Pachmayr Dominator updating
In 1986 I bought a 308 Dominator from Pachmayr on South Grand Ave. in Los Angeles. I shot and shot this gun, found out it liked light bullets. The big draw was the slow loading due to the fact you had to place the round in a shell holder on the bolt face. Took the gun to Jack Huntington and he performed magic, removing the lip of the shell holder, placing a sako type extractor and ejector. Now you load this like a single shot rifle. Open the bolt, drop the round in, close the bolt, take of the hamer block safety and fire. To unload you open the bolt the empty is extracted and is ejected.
I took mule deer, antelopes, pigs and varments. I was going to Africa and needed something special. I had a contender in 475 JDJ which would handle most anything but it was not a long range gun. I went and bought another Dominator to it to Jack, he turned it into a 375/08 with his extrctor and ejector setup. A 270 grain bullet at 2100 fps
is what I used. At the same time he built me a 500 Maximum on a Ruger. The 375/08 took 9 1/2 animals, a high shot on a Wart Hog required me to use the 500 to finish him off after a chase. I used the 500 on a large Eland at 75 yards. I have used this 375/08 on Mule deer and pigs, all killed with a single shot.
I than bought another Dominator and built my own 338/06 improved, a 200 grain bullet at 2500 fps has worked so far. I found out that a ejector is not needed in fact i like it better. The brass is not thrown out it just falls to your feet. These bolts are very hard and I had to use a carbide cutter.
I have one more dominator and I'm thinking maybe a 400 Whelen. I can not go to a larger case diameter there is not enough metal.
Both the 375 and the 338 have 14 inch barrels with muzzle brakes and weigh about 4lbs each. Recoil is approimately like a heavy 44 mag.
If you have a Dominator I would send it to Jack and have him do his magic.
Note: The original Dominator had a extractor but they did away with it due to cost or ???. They also made some left hand bolt handles, these were never put out on the final units.
Those Dominators look great! I have one that was originally chambered in 7mm-BR, and I was thinking about rebarreling it to 450 BM since the bolt head would be unchanged. Looks like Jack might be the man I need to call. The bolt mod he does is very interesting.