• Savage Mark II-JTV Review in .22LR

    The Savage Mark II rifles have been on the market for many years now. They are sold all over the world and have proved to be a very reliable design. They are easily affordable and also quite accurate for an economy class rifle.There is little wonder as to why there are so many Savage rimfires in shooters hands these days.

    Savage re-entered the rimfire market a in 1993 with the acquisition of Lakefield Arms of Ontario, Canada. The bolt-action rimfires are much the same design now as was used by Lakefield in the past, though some modernizing has been made to make the Lakefield made rifles more refined and user friendly. Some of the more noticeable changes were the removal of the traditional rimfire dovetail scope base with the receivers now being drilled and tapped, a second action screw to better secure the action in the stock, and the most recent and best change was the adding of the Accu-trigger. Those who remember doing the shim trick to lighten the old style trigger know exactly what I mean. The new trigger is so much better it's not even funny!

    The Mark II in this review is a new and exclusive version made for Jerry's Sports Centers, a leading firearms and accessories wholesale company. This product and it's Model 12 BGTV sibling are the result of a partnership between Jerry's Sports Centers and Proactive Sales & Marketing, a firearms marketing representative company. These rifles can only be bought through FFL dealers who do business with JSC. You cannot get them through the other distributors as these are not offered in the standard Savage factory catalog.

    Why does a distributor need to have an exclusive model of a firearm made? Well, it's simple. Look at how many firearms are available now and you'll see that most are very similar to each other. Many are even dull and boring. To break through all that monotony, sometimes distributors will have a special run of a common gun with some non-standard features. This will be more appealing to dealers and their customers. In this case, there is also a growing market for rifles that are suited for target shooting and varmint hunting. Rimfires are no exception.

    A fringe benefit of this particular series is that it resolved many of the Mark II's short comings. The factory stocks on the Mark II rifles have always been considered on the small side in they way they fit the shooter. The JTV uses a Boyd's thumbhole varmint style stock that has a much better feel and fit. It also features a real metal trigger guard, a feature that is becoming more and more difficult to find on firearms these days. In fact, one of the most impressive points to me is that this rifle has only one item that is plastic and that is the butt pad spacer. Everything else is laminated wood and metal.

    The most outstanding part of this rifle is naturally the Boyd's thumbhole varmint stock. the stock is done in a beautiful Royal Jackaranda laminate and is a real eye catcher. The thumbhole grip offers a very comfortable feel, and the isn't too wide for shooting off-hand comfortably. The forend is also vented to aid in barrel cooling. Three sling swivel studs are provided, one at the rear and two on the front. The inletting and barrel channel is very nicely done with no splintering or fraying. The fit is great and the stock has a very smooth satin finish with no imperfections. The cheek piece is a much appreciated bonus and greatly assists in achieving a good cheek weld with proper scope alignment. Rounding out the stock is the black rubber butt pad which is a nicer touch than the plastic butt plate that is factory standard issue.

    The action and barrel have a nicely done semi-gloss bluing as do the sling swivel studs and floor plate. The bolt handle is also blued but a little too thinly as it rusted easily. The trigger guard has a very dull matte bluing that contrasts somewhat with the rest of the metal but it's still nice. The scope mount bases that come installed on the rifle are Weaver style and have a smooth semi-gloss black finish.

    Now, let's get to the meat of the matter, performance. The Mark II JTV performed quite well. It is quite accurate once you figure out the ammo it prefers. Like with any rimfire, you must experiment some in this matter. This one likes the Eley Biathlon Sport 40gr and Eley Silhou-X 40gr. In fact, it performed well enough that I was able to score Expert from the standing position on the NRA Light Rifle Qualifications. I probably could have scored Distinguished if I would have had more time but daylight was running out.

    Below is the results of the different ammo I tried. All groups were fired from a Caldwell "Rock" rest on a cement rifle bench.

    Conditions:
    Wind: 4.5mph headwind
    Temp: 79*F
    Barometer: 29.96
    Humidity: 85.6%
    Time: 850AM
    Date: Sept. 2006

    Course of Fire:
    - 1 each 10 round groups were fired at both 25 and 50 yards.
    - Groups were measured outside to outside including the farthest flyers.
    - All test ammo was 40gr.

    As much as I am impressed with the rifle I must say that there are still two drawbacks with it. These are unfortunately a design problem and could not be expected to be remedied through anything other than design change. The most detracting is the magazine system Savage uses on these rifles. They have some function problems in feeding that the shooter has to use a pair of needle nose pliers to fix. It's an easy tweak but it does get aggravating. I bought two other five round magazines to test and one worked fine and the other had to have a very minor tweak to it. The magazine also protrudes below the stock making it an eye sore and in the way when shooting from standing position and when carrying the rifle. These should be replaced with a flush fitting rotary style magazine like the Savage Model 99 or something similar. The other thing I dislike about the Mark II design is that it has a really small port. I like to single feed while target shooting and shooting in matches, and the small port makes loading a real pain. Even with these few nit-picks, this is a great little rifle and one I will be adding to my collection.

    Special thanks to Skip Jeanerret at Proactive Sales and Bob Casella at Jerry's Sport Centers for making this review possible.



    Savage Sports Corp.
    100 Springdale Road
    Westfield, MA 01085
    (413) 568-7001
    www.savagearms.com