EastTNHunter
Well-known member
- Joined
- Jun 13, 2018
- Messages
- 1,772
Well, those who know me know that I’m a tinkerer at heart. That’s why I’m intrigued by savage rifles. You can work on them easily, and thanks to some friends, I’ve gotten bit by the swap barrel bug. I’m just dealing with some factory takeoff barrels at this point to swap back and forth, but it’s kinda fun and I plan to expand my repertoire (big word, huh?) in the future when I have the funds.
Anywho, some of you may remember me mentioning that I tinker a lot with youth loads of various ilks due to having three kids of my own, as well as taking other kids hunting. Because of this I have various powers of loads in various cartridges for various rifles. But since my oldest daughter (14yo) and I are going to WY next fall for a DIY pronghorn hunt, I’ve been trying to get her adjusted to loads that have a little more reach, while still keeping an eye on recoil. She has been shooting my first bolt action rifle, a Rem 700 270 with the full length stock (she’s pretty tall now, and outgrew the youth stock that I had bought for it), and I have her in 130gr “starting loads” at around 2750fps now. That’s a pretty decent step up from the 110gr youth loads at around 2600fps that she had been shooting. She shoots them well, and they performed very well on the two deer that she shot with it this season. I wanted a cartridge and load to complement this for us both to use as a backup on that trip, and had developed an accurate .308 Win “starting load” using 165 TGKs that I used with my Savage 116 (used to be a 30-06, but a long story that I’ll save for another day), but I wasn’t really impressed with how it performed on deer this season. Deer were very dead, but I liked how the .270 load worked in the blood trail department better.
So, I got bored/inspired (not really sure which) the other day and swapped over to a blued 270 Win barrel that I got from a friend. It wasn’t pretty, which was probably the reason that i used the better looking 308 barrel to begin with, but I figured that it wouldn’t hurt to try it. I installed it, took it to the backyard and sighted it in at 50yd, cleaned it thoroughly, then took it to our friends 100yd shooting range on Wednesday to see if by chance it would shoot some of the stuff that I’d previously developed for the Rem 700. I did not do any development for this Savage barrel/gun at all, only checked to see if OAL was safe (which it was). To say that I was impressed by a couple of these loads and this less than pretty barrel would be an understatement. My first shot using the 130 NBT starting load was a fouler/sighter, then the next three fell neatly inside of an inch. The 130 NAB load shot equally as well, then the 110gr mouse fart youth load hit at the same POI in a nice 1.25” group.
It was really too easy. I’ll take 3 rifles to WY: my 30-06 Tikka as my primary, the Rem 700 270 as her primary, and the Savage 116 .270 as both of our backup. Even easier, I will only take 2 loads with us: one for my 30-06, and one for the 270s. I may even get a wild hair and leave the 30-06 at home altogether, but that may hurt my feelings a little bit.
I’ve said it before, Savages are not pretty, refined, or smooth, but they are accurate and can be easily worked on. For the right price, I’m always a Savage fan.
Anywho, some of you may remember me mentioning that I tinker a lot with youth loads of various ilks due to having three kids of my own, as well as taking other kids hunting. Because of this I have various powers of loads in various cartridges for various rifles. But since my oldest daughter (14yo) and I are going to WY next fall for a DIY pronghorn hunt, I’ve been trying to get her adjusted to loads that have a little more reach, while still keeping an eye on recoil. She has been shooting my first bolt action rifle, a Rem 700 270 with the full length stock (she’s pretty tall now, and outgrew the youth stock that I had bought for it), and I have her in 130gr “starting loads” at around 2750fps now. That’s a pretty decent step up from the 110gr youth loads at around 2600fps that she had been shooting. She shoots them well, and they performed very well on the two deer that she shot with it this season. I wanted a cartridge and load to complement this for us both to use as a backup on that trip, and had developed an accurate .308 Win “starting load” using 165 TGKs that I used with my Savage 116 (used to be a 30-06, but a long story that I’ll save for another day), but I wasn’t really impressed with how it performed on deer this season. Deer were very dead, but I liked how the .270 load worked in the blood trail department better.
So, I got bored/inspired (not really sure which) the other day and swapped over to a blued 270 Win barrel that I got from a friend. It wasn’t pretty, which was probably the reason that i used the better looking 308 barrel to begin with, but I figured that it wouldn’t hurt to try it. I installed it, took it to the backyard and sighted it in at 50yd, cleaned it thoroughly, then took it to our friends 100yd shooting range on Wednesday to see if by chance it would shoot some of the stuff that I’d previously developed for the Rem 700. I did not do any development for this Savage barrel/gun at all, only checked to see if OAL was safe (which it was). To say that I was impressed by a couple of these loads and this less than pretty barrel would be an understatement. My first shot using the 130 NBT starting load was a fouler/sighter, then the next three fell neatly inside of an inch. The 130 NAB load shot equally as well, then the 110gr mouse fart youth load hit at the same POI in a nice 1.25” group.
It was really too easy. I’ll take 3 rifles to WY: my 30-06 Tikka as my primary, the Rem 700 270 as her primary, and the Savage 116 .270 as both of our backup. Even easier, I will only take 2 loads with us: one for my 30-06, and one for the 270s. I may even get a wild hair and leave the 30-06 at home altogether, but that may hurt my feelings a little bit.
I’ve said it before, Savages are not pretty, refined, or smooth, but they are accurate and can be easily worked on. For the right price, I’m always a Savage fan.
