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Thanks for the responses. I have other 54s and they work per the suggestions but this one has an inside semi-circular stop near the peep sight that catches the left lug on the front of the bolt. My guess is that the front sight screw retains the stop or the stop has been added to the peep sight and enters the receiver through a milled slot. If Mr. Luttrell would like to see gun, I am near Front Royal and could run it up to Winchester.
Hi Greg-
That’s interesting… 
I do not have a M54 handy chambered in anything other than 30 GOV’T’06, 270 WCF, or 30 WCF. I have pics of the bottom of a M54 22 HORNET bolt, but not sure how the 30 WCF or 22 HORNET bolts relate to something like a 257 ROBERTS, since they were specialized parts (due to the case head diameters being different from the 0.485″ standard). Hopefully a real M54 guy will chime in here… 
Looking at the M54 30-06 and 30 WCF actions, there’s nothing on either that protrudes into the left lug raceway, and only two things that project into the bolt channel from the bottom. The sear itself serves as the bolt stop, engaging that shoulder on the bottom of the bolt body until the trigger is pulled all the way back. The only other interference is the spring loaded ejector situated just aft the the magazine box. On the 30 WCF, which uses a partitioned magazine to accommodate the shorter rimmed cartridge, the bolt throw is made shorter by cutting the shoulder in the bottom of the bolt in a different place. Consequently, the ejector is longer so that it protrudes from the bolt face at the right place. That’s it…
Hornet bolt (compare to the ’06 above) showing how the bolts were modified to handle different length cartridges (shorten bolt throw) while using the same receiver (and longer ejector):
None of this seems to explain your predicament, however… 
It’s certainly possible that when it came to shorter than ’06 length cartridges that still used the standard bolt face recess diameter, Winchester had some other way of regulating bolt throw that did not involve making bolt bodies that were cartridge-specific. I know how it was done on the M70, but not on the M54… Anybody out there with a 257 ROBERTS or 250-3000 SAV M54 willing to take the bolt out and look into the bolt channel?
Not much help, I’m afraid…
Lou
WACA 9519; Studying Pre-64 Model 70 Winchesters
FWIW… I took a look through David Bichrest’s M54 book, but no joy insofar as an explanation why Greg’s ROBERTS is different…
Curiously, the 1936 and 1942 component parts catalogs do note that the M54 receivers for 257 ROBERTS (6154B) and 220 SWIFT (6154A) were different from the receiver (6054) used for any other chambering. (The 30 WCF had been dropped by that time so its specialized receiver was not cataloged). No explanation there as to what the differences were, and I didn’t see any parts numbers for specialized bolt stop parts.
The 220 SWFT and 257 ROBERTS also used a common breech bolt that was different from the other calibers. Again no explanation of what the differences were.
We need a real M54 guy here…
WACA 9519; Studying Pre-64 Model 70 Winchesters
Finally got the peep sight off. On this 257 Roberts the peep sight is attached by 2 screws as usual. The back one is 6-48 and threads into the receiver. The front screw is 8-36, goes through the receiver and threads into the bolt stop which slides out with the bolt. I haven’t put it back together yet because I need to find a 8-36 screw or die before I figure out how to install the stop. I saw a picture of another 257 with no peep sight that had a third screw, presumably to secure the bolt stop. Thanks to all who replied.
greg vogel said
Finally got the peep sight off. On this 257 Roberts the peep sight is attached by 2 screws as usual. The back one is 6-48 and threads into the receiver. The front screw is 8-36, goes through the receiver and threads into the bolt stop which slides out with the bolt.
Making the sear serve the purpose of a bolt stop was a poor & cheapskate design much favored by Winchester (even on high-end models like 52s), but this is their most cockamayme idea yet.
The addition of a bolt stop as described is usually the result of somebody doing a trigger job or replacement with an after market trigger. The after market triggers had no way of holding the bolt in place as the original sear design of the Model 54 . The odd screw size is also not factory as the screw threads for the receiver sight were the same pitch.The bolt stop as described does not appear to be factory.
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