Savage Accuracy fact or myth?

[dubbleA]

From reading recent threads here, there appears to be alot of Savage shooters here, stating the most accurate out of the box rifle made today.

Well here's your chance to show off a little. I feel accuracy claims should be done with multiple groups, a single random 3 or 5 shot cherry picked group dosent cut it.

Here are the rules:


Factory/stock rifles
Centerfire only, 100 yds
Three or more 5 shot groups shot on the same target face.
Impact should be no more than 1 inch from center of bullseye.

This will show consistancy along with accuracy and throw out the occasional "wow" group.

I call real life repeatable accuracy.

I'll start with one....a 10Fp 308

 

[TNBilly]

Every rifle is an individual for starters..... if Savage is more accurate than others I would say it's only more so than rifles that are not up to the more or less accepted standard nowadays. Standards of machining are pretty good today IMO

 

[jmr40]

Based on my experience I'd say that on average Savage is no more accurate than any other rifle. I'm talking about sporter weight hunting rifles, not target guns. That is another discussion that I've less experience with. I've owned several, shot several more. All were good, none exceptional. I've owned some exceptionally accurate rifles, made by other makers. I've also seen some pretty bad examples from other companies.

The myth of Savage accuracy comes from 2 places in my experience. Savage rifles started as budget guns that were mostly purchased by newer, less experienced shooters. Lots of these guys were easily impressed. I've seen threads running at the same time where a Savage owner was bragging about how acccurate his new rifle was. A new Remington shooter was complaining of poor accuracy. When pressed for details both guns were shooting very comparable groups. It is about perception.

The 2nd part is very real. Because of it's design, a Savage rifle does not require nearly as much precision machining to be accurate. For this reason you will almost never find a Savage that is a poor shooter. I'm sure there have been lots of guys who had a bad experince with a Ruger, Remington, Winchester, Weatherby, or whatever that was a lemon. When they pick up a decent shooting Savage they are very pleased.

With the more traditional gun designs it is easy to screw things up and get a really poor shooting rifle. But as long as you are using quality parts and get them screwed together straight any of the other rifles will be at least as accurate.

Not intended as Savage bashing. But a lot of guys automatically say that a Savage is more accurate than other brands. That has not been my experience, but I do think it is fair to say that you are more likely to get an accurate rifle with a Savage, and less likely to get a poor shooter. I don't think buying a Savage is a guarantee of the MOST accurate rifle though.

 

[Steel Horse Rider]

I don't know if Savage barrels are any better than the other manufacturers but in my case the Accutrigger went a long way in making me a better shooter overall because it was the finest trigger I had used to that point. I formerly was of the mind that trigger pull weight was not having an impact on my shooting. The Savage Accutrigger illustrated otherwise.

 

[brnmw]

Personally I think they make really good guns but I would not say they are really that more accurate... I also don't really have any proof either, just in my experience shooting them.

 

[jmr40]

It took me a few minutes to dig up some photo's from Photobucket. Here are a couple of 3 shot groups from a Remington Mt rifle.



I realise this doesn't exactly fit into your criteria, but are some photos of groups I have from a couple of my Winchesters and a Kimber. The Kimber group is admitedly not typical, but the others are. From light weight hunting rifle such as Winchester Featherweight's, Kimbers and Remington Mt rifles this is more than acceptable. A Savage target rifle may well beat it, but I've not found a Savage sporter that will beat these.



Here are a few from 200 yards.



And a typical Ruger Hawkeye at both 100 and 200.

 

[blarby]

Given that none of the firearms mentioned are competition grade rifles, I fail to see what benefit is gained or actually applied by discussing and photographing the differences perceived in pursuit of sub moa groups from benchrested hunting grade rifles.

With that said, your groups look great and are no doubt the result of carefully applied handloading techniques- for which you should be notably applauded.

I will say that unless you are preparing to hunt oreo cookies from a bench during hunting season, the effort is perhaps.... misdirected.

The groups offered by any 1" or perhaps sub-moa rifle as you demonstrated are more than acceptable for taking any game I can imagine- from rockchucks to bull moose, and are commonly available from nearly any production rifle- as has been previously mentioned.


What is the stated purpose of this rifle ? IF you are considering accuracy competition- you are going to need a better gun.

If this is primarily a hunting rifle- you did the hard part. The groups are indeed impressive enough to boast- now pick the gun up off the bag and begin to simulate hunting shots with it.

For the record- I'd say most savage rifles with an accutrigger are remarkably accurate.

