308 hog hunter and me

Hello everyone. Did a very brief hi in the introduction section.

I'm generally a Ar15 shooter. I love quality rifles but am a function over form guy.

I needed a boltgun and went with a savage hog hunter in 308 cause it fit my needs.

I have 3 gripes/questions.

How can I get the mag to not suck so much. It looks like the centerfeed design came off a rem 8 but without the ability to use stripper clips.

Why are the sights so high?

Any way to stiffen the stock?

Can I swap the stock to something that has a trad stagger feed?

I need to mount a sling and shoot the crap outta it.
I may do a aimpoint/magnifier optic setup. I need to find a lower aimpoint mount.
Other that I actually enjoy the rifle

Welcome.

The Centerfeed mags I feel are a better mag than the older Staggerfeed design. Function is better in my opinion. As for stripper clips, most Savages get a scope mounted to them so I am willing to bet that nobody considered stripper clip usage to be an asset. Other than the lack of strippers what is the issue you are having with the mag?

The sights are high because the hog hunter was built to work with a suppressor, so they must be high to be able to see over the suppressor.

Yes there are many ways to stiffen your stock. do a search here and you will find many threads on the subject.

You can swap the stock to any factory or aftermarket stock for the Centerfeed Short Action with the 4.40" screw spacing.

Hope some of that helps.

Thanks for the info. For me its loading. I have fat fingers and loading isn't all that fun. . My uncle hada rem 8 and I hated loading that unless I used clips. With clips it was like silk. I'm sure ill get used to it

I bought it because of the threaded barrel and iron sights. Didn't think about can usage with the sights that high. Makes sense.




What does the centerfeed do better than the stagger feed? Why the change?

In my experiance, some SF I have had would let the round pop from the mag lips a tad early, especially if held at strange angles in the field. That would sometimes cause difficulty in getting the round to the chamber and with 1 SF rifle I had, if I worked the bolt with the muzzle pointed upwards, the round would fall right out of the gun.

With CF mags, I have yet to have an issue with round popping early, or any issues with strange angles in the field.

As far as why the change, IIRC the change was to help feeding with cartridges that didn't feed from SF's very well. For some reason the WSMs calibers are coming to mind. But not 100% on that.

Right now 4 out of 9 of my actions are SF, but I run 2 of those as single shots due to them having questionable feeding, the 3rd is a LA-SF-DBM that amazingly feeds 308 perfectly, and the 4th I haven't built yet so I'm not sure how well if feeds. All of my medium and big game guns are CF just simply due to the reliable feeding.

To help with loading, you may keep your eyes out and pick up a Savage CF stock with a DBM, that should help make it easier for you to load, and will be a direct bolt on to your hog hunter.