A nuance here on that specific aspect (and yes I know this will touch off a firestorm so if we can keep it to that specific aspect)
If a bolt lug is worn and or the recess for the bolt lugs in the receiver are worn, is that headspace or is that separate?
I said the resource man had 100+ 03 bolt, I said I have at least 35 03A3. I said he could not check the actual head space in a rifle he was building. I said even thought he has 20+ 30/06 head space gages of different length.
I show up to purchase a mill, I had no ideal he was having it out on a reloading forum because no one knew and or understood the question. I purchased the mill, loaded it and then he mentioned he was having trouble with head space in a chamber. I told him this was his lucky day, I told him I could check the length of the chamber three different ways without a head space gage and I could modify one of his gages to check all 30/06 chambers from go gage length to infinity. He refused my help because his gage would no longer be 'period correct'.
Anyhow, his chamber was .0025" longer from the shoulder of the chamber to the bolt face meaning his chamber was half way between the length of a go-gage chamber and a no-go gage chamber.
And then I offered to check the length of all of his bolts to determine which bolt would reduce the length of the chamber .0025" and I also offered to check my bolts.
Before I went to purchase the mill, the resource person came over to add all of the stamp marks and identifying marks on my bolts to add the to a data base.
I knew none of my bolts would off set the length of the chamber .0025", another problem, he was building a period correct Rock Island 1911 rifle. The Rock Island had a straight handle bolt, between us we had one straight handle bolt and that was the one he was using.
I offered to size cases to fit his chamber, not a problem for me but we needed cases that were too long to start with from the shoulder to the case head, I have no fewer than thousands of 30/06 cases that have not been fired and all of them are too short to off set the length of his chamber .0025".
F. Guffey