleaned everything, lubed everything that needed lubed and reassembled. I have a total of 50 dry fire cycles through it and everything seems fine now. Still not 100% sure what the heck was wrong but might’ve been debris or dry and dirty.

I just figured something had to be broke as it went from just fine to oh shit what’s wrong.

Thank you all for your help

 

[SDHNTR]

The spring or somewhere in the cocking piece must’ve been in dire need of oil.

 

[Lawnboi]

Looks normal to me. New rifle?

If cleaning it helped, and you have never cleaned it. I’d guess something was binding a bit in the bolt when cocking.

 

[RyanT26]

Looks normal to me. New rifle?

If cleaning it helped, and you have never cleaned it. I’d guess something was binding a bit in the bolt when cocking.

No I’ve had it about 6 years. Had the bolt fluted a few weeks ago by LRI but I have 23 rounds through it since getting it back and probably close to 150-200 dry fire practices on it.
It had been probably a year and a half to two years since I tore the bolt down and gave it a thorough cleaning so it was probably overdue.

 

[sndmn11]

I would bet a metal shaving got in there from when it was fluted.

 

[Shooter71]

Have you blown any primers lately?

 

[RyanT26]

I don’t believe so. Those 23 fired rounds were reloads but I think they all had primers in them when I ran them back through the press.

 

[Shooter71]

Sometimes the little crater disc will blow back through the pin hole and end up inside the bolt body, causing issues. Can be tricky to spot. Yours might just be galling or roughness on the cocking helix or side of cocking piece. Grease that when you grease the lugs.

 

[RyanT26]

I will keep an eye out for that is I continue to work through load development on it. Is there any certain grease you prefer to use.