Barrel swap questions

[DoubleJ]

As a spinoff to my thread here http://hunting-washington.com/smf/index.php/topic,53843.0.html I have done some research on the web and found out I can swap barrels in my Stevens 200 .308.  One question I have is, is the difference between a short action (.308) and a long action (30-06) just the magazine or does the bolt have something to do with it?  Basically, if I want to remove my .308 barrel and replace it with a .270 barrel, can I do that by just loading it one round at a time and bypassing the magazine?

[AWS]

The action is shorter by about a 1/2 in.  You can single load 270 but you might not be able to eject a loaded round  but then youjust have to press the bolt release and pull the bolt out a little further.   Put a 260 Rem or 7mm-08 barrel on and you can load right out of the mag and your ballistics are very close to a 270 or just shoot 150s or lighter X bullets out of your 308.

AWS

[Bscman]

A 150gr out of a .308 is very similar in ballistics to a 150gr out of a .270.
I wouldn't bother swapping them out, to be honest. I don't think there is a whole lot to gain.
Don't get me wrong, I love .270WIN but .308 is a fine round and has a MUCH larger selection of quality bullets...and the options of going HEAVY.

In .270 you're pretty much limited to 130gr and 150gr, with a choice or two in the 160gr range.

[yorketransport]

Like the others have said, you won't be able to eject a loaded round. It's really not a big deal though. You can rebarrel it to anything using the 308 case head with no changes other than the barrel. Changing bolt heads is pretty easy to do as well. Then you have even more options!

As far as just staying with the 308, I wouldn't. Part of the fun of a switch barrel gun is just having options. I like to play with different calibers and a switch barrel gun lets me do that for a fraction of the cost of buying a new gun each time I want to play with something new. In fact, when I got home today I had a 338-284 Winchester barrel waiting for me. I'll throw it on an action this weekend and try it out if all goes well.

Andrew