I would also say no more nor less accurate than my ruger II with the factory two-stage trigger, given the same care and evaluation in handloading from a bencrest at 100 yards.

 

[urbaneruralite]

I have a .260, a 7mm08 and a .30/06 from Savage. The /06 does 3-shots into 1/2" in stock configuration with basic grade factory ammo. The other two needed work to beat 1.5" at 100. It's good for a rifle based on a clunky action assembled from mass-produced parts, but it's nothing to get excited over.

 

[Kachok]

Savages are good but picky, I own and handload for several of them, and they all are fussy about what they like to shoot, that does not bother me though because every one of them likes at leased one of my go to bullets (SSTs, Serria Game Kings, Speer BTSP or Nosler Ballistic Tips.) So long as they shoot one of those into tiny little groups I am happy with the rifle.

 

[sixgunner455]

jmr40 - Savage may sell a lot of budget/value-priced rifles, but they certainly did not start out doing that as their primary business model.

The Savage 99 has a great reputation for accuracy, too, and it is certainly not a "clunky action made from mass-produced parts."

 

[Cee Zee]

2 places in my experience. Savage rifles started as budget guns that were mostly purchased by newer, less experienced shooters.

+1 on that. Savage has a long history of making firearms that extends well back beyond the 80's and 90's when Savages were seen as budget hunting rifles with accuracy. For an example I have a Stevens 15-A, single shot .22 from the early 1950's. It is very accurate. There was a thread about those very rifles on Rimfire Central not too long ago (I think that's where it was) where people talked about having learned to shoot on those rifles. More than a few of the shooters mentioned how accurate those rifles were. Mine is very accurate. And as sixgunner pointed out, the 99 was a popular gun with a reputation for accuracy dating well back before the last couple of decades.

I also have a 12 LRPV that is a very accurate rifle. And it isn't just a hunting rifle. It is actually a varmint rifle but is very close to their target rifles in character. The fact that Savage rifles have dominated long range shooting disciplines like F T/R and F Class has brought a lot of people around to the Savage way of thinking too. At the same time Savage was taking great pains to put every improvement the custom rifle guys were doing to Savage products into their production rifles and Remington was suffering from the effects of the buyout by Freedom Group. That has converted a lot of Remington fans into Savage fans. I was one of those. I almost bought a long range Remington model (the Sendero) in 7mm mag when I started hearing about Team Savage and how they were using stock rifles and being custom built rifles in F T/R shooting. That really impressed me as I'm sure it did a lot of other people. So I bought a Savage instead of a Remington and I haven't regretted it one second. I've shot my share of Remington rifles and not one of them shot as well as my LRPV. Maybe I never shot a top tier 700 but then again my 12 wasn't the most expensive rifle made by Savage either.

I just know that I can get very good accuracy from my Savage and that I get more accuracy from it than I have from any Remington I've shot.

I do have an early 1990's Savage 110 in 30.06 too. It is nowhere near the rifle my 12 LRPV is. It's accurate enough but it won't win any competitions without a long list of improvements. But my 12 could. It shoots that well and that's with me shooting it. I can only imagine what it could do with a top notch shooter behind the trigger. I shoot OK I guess but there are a lot who shoot better.

 

[dubbleA]

C'mon all Savage shooters, show off your targets. Remember no cherry picked single groups, they all must be on the same target face.

Cee Zee and Kachok, lets see those targets!

Hint: Shooting 3 consecutive 5 shot sub 1/2 moa groups with any factory rifle is alot harder than it looks.

 

[JoeMal]

Savage 25 with factory ammo. These were from when I first got the gun...I haven't taken any good pictures of new targets but I get groups like this regularly without handloads

 

[Cee Zee]

I don't shoot targets at 500 yards because they're too hard for me to see well. I shoot objects that stand out well like busted pieces of clays. Plus it takes so long to go check out a target after you shoot it that you spend all your time going down to look then coming back. And the spot I shoot requires that any target be placed half way up a high wall so that it can even be seen at that distance. I will soon be able to have a better way of setting up targets though. But like I said before, what I shoot most often are those 2" chalk targets that explode in a puff of smoke when you hit them.

I do have lots of .22 targets though that I shot with my Savage MkIIBTV. I found this one which is a copy of a target I sent to Savage about key hole problems I was having. I circled the keyholes on the target. The targets are the same size as the ARA targets. The inner ring measures half an inch to the outside of the line on both sides. And this target was shot at 50 yards. Clearly I have 2 groups under .5 MOA and 40% of a third group too. I guess I did have one flyer outside the half inch ring. It would have been the last target I shot so give me two .5 MOA groups I guess.

