A few years back I purchased a complete 1898, ser. #101*** for the stock which I wanted for another '98 that had a cut down stock. The chamber neck had been roughed out to almost the size of the case. I'm inclined to think that a properly skilled machinist / gunsmith could reline the chamber and make a shooter out of this piece.

Have any of the forum members had any experience with this type of repair, that can speak to its success or the wisdom of such a fix?

TIA  Mike J.

The safer, proper fix would be to set the barrel back enough to be able to recut the chamber.  This would mean removing the barrel, cutting a little bit off of the threaded shank, and cutting the same number of new threads.  This is regularly done on revolvers with worn forcing cones.  The only concern from an originality standpoint is that the barrel will be just a tad shorter overall than original.

That is correct cgt4570. I might add that due to the extractor grove its necessary to take one or more full turn of the barrel to avoid too much shortening of the barrel length.