Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Savage quality

I'm curious if any of you have noticed savage quality going down? I've never been a savage guy personally, but always heard they were very accurate. So I've been developing loads for my grandsons new 308 shooting 165/168 gr bullets with variety, 4895, 4064 and I cannot get this rifle to shoot. I have adjusted the bedding and the trigger, along with seating depth, etc....and I'm only getting 1.5" groups at best. Did he just get a Lemmon?

Honestly, the one I owned wasn’t a very good shooter. 1.5 was about typical.

I have Ruger Americans, Thompson center venture and compass, Remington 783, and even a marlinxs7...... All of which will shoot a minute moa or better. This savage is driving me bat [bleep] crazy

It may not be a lemon per se, but it is bordering on non typical Savage behavior. I have shot 2 different savage rifles that were almost as bad as your grandson's rifle. One was a 270 win and the other a 30-06. With the 270, it had a bad crown, my buddy sent it back to savage and they replaced the barrel. Excellent CS in that case. The 30-06 was a pain in the azz. One of my co-workers bought a trophy hunter package rifle and he said the best he could do was 3" with the rifle at 100 yards. I told him I could get it to shooting better for him, so I took it home and proceeded to work on it. The first thing I did was pull the cheap azzed bases and rings off and threw them away (literally). I threw on a good set of bases and rings and loctited everything down. I checked to make sure his barrel was freefloated well enough and relieved a couple spots in the stock. I also adjusted the trigger down to and even 2.5 pounds. I then started a little load development and took it to the range. Just about every load shot into moa and printed nice triangular groups. Honestly, I was not used to that big of a group from a Savage bolt action rifle. I just assumed since it was a 30-06, maybe that was some of the reason. However I have some Winchester model 70 30-06 rifles that shoot 1/2 moa (for 3 shots) at 100 yards easily. I brought the Savage 30-06 back in to the guy at work with 6 targets I had shot that were all centered on the bulls eye (orange dot) and right at an inch even. He looked at it and said, "Hmmm, I was expecting better". Obviously some guys watch too many youtube videos or something and have an unrealistic expectation of what a $300.00 package rifle can do accuracy wise. Funny thing is, he took the rifle home and fired off some factory ammo and brought back his targets that were 2" now, instead of 3". I told him, "he needed to work on his shooting skills....Because that is a true moa for 3 shots rifle"....

I don't think one rifle shooting 1.5 MOA means the whole company is taking a dump.

I don't either. Lately I've been buying a lot of savage rifles and they have all be great. I have one 6.5 creed in the line-up for next to buy. The only thing I did notice on that rifle was the bolt was a little rough (when you worked it), as compared to my other savage rifles.

Not a owner, but I was looking at getting one...

The safety mechanisms seem hit & miss on functio when comparing several guns...

I went to a retailer that stacks up 20 rifles on a table and it seemed like something wasnt right with many of them.

The worst was the scoped rifle packages made no effort to even align the reticle vertically. You have to wonder what goes wrong when you can get the obvious visual things right.

Probably the lowest guy on the totem pole mounts the scopes.

I have had several, but do not have any now. I had a BVSS in 308 which I could not get to shoot much under 1 inch at 100 yards. After 200 rounds of handloads and some factory I threw in the towel. For a heavy barrel it should have done much better than that. My guess is the barrel was the culprit, but I sold it and moved on from it.

I had a 30-06 that stayed at 2"-3" not matter what load I tried. I bedded the action with Devcon and floated the barrel generously. After that it stayed consistently under 1".

My son bought a LH Savage bolt in 300 Win Mag about a dozen years ago.
With no tweaking, it is scary accurate with factory 165 grainers.

I have two. Accurate, but nothing that will knock your socks off. The fit and finish on both is garbage. On one if you slam the bolt home hard, it dumps the magazine on the ground. You get what you pay for.

forget where i read this, maybe the accurate shooter page ... in a .308 if it wont shoot with 41 g of 4895 and a 168 SMK, it aint right. my salvage .308 wouldnt shoot worth a crap until i tried that load (or mebbe it was 3031). then all of a sudden it dropped to sub-MOA.

i really like the salvage lightweight hunter platform, but only when its on sale ...

My 9 year old put 3 inside 1” @ 50 yards with her pink Axis. First 3 CF rounds she ever fired.


We happy.....

Thats cool. I think i heard stick did the same thing with his. Of course he couldnt hit the egg though, bless her heart..

The three bolt guns I have will shoot an inch or less.

I have 3 a M110 of 1 st year production 30-06, M111 Chieftain in 243, and a M110 WLE in 300 Sabage all of them are good shooters. BSA1917 which model you buying in the Creedmoor? MB

[quote=Magnum_Bob]I have 3 a M110 of 1 st year production 30-06, M111 Chieftain in 243, and a M110 WLE in 300 Sabage all of them are good shooters. BSA1917 which model you buying in the Creedmoor?

Model 10 i believe, but i think its a special run. Ive looked everywhere and cant find the exact model to compare it to. Looks like a predator model, with detachable magazine, heavy tapered 22" barrel and cryptic camo stock. She's pretty sweet looking. I can almost guarantee, it will shoot better than my new Tikka, with minimal load work-up. Its also only $400, which seems like a great deal.

Just my opinion...A sound design if you can get past the appearance but their qc has gone to [bleep]. Sounds familiar huh? The barrels are amongst the roughest I’ve ever looked at and the actions are pretty cheaply put together. Rough barrels can still shoot well though they foul badly and are tough to clean.

I’ve seen many world class target guns built off the actions and changing a barrel is a snap for all but the most bam handed

I have one, a 16 in 250 Savage and the thing is stupid accurate no matter what I run thru it.