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A number of years ago I inherited the first firearm my father ever purchased. It is a Savage 99 in 303SAV circa 1924. He bought it very cheap as it was abused. I realized I had never cleaned since I only put a couple of rounds through it. I decided to clean it up today. It was cruddy and just never seemed to get clean. I used a couple of regimens of Bore Tech Eliminator and it was still bad. I switched to Remington Bore Cleaner since it has a little grit. It helped a lot and finally got to an acceptable level of clean. After all this, I pulled out the bore scope to see how bad it was. I was truly shocked. It is pitted from end to end, both grooves and lands.

Is there anything to smooth it out or at least make it less of a nightmare to clean? I am not going to shoot it a whole lot but plan to get a deer or two with it.

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A new barrel would make it easier to clean.

I have a few milsurps with pitted barrels, but they shoot okay. I'll never get a totally clean patch out of them.


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First of all how does it shoot? If it groups well, leave well alone and don't let what you see haunt you.

MANY of the older combo guns I get have awful looking bores, but most shoot reasonably well, some being spooky accurate. If it shoots fine after a few rounds through it, go with it and don't clean it to death. It's a short range round and is probably just fine.


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I've read about casting a lead slug and lapping the barrel with fine valve grinding compound. Never done it. Would want to monitor it with a borescope. It won't remove the pits but may make it a little smoother. Maybe others can chime in.


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Can you rebore it to anything larger that uses the parent case?


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I bought a 788 in .308 several years ago. Worked up an excellent load for it. Kept the bore nice and shiny when I wasn't using it.
Then I bought a bore scope and about fell over when I saw the same situation that you have.

I'm going to keep it.


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Originally Posted by luv2safari
First of all how does it shoot? If it groups well, leave well alone and don't let what you see haunt you.

Yup.


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Had one come through the shop like this and it shot very poorly bore was a nightmare. It was about the same age as yours a takedown model in 250-3000. Shilen makes a contour that is extremely close and changed the twist to 1-9 to solve that problem. Its now a shooter. Shoot it first.


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Originally Posted by 12344mag
Originally Posted by luv2safari
First of all how does it shoot? If it groups well, leave well alone and don't let what you see haunt you.

Yup.

I agree with that as well.


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Always gonna be a PITA to clean pulling up copper and powder fouling out of the pits. No way around it.
Shoot it and see how it does.
Might need to build up copper to "level" out the pits so to speak and group acceptably.
Then light cleaning with hoppes 9 for powder fouling and saving your copper fouling might be the way.

Or it might group acceptably at the baseline of clean you have it at now and maintain that.

A simple variable speed drill, round head brass bolt chucked in it, and valve grinding compound to recrown it might help it out with pits at the muzzle. You can Google fu vids on that.

Gotta shoot it 1st.
At least a box of shells to see how it does progressively.
If it starts shooting tighter as your put beyond say 5 to 10 rds thru it.
That might tell you a fouled barrel with some built up copper is the solution.
If it starts declining from your base line clean right now after those 5 to 10 rds that will tell you the solution



Especially those 1st 2 to 5 shots and then you see a drastic fall off or improvement from the barrel condition you have it at now.


You might not have to go the new barrel route with some range work feedback.
And if you are gonna use it just to hunt a few times a year with it. You might have a acceptable level of accuracy with it after some range work with it and know a baseline of barrel condition to hunt with it.
If you can get 2 MOA out of it at 100yds.
That might be acceptable for you.
If you get less, then it's bonus land considering the barrel pitting.
Nostalgia of the originality of it.

Or it might need a new barrel.....

Last edited by renegade50; 02/09/23.
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If it shoots decent, you may want to look up fire lapping a barrel which is a lot easier than the lead slug lapping method. I've done the latter on a severely pitted TC Omega M/L barrel. A real PITA but it did shoot a lot better when completed

Last edited by nimblehunter; 02/09/23.
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Get some cast bullets. Take the bullet lube out of the lube grooves of the bullets. Replace it with fine lapping compound. Load them at very low velocity. Shoot about a dozen through the rifle.

Finish up with a bronze bore brush wrapped with 0000 steel wool on a bore cleaning rod, squirt some light oil on it. Work it out good with it.

Give everything a good cleaning afterwards.

It won't remove the pits. But it will smooth them out so that they don't abrade the bullets as much and catch so much copper.

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If it shoots well, you might want to look into fire lapping a barrel because it's much simpler than using lead slugs to do so.

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It does shoot fine. To be honest, it always has. I just want this gun to last. I have plenty of brass for the 303SAV and a bunch of Winchester and Remington factory ammo form the 1970s.

Thanks for all the replies. I will look into fire lapping.

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I am always amazed at what bore scopes reveal in barrels that otherwise look shiny looking down the muzzle. Especially true as other have said on milsurps. It’s also revealing at times to see the difference between new Sako barrels and Winchester or Remington barrels!


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I wouldn't do anything to it if it shoots fine already. Just keep using it until your results change significantly.

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Fire lapping just drives the grit in deep enough that it will be impossible to remove, especially in a pitted bore. Shoot it, scrub it clean, and mop a bunch of Ballistol into the bore before you store it away (muzzle down!) No point in letting the oil in the bore creep down and soak into the wood!


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You could create a wildcat.
Rebored and rechambered.
Fireform 303 brass to, 338-303 Savage Ackley Improved. You'd likely be pleased with performance, and own something very unique.
If not, I'd sure make an offer, budget permitting.

Last edited by Nessmuk; 02/09/23.

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Another thought. Is 30-30 considered a caliber that can be relined, if loads are low pressure?
Or, reline it to a chambering Savage did at one time, and start searching for the right parts.


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Originally Posted by Hotrod_Lincoln
Fire lapping just drives the grit in deep enough that it will be impossible to remove, especially in a pitted bore. Shoot it, scrub it clean, and mop a bunch of Ballistol into the bore before you store it away (muzzle down!) No point in letting the oil in the bore creep down and soak into the wood!

Polishing a tube isn't brain surgery. A patch cut from a piece of scotchbright and stuck on the end of a cleaning rod will polish one as bright as you want. It jut depends on how long you want to work on it.

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