Savage 6XC, first real range time to test it out.
This is a copy of the post I made over on Specialty Pistol but since you have to be a member there and this is a Savage Forum I'd like to post it here. Lots of good information over on SP ( http://specialtypistols.infopop.cc/eve ). Loving these Savages more every day. Will post pictures of our rifles and the pistol when the new stock arrives this weekend in the pictures thread.
First outing and on range testing of the new Savage Target Action LR pistol in 6XC has come and gone. Been thinking on how to put into words how the day went and not sound like a school girl bouncing around after learning she made the cheer leading squad and started dating the star Quarterback. I've already posted a few pictures of the groups I got while working up a few different loads but will add them again to make this a more complete thread. They were only three shot groups shot at 100 yards but a couple groups were in the .175 to .2 range and most were under 3/8" so it seemed to like the Hornady 105 Amax bullet with most charges. I took both but will probably use the 39.8 loads for the first few matches.
http://imageshack.us/a/img24/6964/6xctarget1.jpg
http://imageshack.us/a/img203/2917/6xctarget3.jpg
My new 7fingers Savage stock won't be here until next weekend so Randy loaned me his original model that started this whole 7finger stock thing off. He made this one from a chunk of billet aluminum on a manual Bridgeport mill but the new models are whittled out on a CNC machine and are so perfect the action will drop right in and need no bedding. So far every stock I have handled is a work of art. All shooting was done off wooden benches at home and at both ranges we shot at on Sunday with a leather sandbag under the rear grip and a Harris bi-pod on the front. It might shooter better in a better type of rest but this is the way it’s shot at matches so it’s the way I wanted to make it work. It will look identical to my XP-100 stock but the fore end will be two inches longer.
Two of these are my XP-100 stocks just to show what the 7fingers stocks look like.It's available for single shot XP-100, XP-100R, Savage Striker and Savage Target Actions so far.
http://imageshack.us/a/img198/4895/allfourguns1.jpg
http://imageshack.us/a/img690/3310/c...otherstock.jpg
This is the original stock that Randy made I'm borrowing and did this testing with.
http://imageshack.us/a/img18/3762/6x...ldstockonb.jpg
Went out to Rayners which is the range we shoot our 1000 yard matches at. I had a pretty good 200 yard zero and started off at 234 yards with center hits, then moved to 300 with more center hits. At 375 and 400 we have smaller higher value targets usually the rifle guys gamble on but it centered both of them so doing really well so far. Went to 500 and got good hits on the next to smallest then moved on to the smallest and another good hit. We moved on up the hill to the 600 with another good hit on an 8" plate.
DaleT was on the bench beside me with his Striker wearing an XLR chassis in 260rem experimenting with some lighter 123 gr bullets and I'm pretty sure he was following right along with hits on the smaller stuff as well. Can you see a pattern forming here using these Savages? Maybe he'll elaborate more on his findings with the lighter bullets. It’s a toss up between lighter, faster and heavier, slower to see which works best in the wind. DaleT is meticulous in his research on this so I’m anxious to see what he comes up with for these pistols.
http://imageshack.us/a/img577/4567/daletxlr.jpg
We all moved up onto the top of the hill for the longer range stuff and started off with a center hit on the smaller rectangle at 650 yards. At this point I let my Son try it and he also got a good hit on it. Randy had this "I wish I hadn't sold the barrel" look so he had to take one last shot with his barrel and also centered the small target. (Thanks again Randy) We then moved over to a really small rectangle at 720 yards that we all respectfully call a "black hole target". The rifle guys will shoot at it and it'll swallow up their bullet and not give a hit. It's that small and that tough. The little 6XC got a good first round hit on it too. It's worth 20 points but not worth the gamble in a match. I’ve only hit it a few times in practice just messing around with my rifle. My son then shot two at it and got two more hits in a row.
Then we moved over to the 630 and 700 yard plates but they were a huge 15" and got first round hits on both. The 630 yard target for some reason has DaleT spooked, he can drill the little stuff at every other station but for some reason this 15” plate has his name and ducks and dodges whenever he shoots at it with any of his guns. Today though DaleT must have had his hat pulled down or snuck up on it cause he put the hurt on it with a bunch of hits. Victory laps for DaleT!
