roundball and anyone else's advice

[stalkerhawk]

I just got a GM drop in in .32 cal for small game I forgot to ask about the heli coil.thought I was ok after I read this "The range of barrels that contain helicoils are 026220-027303. The barrels that are being produced now do not have helicoils in" my serial# is 028765 pulled the nipple,and there it was a heli coil.Now should I send this back to the company I purchased it from or right to GM and who pays for the shipping.Or is it ok in a .32 cal? how long will it take to get a new barrel?

 

[RedFeather]

Guess it pays to read these threads! My bet is you will have to contact GM as they are the ones you bought it from. Was that s/n range something they put out? If so, they need to revise it. In any event, if the helicoils are the reason for the recall, you barrel should be included. I think it only fair they pay the freight, but, again, that's kind of up to them. Good luck!

 

[Halftail]

I just got a GM drop in in .32 cal for small game I forgot to ask about the heli coil.thought I was ok after I read this "The range of barrels that contain helicoils are 026220-027303. The barrels that are being produced now do not have helicoils in" my serial# is 028765 pulled the nipple,and there it was a heli coil.Now should I send this back to the company I purchased it from or right to GM and who pays for the shipping.Or is it ok in a .32 cal? how long will it take to get a new barrel?

"Stupid question alert

What is a Helicoil?

 

[Birddog6]

I guess an easy way to describe it is a Bushing. When you have damaged threads in something or another example is wanting steel threads in something aluminum, they drill & tap the hole oversize, install the steel helicoil w& Locktite it in & thus you have smaller threads or back to original threads & they are steel & strong.

IMHO, if Grn Mtn. or T/C had these barrels made & put a helicoil in them, they should have cut the price in half & told the customer the screwup, not just send them out.
:shake:

 

[roundball]

I just got a GM drop in in .32 cal for small game I forgot to ask about the heli coil.thought I was ok after I read this "The range of barrels that contain helicoils are 026220-027303. The barrels that are being produced now do not have helicoils in" my serial# is 028765 pulled the nipple,and there it was a heli coil.Now should I send this back to the company I purchased it from or right to GM and who pays for the shipping.Or is it ok in a .32 cal? how long will it take to get a new barrel?

Send it back...you do not want it !!
Call Keri at GM, tell her you refuse to accept it and ask her to send a UPS pickup tag...and exchange the heli-coil barrel for a proper one...I made them do it for me on a Flint barrel.

 

[ryoung14]

If you're going to shoot conicals in your .32 and load them to the maximum frequently, you probably should send it back.

If you plan to shoot roundball with just enough powder to get good performance on small game, you should be fine. My favorite load for the .32 is PRB over 10 to 20 gr. of Pyro P or fffg. I think 15 gr. duplicates .22 RF performance, which is all that's needed on squirrels and such. With mild loads like that, I doubt you'll get over 5000 to 6000psi....if that. The lightest fffg load listed in the new Lyman manual for .32PRB is 30gr which generates a pressure of 9400psi...a shotgun pressure.

For my .32 usage, I wouldn't worry about it. Heck, I'm not worried about the helicoils in my .54 GM roundball barrels. But I would send those barrels back if they were sabot/conical shooters as pressures could go much higher.
FWIW
Bob

 

[George Holton]

Helicoils are used on damaged sparkplug threads !nuf said

 

[Claude Mathis]

What is a Helicoil?

It's a thread repair kit.

HeliCoil

 

[roundball]

Send it back.....these are the helicoils that they use:

 

[Halftail]

Are they trying to sneak these "Repairs" by trying to fool the customer?Seems to me it would take away their credibility.I'm sure I wouldn't want one.
Thanks for the link Claude.

 

[Runner]

Send it back!

 

[ssettle]

If you don't feel it's safe send it back. It's one of those things that would be on my mind everytime I shoot the rifle. GM must think it's safe either that or they don't mind being sued.SSettle

 

[cowpoke1955]

I would send it back!

 

[Zonie]

In and of themselves, Heli-Coils are not dangerous.
They are made out of steels which are better than the mild steel most muzzleloader barrels are made from however, they are not gas tight, meaning, they do not seal the threads.
While this is alright for things like spark plugs which have large sealing surfaces to seal against the engines cylinder head, this is not true with a muzzleloader.
The diameter of the nipple is not large enough to completely cover the Heli-Coil threads so some gas will blow up past the nipple when the gun is fired.

Is this OK? I guess it is when I think about all of the gas that is blowing out of the nipple when the gun fires. The small leakage of the Heli-Coil will hardly be noticed.

On the other hand, you paid for a quality barrel with quality cash and recieving a "reworked" barrel, regardless of it's safety is something that many folks have heartburn with.
zonie

 

[roundball]

My take is if they already screwed up threads when they were trying to do them normally, in a conventional manner that they'd been doing for years, I get real nervous about them "experimenting" with a repair that they HAVEN'T done before...and consists of twice as many surface areas compared to a conventionallly drilled/tapped hole.

And if it's not air tight and high pressure gases will be leaking then that means there will be gas cutting...and....pressure will also be pushing BP fouling in there which will start the corrosion process behind & between the coils, weakening it.

A rube goldberg contraption if there ever was one...sitting just a couple inches from your brainpan with 8,000-10,000psi on the other side of it.

Not me...life is complicated enough without "accepting" weakened/repaired parts right from the beginning...I'd worry about it every time I squeezed the trigger.

 

[ss1]

When I was thinking of getting a GM, I called and was told that if I bought a GM barrel [ and it had a heilcol ] outside of recall serial #'s, to let them know.

 

[stalkerhawk]

I agree. I'm going to have to send it back it worries me both with the gas loss and the fouling making it weak I want a barrel the lasts with proper care for a long time.If I had bought this barrel at a reduced price knowing it had a heli coil that would be completly different.Thanks all for the input.you guys are great!!

 

[jethro224]

I bought a .32 GM barrel for my GPR (modified by Track of the Wolf) that came with a helicoil. I sent it back to GM after calling their customer service. Got it back in about a month with a new breechplug. Looks good now. Have not had a chance to shoot it yet.
I also bought a GM .62 smoothbore barrel for a T/C Renegade. It came with a helicoil that was cross-threaded, not even square to the bore of the nipple hole. The nipple sat at an angle, about a thread and a half showing on one side. I sent it back to GM too. Still waiting for that one to come back.
On both of mine I paid the postage to them and they paid it on the way back.
Also be aware that the "drop-in" barrels don't necessarily drop right in. You may have to do some fitting.
Good luck with yours.

 

[BLAHMAN]

What is a Helicoil?

It's a thread repair kit.

HeliCoil

And here I thought it was a helicopter of some sorts! :shake: :youcrazy: :haha:

 

[brubincam]

why didnt gm make nipples to fit the threads put in by mistake instead of using heli coils ????? :hmm: :hmm: :hmm: