I will assume you meant 'chambering' and I do not know what you mean by "I have done this for a long time". What have you been doing for a long time? I can find no mention of any smith or reloader that that measures a chamber with any gage except the go, no and beyond gage with one exception. And then there is the modifying of gages as in one gage does it all from go-gage length to infinity or a more practice length that would be .016" longer than a minimum length/full length sized case for the 30/06 chamber.
F. Guffey
ok. I am referring to the chambering process of making rifles and pistols and wilcats too. Sorry bout the typo. My auto-correct perhaps.
I am not trying to get into long arguments that do not go anywhere and often too long and even boring but really tried to understand the logic here.
You might not find any mention of any smith that chambers with any gauges other than a go, no-go and beyond but you also said
that you would measure and possibly return gauges of different sizes.
Instead of continuing in circles let me provide a couple of examples with actual measures:
A) The simpliest scenario. Lets even forget we are chambering a rifle. Lets say we buy a 308 rifle off the rack.
We give it a good cleaning and then we decide to check the headspace just to make sure is safe that is the most common reason.
We put the no-go gauge and it closes, ok. At this point we take another no-go gauge that is 2 thousands longer than the
the first one (lets say PTG 1.636 vs. Forster 1.634) and then it doesn't close. We use forster go gauge of 1.630" to verify and it closes.
Factory ammo and reloads chamber w/o problems. Everything is good and safe.
B) One is chambering a caliber. When checking headspace the chamber will not close on the largest no-go gauge.
I want this chamber to be most accurate it can be for my match ammo and reloads. I have to shorten the shoulder
in the tenon and thefore adjust the headspace. I will use the cutting tool to do 1 or 1/2 thousand increments and can
use a micrometer but at this point my gauges are the best way to verify. I will have to verify anyway after installing and
torquing the barrel to the action. Additionally I have a couple of dummy rounds FL sized from my set of dies. I will be using
these for tuning the headspace. At this point I cut, clean and test and get to the point where the case is snug yet the bolt
drops into battery. At this point I use a go gauge and it closes but it is sticky. So I decide to put a forster 1.631" that will give
me almost the same feedback. we are talking the bolt is closing but with friction. So now I take a forster go gauge that is
1.630 precisely and the bolt will close. Of course I also take the shortest no-go gauge that is the forster too and verify
the chamber doesn't close with that gauge. I torque the barrel and repeat the same process again with same results.
Everything is good and safe too. In addition I have the best possible chamber I can have with the rounds I have used
for head-spacing all fully supported as confirmed by the 2.631 gauge. My chamber is 2.631".
If I didn't have more than one gauge with different dimensions I would have to use alternative methods in both situations.
In the case of chambering having the brass is paramount as the rifle is headspaced with the rounds and not the gauges.
As I said several posts above the gauges are just a verification. The chamber is matched to the rounds and the rounds
to the chamber. The math adds up and fall within the expected tolerances.
These are the reasons people buy different brands of gauges with different measures or gunsmith sets.
This is a full set other member posted in a related thread a while back.
Similar subjects seem to repeat from time to time.
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/making-dummy-rounds.711585/
Alternative measures for measuring the chamber and gauges will not provide more precision that the specified and often printed value in
the forster, PTG, mason, etc.. gauges. They use machines and processes most of us cannot compete with so IMO it doesn't make any sense
to verify them.
I also wonder what kind of explanation one can give to the manufacturer for the return.