Savage No.4 Enfield Accuracy

[bigjohnson]

Picked up a Savage No.4 Mk 1* Saturday at the Chantilly Gun Show. Bore is bright and shiny, and the rest of the rifle really looks good. Tried it out today, using US GI .303 ball. Wasn't impressed with the accuracy. Shooting from a sandbag rest at 50 yards, the best I could do was a 3" group dead center. Can't complain about the point of aim, but I would have thought that the rifle would shoot better than that. Any thoughts?

 

[alemonkey]

Make sure the king screw (the one at the front of the trigger guard) is REALLY tight. The forend should not be loose at all. I had to put a wood shim next to my screw hole to get the forend to tighten down.

The No.4 also likes a few pounds of upwards pressure on the end of the barrel, so a couple of shims at the end of the forearm may be in order.

 

[lionking]

I have a minty one that was in the wrap and a older more used Longbranch and so far the Longbranch shoots better.


3 inch groups or maybe slightly less at a hundred yds,with factory ammo and iron sights, personally Im fine with that.I have found that Sellier&Bellot while not cheap ammo,gives overall good performance rather than shelling out $22 for a box of Rem or Win ammo.

I never tried PP ammo yet or surplus ammo,but try some different ammo and you may get better results.Also I use the ladder sight,it does better for me than the battle aperature.

 

[alemonkey]

+1 on the S&B. It's cheaper than domestic stuff and my .303 likes it better.

 

[35 Whelen]

I owned at one time three Enfields one of which was a Savage. Their bore diameters were .314", .314", & .315". As I'm sure you know, most jacketed bullets for these rifles are .310", so therein lies alot of the accuracy problem. I found two solutions (and the both involve handloading):
1.- The Hornady .312" 150 gr. bullet. It's shot very well in every Milsurp I've owned.
2.- Cast bullets. Actually, I think the best solution. I can cater my bullets to fit the rifle and they shoot very well:






All the above targets were fired at 100 yds. with cast bullets. I had some pics of groups I fired with the Savage, but I can't find them.

35W

 

[Jeff F]

Lionking you just need to shoot that minty one a bunch. I have a No4 Mk2 that didn't come around until I had a few hundred rounds downrange.

 

[wizzegun]

What is US GI .303? Or do you mean British (hopefully not Pakistani) surplus .303

 

[DougW]

You can wring out some better accuracy with hand loads. It gives you a chance to fine tune the accuracy for that rifle. Here is a 5 shot group at 100 yards with my Fazakerly #5mk1, 40gr IMR4895, 150gr spitzers. This load is my pet load for my Fazakerly #4mk1 rifle I use in matches, but the #5 likes it too.

 

[lionking]

Jeff F,yes someone else mentioned that to me also.It does have maybe 200 rounds through it so far,it is a rifle I have used sparingly.I really need to adjust the windage from shooting to the right also.

Factory ammo wise for the most part in my milsurps I have been testing S&B and Prvi Partisan ammo for quality vs price and while PP is decent,it seems to give slightly less peformance.


Other quality ammo might give better performance but it gets to a point that shelling out too much on ammo just doesn't seem reasonable for accuracy in a milsurp not hunting or competition shooting.Handloaders really can get the best out of a rifle but I just never got into that yet.


There are those that get good results with bargain surplus ammo but Im am just skittish (and lazy) about using corrosive ammo.


But the Lee Enfield and also M1917 Enfields are capable of some pretty good accuracy though so it seems.

 

[bigjohnson]

WIZZEGUN: Actually, I meant exactly what I said. Several years ago I bought a 400 round can of ammo that is marked on the side " 400 ROUNDS / CAL. .303" BALL / LOT:WCC-81-008".

This ammo was made in 1981 by Winchester-Western for the US Government, and is in plain white 20-round boxes in the 50 cal. ammo can. It headstamped "WCC 81 / 303". It is boxer primed, is non-corrosive, and is supposed to be the most accurate milsurp ammo out there. I've never seen any for sale, however, so I shoot very little of it.

 

[Slamfire]

Shooting from a sandbag rest at 50 yards, the best I could do was a 3" group dead center.

I purchased a like new Savage Lee Enfield and took it to the range. It would not group on a 8.5" paper target at 100 yards.

I removed the forened screws, and the forend fell off! It should have been a tight fit. Obviously the bedding was bad when it left the factory, or the wood had dried in the 50 years since.

I bedded the rifle, following guidance in the book "Lee Enfield Rifle" by Major E G B Reynolds.

This brought the groups down to 2.5 MOA at 100 yards. Actually the best groups were fired when the bedding compound still had some give (2.3"), and once it completely hardened, the groups increased to around 3 MOA.

I later center bedded the rifle and found that that was a mistake. Group size did not improve and it was now more sensitive to foreend pressure.

I have examined the chamber of my rifle and saw lots of reamer marks in the throat, and the barrel is closer to a gray color than bright. So I don't think these rifles were built to be tack drivers. I think as long as they went bang, that was good enough.

The best built No4's are the No 4 MKII, and the Long Branch.

 

[MJ]

I have two Savage rifles that both shoot OK. Both had not been fired when I received them. I have one hand load only for all of them using IMR4064 and the 174g SMK in five round strings.



Let me try five of your WW rounds as a test .

Cheers
..MJ..

 

[armoredman]

I have a No4Mk1* Longbranch which has given me some sub MOA groups at 100 yards with one handload, (That was a REALLY good day!), the 174gr Hornady FMJ/BT bullet. The rifle had been FTR at Faz, and the barrel not had a bullet down the bore since then. Best $50 I ever spent.

 

[NavajoNPaleFace]

I have a No4 MK1 Savage that shoots very well.

I don't have any targets saved to show but at 75 yards (best for my eyes) I was shooting 2-2 1/2" groups open sights with commercial Remington 150 grain bullets.

I've thinking of loading for it on the next go-round of loading.