Tikka spins in barrel vise

[sndmn11]

I soaked mine in 50/50 mix of acetone and ATF overnight, then put it in my viper as tight as I could with tape on the barrel. Used a breaker bar and the threads broke free fairly easily.

@MThuntr lube the threads in side the chamber and outside the action.

 

[kpk]

I had one that I had to do a relief cut on as well. I tried everything to get that barrel off and it just refused. Can't remember exactly, but I used either a dremel cut off wheel or hacksaw and spent 5 minutes to make the cut and the barrel basically spun off by hand after that.

 

[Nine Banger]

Put a casserole in and we'll all be over after the kids go to bed.

I'd rawdog it at this point, get the action so close the the vise you think it will scratch it, and torque the top 2 bolts on the vise so hard it bends the plate.

 

[brushape]

make sure you don’t over tighten the action vise and put too much pressure on the threads i did that and struggled big time ever since i figured that out they usually come off somewhat easy


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[JohnJohnson]

Patriot Valley Arms just does a relief cut to take off factory Tikka barrels. If you don't care about the barrel's resale anyway that seems like the simplest option.

 

[finner]

Relief cut or just file/grind out flats on either side of the barrel if you're not going to resell it

 

[MThuntr]

Based on this, I have to ask, how are you tightening up your vise? If you used drywall tape and snugged the vise down you shouldn't get any marring of the barrel, even if it does turn. The fact that it marred and jumped out of the vice tells me that you are getting limited contact, probably only on the front edge of the vise.

So, wrap the barrel with drywall tape. No more than two layers. The tape will compress and every extra layer just adds to that.

Put the barrel into the vise so that the front of the vise is no more than 1/4" from the action. You have to have the shank of the barrel well supported in the vise. Tighten the front nuts down to just finger tight to hold the barreled action.

Then tighten the rear nuts down to finger tight. If you see the vise start to bind up, give it a little whack with your wrench or dead blow to loosen it up.

Once you have all the bolts finger tight, make sure you have contact on the barrel in both front and rear. If you don't, loosen the nuts opposite of where you don't have contact and tighten the other nuts in order to get contact, then retighten the nuts you loosened. The Viper vise will bind up at times. This is how you fix that.

If you do plan to do a lot of Tikkas, then I would recommend splitting the top of the vise. I did mine and it keeps it from binding and allows for better grip on the factory barrels.

Once you have contact front and back, tighten the nuts in a criss-cross pattern starting at the back. It doesn't matter which side. Just back-front-other back-other front, repeat until they don't turn anymore. It isn't a bad idea to whack the vise top every now and again to make sure it isn't binding side to side.

Finally, it seems like you already know this, but don't put the action wrench on too tight. It should be just forward of the ejection port and I have mine finger tight, plus 1/2 turn of the nuts.

I'm a single wrap of tape on the barrel about 1/4" from the action. No marring on the barrel. The marring is on the action from the last whack with the hammer on the action wrench. Maybe I didn't get the wrench quite snug enough but it's definitely not torqued down.

I haven't tightened front to back in crisscross method so maybe I'll give that a shot. I think splitting the top may be in order because I'm probably not getting good contact up front. I don't mess with many other rebarrel jobs except for my Aero Precision Solus.

 

[bpitcher]

I did not care for my Viper and bent it all to hell getting several barrels off.

Switched to the Buffalo Creek Machine with the correct bushing and the last couple have come off with one or two whacks of the hammer. The Viper seems to have a lot of trouble with the Tikka shank.

 

[Legend]

Rigjty tighty and lefty loosey....

 

[camp_86]

Thread 'Factory Barrel Removal and Viper vice hack'

Mar 10, 2025

A barrel slipping is usually the weak link in pulling factory barrels, especially stubborn ones like Howa and Tikka.

I have found a few things make it simpler and possible on the most stubborn barrels. Do all of them and I bet the vast majority of barrels will come off. If you don’t get just one of them right, it can make it hard if not impossible.

I think they is why many people can’t get the same success with some of the same tools. It has taken me a few dozen barrels to figure stuff out.

Put Kroil inside the action in the corner where the barrel face and action meet. Give it time...

• hereinaz
• Replies: 61
• Forum: Firearms

• 

This worked perfectly for me.

 

[schmidty3]

My go-to smacker is a 20lb rubber dumbbell. Haven’t had one yet stand up to that puppy

I couldnt find my hammer in the last one...

Can confirm that a 45# kettlebell also works

Ive done the drywall tape plus brown sugar trick on 3 now.

 

[MThuntr]

Rigjty tighty and lefty loosey....

Believe me I was convinced I was going the wrong direction for a hot minute.

 

[HuntHarder]

What external wrench did you use? I have never had an issue with mine slipping on the reciever.

 

[waspocrew]

Does your bench have much wobble or give? If so, weight it down so it won’t move. You want all the force going to the action wrench.

 

[Choupique]

Ive never taken a tikka barrel off, but I dont see how action in a very rigidly mounted vise and a long ass pipe wrench couldnt get it off. Relief cuts would certainly work but theres some risk associated with that. Pretty easy to get a little too wild with a grinder and ding the action up.

I think you guys just arent swinging your purses hard enough.

Or, buy a nut of the correct size, slip it up the barrel till its touching the shoulder, weld it to the barrel, and beat that with your purse.

Qualifications - was a pipe fitter helper in a past life. Weld heat beat.

 

[43.6N]

lol. That made me laugh. It’s definitely hard to hold a purse and a pipe wrench at the same time.

OP, if you’re at the point where it’s still stuck, and you’re dinging up the action, do what @Choupique previously stated: stick the action in a traditional bench vice (pad the jaws with leather or tape to protect the finish)and use a 4ft pipe wrench on the barrel.

 

[Macintosh]

Does your bench have much wobble or give? If so, weight it down so it won’t move. You want all the force going to the action wrench.

This^^^, but more than just weight. ANY flex or give in the bench will prevent it from loosening. Ive done a solid handful of tikka barrels now, all went easy enough but the last one I did gave me fits. I ended up reinforcing the heck out of my work bench and it went easy after that. It was a very burly workbench—3/4” plywood surface with 2x6 framing on 12” spacing. Still not burly enough. It has to be truly rigid because even an unmeasurably tiny amount of flex will reduce the torque on the barrel significantly.

 

[Kauaihunter]

This is my Viper through bolted to a 4x4 bench leg that is capped, wrapped and braced back to the wall with 2x4’s and the bottom of the leg sits on the concrete floor. As said by a few, the vise cannot move, period.

Also, in my experience, the Viper cannot hold a factory torqued Tikka barrel right up to the action, not without over tightening and possibly even breaking bolts. There is not enough surface contact area. This is why I slide it back a little and add the tapered barrel bushing and second Wheeler. The reason I use the second action wrench is the bushing doesn’t fit in the Viper. If I did it all again I would get the bushing type vise for removals.

 

[IrkedCitizen]

This is how I have my modular SAC vise. Still have to nerf the top bolt to keep the barrel from spinning but I'm not lifting the truck off the ground.

5" lag bolts through the 2x2 tubing into the 4x4
SAC ARCA plate screwed into the 4x4
SAC vise on top

Same can be done to a viper

 

[Choupique]

Ideally all that stuff would be made out of steel. Wood has a lot of give to it. If they are THAT tight, rigging up a way to bolt the vise to something steel would help a lot, especially if yall are beating on it. A set of choppers, the bucket of a tractor, forklift at work, anything like that.

A simple thing most people have is a truck with a reciever hitch. Get a piece of 2" square tube, bolt your vise to that, stick it in the reciever, and put a bottle jack under it and snug it up. You can let your railroad spike driving buddy hit that with a 12 pound and it wont budge.

That wont help with slipping, but it will certainly help you get 100% of your whacks into spinning the action instead of shaking the table.

You could also weld a nut to the very end of the barrel, use a gangsta ass impact to get the barrel off, and have the barrel cut down. As long as you dont gorilla weld the nut, the heat affected zone wont be more than a half inch. Chop off 3" or so and itll be good as new with zero marks anywhere on it.

If the barrel is threaded, screw a 5/8 nut on it and tack it on the backside and you will have even less heat involved.

Im here all week folks. I like this. If there's one thing I do know, its taking stuff apart that don't want to come apart.