Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Tikkas

Beaver10,

Thanks for the example of one.

Have not only owned the two Franchi Momentums mentioned, but seen perhaps 12-15 others shot at various ranges. Your results are far from typical.

But it's pretty common for Campfire members to cite a single experience with a rifle/bullet/scope etc. I can understand why you were extremely disappointed, but have encountered the same sort of "dis-accuracy" with a number of other factory rifles, including one brand noted for accuracy that refused to consistently shoot groups much under 3" at 100 yards. Turned out it left the factory with a big gap in the rifling near the muzzle.

Your personal experience doesn’t change mine, now does it? Did you personally oversee the box rifle I bought being made and assembled by Franchi?

It’s a box gun, John. They all can have problems, no matter who’s name is stamped on the barrel. Just because you owned two rifles and seen a few others shot, doesn’t speak to the quality of each firearm leaving the factory.

Aside from your personal findings. Google some reviews and you’ll find other gun writers, that are currently published, finding accuracy issues with their factory shipped rifles for testing.

You’re also correct that Campfire members and gun writers do have something in common. Both tend to cite personal experiences, with the latter thinking theirs is the only information that should be considered valid.

🦫

My Sako 75 is as accurate as my Tikkas. No difference in my sample of one.

I have a Tikka CTR in 308 (along with my best friend who has the exact same setup as mine). Both are boringly accurate with anything I have shoved in the chamber. I have also mounted a VX6 3-18x on my buddy’s 30-06 SL and .300 win mag SL. Sighting both in was quick and easy. I took the .300 win mag to the 600 yard range to air it out, it remained MOA with factory Nosler 180gr Accubonds. Around the 20th round with that rifle on a nice July day wearing only a T-shirt I found my limit to shooting light high recoiling rifles.

I'm a big fan of tikkas mostly because I'm a very non sentimental, practical kind of hunter and shooter. Tikka's just work IME. Ive got a 223 8 twist that I lightweighted to 6.6 lbs with scope, sling and 5 round magazine full of ammo. My 270 shoots a 150 partition at 3000 fps! Its hard to beat a 150 at 3000 for just plain working on almost all game. My third tikka was a stainless 6.5 swede however this rifle recieved an upgrade and tikka aftermarket is exceptional. It now has...............

KRG Bravo chassis/stock
CTR 24" stainless 6.5 creedmoor barrel
Area 419 hellfire self aligning muzzle brake
Area 419 20 moa rail
Bushnell DMR3 scope
Vortex Rings
2 5 round KRG mags with the 2.095 extended coal
Mountain Performance Trigger Spring, Tactical Bolt, Bolt Stop
Mystic Precision MPOD

Love me some tikka of many varieties

I have 2 tikka t3 lite, one is 30-06 other is .338 Winchester mag. Most of my hunting last few years has been with the .338. It is accurate and light weight.

I concede some of your points, because I have had poorly-made rifles sent to me for testing. Two were .338 Winchester Magnums--which were NOT "box guns" (however that's define), but walnut-stocked rifles made by an old American firm. The magazine's deadline wasn't super-close, but wasn't a long way off either. After mounting a reliable scope on the first and going to the range, I found the rifle wouldn't shoot groups much less than 3" at 100 yards, no matter the ammo. This seemed odd, since my bore-scope showed the bore to be very good, and the stock bedding also checked out. But eventually I checked something else I should have right away--finding only ONE of the two bolt lugs was seating in the receiver.

So I contacted the PR guy at the company, and he shipped another rifle immediately. When it arrived I checked it carefully before any range work, and found the same damn problem: One of the bolt lugs wasn't making any contact.

By that time it was indeed too late to try a third rifle before the deadline, so I wrote about something else--which the magazine's editor readily agreed to. (While some readers think gun writers should report on "fail-grade rifles"--or scopes, or whatever--on the occasions when magazines occasionally do so, they get a bunch of comments from readers accusing the magazine of wasting their time reading about poor products....)

Now I will provide more details about my encounters with Franchi Momentums. The first took place was a 2017 hunt in South Texas, with about 7-8 other writers and industry folks. During the sight-in session I got to watch ALL the rifles being shot by the various participants, and noticed some rifles grouped around an inch for 3 shots at 100 yards, while others grouped more like 2 inches. (By the way, all the rifles were .308 Winchesters, using the same factory ammo, Fiocchi with 150-grain Hornady SSTs, and had the same model of scope, Burris 3-9x40 Fullfield IIs.)

So I went through the line-up of rifles, grabbing the forend tips and barrels and pressing hard. The rifles that shot better made no contact between forend and barrel, while the others allowed me to easily press the forend against the barrel. This can be a common problem with injection-molded stocks, and I pointed this out to the guy from Franchi, who found it very interesting. (After the hunt I had him send me the rifle I used, which did have the forend properly free-floated, and after running more tests, bought it because it shot so well.)

The next year I was invited by the same PR guy to take part in a mule deer hunt in northern New Mexico. Again, he was, along there along with around 6-8 other participants. We were all using the same model of Momentum, but this time 6.5 Creedmoors and factory Hornady ammo with 143 ELDxs, and the scopes were all Burris's latest model of Eliminator laser scopes.) During the sight-in session, which went out to 300 yards due to the more open country, all the rifles grouped very well--and again I checked out the forend bedding. The barrels were ALL properly free-floated--which the PR guy said was one thing they now made sure of after receiving each new shipment of rifles from Italy.