 

[razorback2003]

For the money, Savage puts out a pretty accurate gun with a pretty good trigger.

It is an ugly gun, but it will satisfy the needs of most hunters out there.

 

[Steve in PA]

I have a Savage 12FV chambered in .223 and the rifle is insanely accurate!

 

[allaroundhunter]

I have a Savage in .270 WSM. It is a pretty accurate rifle, but with the price of that ammo I don't shoot it much, typically just to check the zero as it is my go-to hunting rifle.

My Remington 700 Varmint in .308 is a very accurate rifle... I think that Savage has fewer lemons go through, but I would not say that they are inherently more accurate than most other manufacturers.

 

[cal30_sniper]

My light barreled .308 11F model shot ~4" groups out of the box when I bought it way back when. That was with a new Weaver K2.5 scope, no accutrigger model, and factory Winchester 150grn loads.

After glassbedding the action and forearm, and free floating all but the first 3" of barrel, it will consistently do ~1-1.5MOA 5 shot groups. I figure that's pretty good for a light barrel, it gets hot pretty fast.

I also had an old 110E model in 7mm Rem Mag. It would do about 2" 3-shot groups with an old El Paso Weaver K6. After bedding it into a Boyd's Laminate stock, it would do sub 0.5MOA 3-shot groups at 100. Any string longer than that started to open up as the barrel got hot.

I haven't shot the .30-06 110 yet, but I'm hoping for similar results with it. I think the key to many of the plastic and wood stocked Savage rifles is proper bedding. The factory plastic stocks are flimsy, and the factory wood stocks are poorly inletted. None of my rifles had accutriggers, all were just the old-style Savage factory trigger.

Most of my Mauser sporters can do as good or better than my Savage rifles WITH the right load. However, I find the Savage to be much more reliably accurate over a wide range of various powder and bullet weights, as well as factory ammo.

 

[Deer_Freak]

One thing I have noticed is people show off groups they shoot off a bipod, sandbag or leadsled. I have killed a lot of deer in my life. The best I get for a rest is propping my gun up on the side of a tree. Once in a blue moon I get a shot off a shooting stick or across the seat of a 4 wheeler. Once the gun is sighted in I am interested in the groups I can shoot free handed.

 

[NeuseRvrRat]

One thing I have noticed is people show off groups they shoot off a bipod, sandbag or leadsled. I have killed a lot of deer in my life. The best I get for a rest is propping my gun up on the side of a tree. Once in a blue moon I get a shot off a shooting stick or across the seat of a 4 wheeler. Once the gun is sighted in I am interested in the groups I can shoot free handed.

but the thread is about a particular brand's accuracy. benching the rifle makes the shooter less of a factor and lets you better evaluate the rifle alone. maybe you should start a thread about the shooter's accuracy from trees and ATVs.

not to mention that rifles are used for a lot more than killing deer. there's plenty of hunting that gets done off of bipods and rests.

 

[SOTSpro21:31]

Lot of economy rifles out there that are just accurate as a Savage. Field and Stream has a pretty good list of budget rifles. The Marlin x7 in .308 rated as the most accurate.

 

[NeuseRvrRat]

do you have a link to the article? i doubt they included the Savage 10 in an "economy rifle" comparison. Probably the Savage Axis.

 

[89yj]

Shooting Times Guide to Long Range Magazine did a six way accuracy test with budget rifles. They used three examples of each gun and three different loads with three different shooters. Savage placed last in overall accuracy. They would have been middle of the pack except all three Savages had trouble grouping one of the loads.

 

[Kachok]

C'mon all Savage shooters, show off your targets. Remember no cherry picked single groups, they all must be on the same target face.

Cee Zee and Kachok, lets see those targets!

Hint: Shooting 3 consecutive 5 shot sub 1/2 moa groups with any factory rifle is alot harder than it looks.

I would but I always cut out my targets and keep them with the load data sheet for future reference (I don't shoot much factory ammo). Next time I get my 06 and 270 to the range I'll keep a target intact to show you.
While I do consider Savages to be an accurate rifle I will say that my Tikka is even more so, that thing is a dang tack driver.

 

[Cee Zee]

It is an ugly gun

My .223 12 LRPV is "not" ugly. Not by a long shot. I'll take a photo when I get home later.