I bought my first B-Mag 3 weeks ago, looked nice, price was right. After owning it for 5 minutes I put a dent in the beautiful thumb hole stock from the bolt going down before it was ready to lock up. After looking at the bolt mechanism I immediately began thinking how to fix this bad design. It took me 3 days in the workshop to come up with something that works very well (listen up Savage it wasn't that hard).

First was to get a new bolt handle then make a polished steel bolt cap, this cap eliminates the round spring clip and holds new bolt handle very tight. Because the bolt handle no longer wiggles, this allows for a larger set screw point to be made to further reduce play (stock screw had .072" point, new one is .095"). These things alone help but will not stop the bolt from going down when pulled back.

I then cut a slot in the end of the bolt shaft so a hand crafted locking pin could lock the bolt from turning. Since there is no round spring clip anymore this clears way to drill a hole in bolt handle for a spring loaded push pin to activate the new locking pin.

The bolt now locks in the up position and has very little wiggle. When the bolt is pushed forward the lock is released and allows it to go down. I then fixed the dent in the stock and that will never happen again.

I also added a .005" shim on the bolt handle flat to take up slop.



Click below for pictures:

https://imgur.com/a/GJub5