Tikka T3 factory mag.. Can I use a 6.5 CM mag for 7mm-08?

[EastHumboldt]

I have a T 3 in 7mm-08 and I just bought a 6.5 CM 5 round mag. (They didn’t have the right mag in stock). Haven’t taken it out of the package yet. At the store we pulled a 7mm-08 cartridge out of a box and it fit nicely in a mag we took out of a T3x chambered in 6.5 CM. It appeared to have about 1/10” extra room on the bullet end of the cartridge.

They look remarkably similar. I’m wondering if anybody has actually tried this. The 308 mag fits .243, 7mm-08, . 22-250. The 6.5 CM has a slightly less tapered case so I’m wondering if I’d have feed issues.

 

[SamsonMan22]

It works just fine

 

[NWBLKTAIL]

Yeah I put a longer bolt stop in my 7mm-08 and use the M+ mags that are for the 6.5cm. I haven’t experienced an issue feeding

 

[khuber84]

I've used long action 30-06 Tikka mags with long action bolt stop, with 65cm loads utilizing 156 Berger seated over 3" coal with zero feeding issues. Tikkas just work 99.9% the time.

 

[pods8 (Rugged Stitching)]

Yeah I put a longer bolt stop in my 7mm-08 and use the M+ mags that are for the 6.5cm. I haven’t experienced an issue feeding

I don’t think you needed a long stop for the M+ fyi.

 

[NWBLKTAIL]

I don’t think you needed a long stop for the M+ fyi.

I’m aware, had it installed with the intent of using long mags but rounds failed to feed reliably.

 

[BLJ]

I've used long action 30-06 Tikka mags with long action bolt stop, with 65cm loads utilizing 156 Berger seated over 3" coal with zero feeding issues. Tikkas just work 99.9% the time.

Was it throated deep enough from the factory to utilize that ammo or did you have work done to accommodate? Thanks.

 

[Macintosh]

factory loaded 7mm08 works fine in m+, only had a season of overlap but never had a failure to feed. Theres not much difference.

 

[EastHumboldt]

Thanks for the help everyone.

Macintosh, what is a season of overlap?

 

[HandgunHTR]

As everyone has pointed out, it works just fine, even with the short bolt stop.

I have changed all of my SA Tikkas over to the M+ (Creedmoor) mags. A regular Tikka SA mag allows for COALs of about 2.830" +/- 0.005". The M+ mag allows for 2.950" +/- 0.005". If you have a round file of the right size you can also do a little modification of the mag to get another 0.010" - 0.020" on both of them.

 

[khuber84]

Was it throated deep enough from the factory to utilize that ammo or did you have work done to accommodate? Thanks.

Tikka 65cm chambers are way deep, at least the 5 I've been around are. Saami is 0.198, I thin the tikkas are closer to 0.240

 

[Macintosh]

Thanks for the help everyone.

Macintosh, what is a season of overlap?

I owned a 7mm08 tikka and a 6.5 tikka at the same time for only 1 season, ie “one season of overlap”. Ie I only have one season of experience mixing the mags, as opposed to extensive experience. The cartridges are redundant afaic so I sold the 7-08 and regular M mags.

 

[EastHumboldt]

Before I took it out of the bag, I measured it and realized that the “filler block” at the butt end of the 6.5 CM mag is 1/10” thinner than the factory mag for .308 based cartridges. So that means the bolt has to be pulled back 1/10” farther to pick up the cartridge rim. It also means you can run your COL 1/10” inch longer than factory max, although I suspect you might hit the lands first.

I decided not to mess with it and got the factory recommended mag at another store. Took this one back for a refund.

Sorry for all the trouble, but I guess many of us learned something from this thread.

 

[HandgunHTR]

Before I took it out of the bag, I measured it and realized that the “filler block” at the butt end of the 6.5 CM mag is 1/10” thinner than the factory mag for .308 based cartridges. So that means the bolt has to be pulled back 1/10” farther to pick up the cartridge rim. It also means you can run your COL 1/10” inch longer than factory max, although I suspect you might hit the lands first.

I decided not to mess with it and got the factory recommended mag at another store. Took this one back for a refund.

Sorry for all the trouble, but I guess many of us learned something from this thread.

The factory short action bolt stop will allow the bolt to be pulled back far enough to pick up a round from the M+ magazine. Additionally, the SAAMI/CIP spec for the 7-08 has quite a bit of freebore, so you can load pretty long before you get into the lands on a factory gun.

As stated before, I no longer use any of the standard M mags in any of my short action chambered Tikkas.