So all together, between the two hunts, I witness the performance of close to 20 rifles, and pinpointed one potential problem, which the company eliminated. So I felt pretty confident in writing my articles on 'em.

Oh, and by the way, I also learned something else on both trips. Like many hunters, I'd had poor luck with early Hornady SST bullets, but during the Texas hunt 20 big game animals were taken, including wild pigs and buck whitetails weighing up to 200 pounds. The bullets all expanded and killed well, but we never recovered any--and the shots included a nearly lengthwise frontal shot on the biggest deer, and a double shoulder shot on the biggest pig.

I also gained more experience with 6.5 143 ELD-Xs, which also performed very well--though two were recovered. My mule deer buck was standing broadside in a patch of Gambel oaks, and the only possible shot was high through the shoulders. I put the bullet there and the buck dropped immediately, then rolled maybe 25 feet down the steep slope, dead. The bullet had broken both shoulders and centered the spine, and was found under the hide on the far side. The jacket and core had separated, but the two parts were almost touching each other, so the separation didn't happen until after the work was done. It was also a pretty big-bodied buck, which resulted in exactly 100 pounds of boned meat--which meant it weighed around 300 on the hoof. (Oh, and the range to where the deer fell, measured with the Eliminator after the shot, was 101 yards.)

My hunting partner shot an even bigger-bodied buck at a little over 300 yards, while the buck stood quartering away. This buck was ranged before the shot, at a little over 300 yards. At the bullet's impact, the deer made that little leap indicating a solid heart/lung hit, then trotted about 30-35 yards before keeling over. We found the bullet under the hide of the far shoulder, intact and retaining over 70% of its weight. Have since seen other 143 ELDXs used from the Creedmoor and similar 6.5 rounds, and feel confident about recommending them as well.

Talk to Franchi this morning. They said the barrel wasn’t properly free floated.

They’re fixing the stock and returning the rifle to me - hopefully fixed.

When I get it back. I’ll trade it back to my LGS for money off a scope.

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In the interest of science, why not shoot it when it comes back? It would be a service to all if you posted the results. Shucks, if it shot well you could sell it here, as you'd have worked all the bugs out of it.

If that's the cartridge you'd like, perhaps you should ask your LGS about ordering one in. They can give you a price, arrival timeline and evaluate your trade. Just a thought.

At 65 I've owned and shot hundreds of bolt action rifles from most well-known manufacturers and several costly custom-built rifles with Lilja, Shilen, Pac-Nor and Bartlein barrels.

My experience with owning 8 Tikka's in multiple calibers has been great. With handloads my Tikka's will rival or exceed any factory-made bolt action for accuracy and several will shoot with the customs @ 1/4" groups.

Some people scoff at the synthetic stocks, plastic trigger guards, magazines and bolt shrouds. I've never had any functionally issues with them. I've changed a few of the factory T3 & T3x stocks to B&C & McMillan and the bottom plastic to metal. While the changes may have felt or looked better cosmetically, they did NOTHING to improve accuracy, functionally or reliability.

I'm keeping all of mine and my sons are too.

Good point, and I may shoot it...I have a couple of PRC builds already. This rifle was intended to be a beater, ATV gun for around the property. It’s price point slotted nicely for that use.

I already moved on - having Shaen do up a 6.5x47 Lap for the Franchi’s intended purpose.

As for selling it here on the Fire. I wouldn’t be comfortable passing it on to a member. I’d also be lying, if I didn’t say the financial loss to me in selling a $799.00 retail rifle here, that had issues, at a discounted price, plus the shipping, would be a greater loss than me taking it back to my LGS and trading it in on an optic.

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PS

RE: Mule Deer posts. The stock and barrel free floating may still plague some of the rifles. While the stock felt rigid to me at the LGS. There was (play and movement) with my barrel, which could be the explanation for it’s inconsistency.

Beaver,

Thanks for the additional info.

Well I’ll fit mule deers mold perfectly. I’ve never even owned a tikka just had experience with my friends tikka 308 youth model that my kids have borrowed to kill bull elk and black bear. I freely admit I have a very narrow range of style of rifle I like. And I also think a rifle should feed well. We used that tikka because it was handy for two smaller than average at the time 12 and 13 year olds.

I don’t like a single stack removable box mag in a hunting rifle. That tikka fed poorly. And I hate the small ejection port. It’s accuracy was acceptable, nothing special. And on big game guns I don’t get that worked up about accuracy.

I also freely admit a sample of one is a poor representation. But it sure didn’t get me all hot and bothered over tikkas.

I’ll go to the corner now.

Ejection port size? Seriously?

Fed poorly? What does that even mean?

Feeding poorly means when the bolt would push the cartridge out of the magazine it would bind up and often required finessing to get it to chamber.

And I think this is where my dislike for the ejection port size came from too. When it did jam it was hard to do much about it through the port.

Yeah, some people get worked up about not being able to efficiently load a Tikka from the top for some reason. Finding issues with Tikka rifles is kind of like an IRS audit. They nitpick until they find the least little something. Fine by me, just an observation. Between me and the kids, and coonass buds I've rigged up Tikka for, it accounts for about 12 different rifles that we've found no issues with. If I could just find one of those 595's in 7-08.......

To the OP- my tikka in 6.5 has been one of the most accurate rifles I’ve ever shot. It’s boring at the range for a reloader.

Same as AKduck. Hornady 6.5 ELDX 143 grs with 41 grs of H4350......Winner