Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Savage Collectors Savage Heat Treatment

Thanks to Skidrow for locating letters that Mark Benenson received from Savage on the issue of heat treatment of the receivers.

I have the letters in PDF format if anyone wants me to email a copy, drop me a PM.

That is interesting and makes me wonder how Savage re-tempered the steel. The Springfield and Rock Island arsenals had a problem with brittle receivers in the early 1903 rifles and the government came to the conclusion that those guns could not be fixed by additional heat treating. Of course I know just enough about metallurgy to ask stupid questions, but how did they do that? Would the steel in the older 99s have been tempered to a harder or softer degree than later guns?

I assume that .250's below 266K are OK?

I have three .300's with serial numbers lower than 266,000 so hopefully they were tempered also. I think we've kicked this question around before. David

Jeff, I don't think it's fair to compare the low number Springfield to the Savages of post-90,000. The Springfields were made from very low carbon steel, and carburized (case hardened) for wear ability and strength enhancement. Those buggers have glass hard surfaces that files just glance right off of and are a holy terror to try and drill and tap.The 1899 receivers I have messed with weren't, that I could tell- being relatively easily file-able, which tells me they were of some alloy that responded to through heat treatment not just a hard "glaze" on the surface. That could mean a simple high carbon steel, or a more complex alloy. Who knows?

As for would the later guns be "harder" or "softer", that's a subjective question. The strength characteristics of different steels is a complex and bewildering field with alloys designed for myriad applications. A glass hard steel alloy (through hardened) has little or no compressability or elasticity and not be able to withstand the sudden shock of tremendous pressure as well as a softer simpler alloy (staying put until its limits are reached and then shattering gloriously), but that soft alloy on the other hand can reach its limit of elasticity early on and fail accordingly. It takes a fine balance between the two characteristics to make a good gun steel, a carefully choreographed ballet between alloy selection and heat treatment. Those metallurgists of 100 years ago flew by the seat of their pants for the most part and developed by trial and error the alloys that evolved into what we take for granted today.

The guys who did the actual heat treating in the factories worked the furnaces by eye and by feel, with knowledge learned the old fashioned way- by serving apprenticeships and learning the "feel" of their craft. Accurate temperature gauges were just coming onto the scene immediately pre-WWI, which were the first big step in taking heat treating from an art to a science. It is precisely what got Springfield Armory's collective asses in a sling as we plunged into the Great War. Those old guys were darned good at it, but they worked one shift only and gauged the temperature of their work by sunlight that lit the furnace rooms through huge skylights. All was well and the carburized low carbon steel receivers they produced were more than up the task of a service rifle (the soft inner core of the receiver steel withstood the shock while the hard glazed surface made for superb wear characteristics, and also added some strength to the whole thing). It was when they went to 'round the clock production (to correct a woeful lack of service rifles with which to arm a burgeoning Army) and hired a slew of newbies to staff the night shifts that the troubles began. Those well meaning guys didn't have the practiced "eyes" of the old hands, and were working under the handicap of artificial light instead of sunlight which gives appearances of different colors to the steel as it's heated- a double whammy which led to a series of rifle failures and caused the Armory to seek out different protocols (and purchase a bunch of new-fangled pyrometers to accurately gauge the heat of their furnaces and the product coming out of them). I never read of such shenanigans at any of the commercial gun manufacturers.

I have every faith that Savage used proper steel and proper heat treatment on the rifles that bore the "new" high pressure smokeless cartridges.

I still miss Mark Benenson and his wealth of knowledge and trove of information. I knew him mainly on another forum where he and Michael Petrov generously shared their knowledge, insight, and research of the world of pre-war rifles and the construction thereof. He supplied me with a couple Krag actions several years ago, one of which is the heart of my latest project.

Gary - thanks for the explanation. I wasn't skeptical, I just didn't know how they did it and did offer the caveat of knowing just enough about metallurgy to ask stupid questions. Some people say that there is no such thing as a stupid question. To them I say, oh yeah - just hang around me for awhile and I'll change your mind on that one.

In the earlier days of the Forum, rifles would turn up that had the Savage Model 99 stamping on the receiver ring that dated to earlier dates of production. If a rifle was sent back to the factory for work why would the receiver ring get stamped? I think it was during these postings that the Mark posted these letters.

It appears that receivers used on .250-3000 and .300 rifles were always treated. It was only the receivers that were used with rimmed cartridges prior to serial 266,000 that are of concern when converting to other calibers.(rimmed calibers/reworded)

Thanks, Mike, George and Mark, for posting this info.

266,000 is an odd break point.

It almost sounds as though the factory is saying there were no 250-3000 or 300 Savage rifles before 266,000. Which is silly, there is 3 years worth of 300 Savage rifles at that point and 10 years of 250-3000's.

266,000 would be fall of 1924. Anybody have a 1925 catalog they can look through to see if there's any mention of new heat treatment?

Gary's post reminded me something I heard while working on my book. Someone said the post WWII Savage rifles had improved metallurgy that was developed during WWII. Someone else said they didn't think so so I didn't include it in the book. Anyone have any input on this? Thanks, David

WWII, or WWI?

It would seem logical that Savage would have taken advantage of any improvements widely available. I'd bet that was a consideration when building the 900K guns for the .308 cartridge family.

As to the 266K discussion; I think Rick sums it up best:
"It appears that receivers used on .250-3000 and .300 rifles were always treated. It was only the receivers that were used with rimmed cartridges prior to serial 266,000 that are of concern when converting to other calibers."

We'll never know unless someone unearths some engineering records or finds an old codger still alive who was involved.

The way I read the letter is that Savage is referring to calibers other than the .250 and .300 and that the .250 and .300 were already treated. Would they state to not convert to the .250 or .300 without heat treating yet produce the same that was not treated?

Is there anyway a couple "beater" receivers could be tested to determine the presence/absence or degree of heat treatment? This is just a hypothetical spit ball I'm throwin' out here.

Where's RAM when you need him?

I think this is reaching the stage of picking the fly chit outa the pepper.

Could be, but I'm not concerned about things from a safety standpoint. I'm just interested in the technical stuff.

Certainly. One can hardness test one at various points with a Rockwell Hardness tester and not leave anything behind but small punch marks. You could also have the steel analyzed to determine its alloy content. But, you would have to do a bunch to get a decent idea of when the shifts in "recipes" occurred. A huge expensive undertaking.

If they heat treated the .250-3000 and the .300, but not the .other calibers, I wonder how they kept track of which receivers had the better heat treated and which were not as they headed to assembly.