At this point I'm over my highest score with my 260 Savage rifle and well past the high pistol score. All these settings were from my JBM printout and were spot on. At 900 the first shot was low and a bit off on wind call with a miss. First miss so far and was off the JBM recommended setting. I came up the appropriate amount based on seeing the miss and got a hit. At 990 had another low miss and bad wind call, made the adjustment and was on again. DaleT and the others were having an elevation problem on these two sets of targets and we think the headwind was messing a bit with us. We usually don't have that problem so we'll have to pay attention to that at the matches.
The wind was not heavy but ever changing and that really messed with us all and I'll probably never have another day at Rayners like this in these conditions but at least for one day the skies opened up and the Sun shown down on us and it was Butterflies, Unicorns and Rainbows with lazer guided bullets for everyone.
Not sure if we've finally stumbled onto the correct assortment of barrel, stock, bullets, load, scope or what but it all seems to be really working well as a unit. I was waiting to do a report with the new stock so I'd have pictures and video of the finished product. I'll add what I have later in this post.
Equipment list on the gun:
Savage Target Action
16" McGowen 1:8 twist barrel
Brake made by 7fingers
Aluminum stock made by 7fingers (no bedding)
Farrells steel 30moa mount
Seekins rings
SWFA SS 5-20x50 scope
Harris swivel notched leg bi-pod
Leather bag for rear
Now on to the second half of this incredible day. A buddy (Blackie Sleeva) who is one of the best long range pistol shooters in the Country had called and invited me over to his place on this same day. Said JD (from SSK Industries) was bringing over some stuff to shoot and we'd spend the day ringing some steel. Said I'd be late but would get there in late afternoon after leaving Rayners. We've been telling Blackie and JD about these LR pistols and both had been wanting to see them. JD has seen and shot a lot of long range pistols before but this was a first for Blackie with a setup like this.
Blackie has 500 yards behind his garage with some pretty small stuff him and JD use for testing some of the guns SSK builds. Initially I think Blackie was a bit apprehensive about these claims of the 1000 yard matches we've been attending and how well the guns shoot. After a shot to determine the wind across the hollow to the 500 yard targets I turned Blackie loose with the 6XC. He started on a big (12") plate to get the feel, missed the first shot and made a wind adjustment and absolutely centered it. I don't think you could have painted a more perfect hit on it. Then moved over to a 6” steel plate and another hit that was dead center perfect.
About that time another friend (Tom Sikora) and JD wandered around the building to watch. Tom is another old time Silhouette shooter and is familiar with long range pistol shooting but nothing like this. Blackie had told him earlier I was bringing a 1000 yard pistol over to shoot but he really had his doubts about a pistol being able to shoot that far. He sat down and proceeded to hit everything he shot at. I think he is still wearing the wall to wall grin he had on. JD had been watching and asking a few questions about it and we all know how he hates to shoot but it didn’t take much coaxing to get him behind it.
http://imageshack.us/a/img812/4541/jd6xc.jpg
I had quite a few rounds left but of a lighter load I had started load development with. They needed a couple extra clicks of elevation but shot great groups. It took a couple shots for him to get the correct windage then proceeded to lay one in on top of another on a couple plates. He kept going to smaller targets till finally he was shooting at a small rock (approx 4 inches to start with) and breaking it in pieces then shooting the pieces of pieces. At the end the one piece he could see was between a quarter and half dollar size and the cross hairs covered it up. I'd like to say he center hit it but if it'd have been a silver dollar he'd have not missed it, the misses were that close.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5gvQgMo2NA
Blackie had also shot a couple of the small rocks and split them in half then shot the half of a half. I was spotting for him and didn’t take any pictures or video of him but maybe next time. Incredible shooter I’ve tried to learn from watching over the years and has helped so many of us improve our shooting skills. I like to think I've learned from both of them over the years shooting IHMSA together back in it's younger days. When we were just about done Blackies wife Rosetta who is also an exceptional long time IHMSA metallic shooter walked around the corner to see what we were all up to.
http://imageshack.us/a/img827/3452/6xcrosetta.jpg
I doubt if she’d weigh 90lbs with a bag of rocks over her shoulder. It didn't take much prompting for her to set down behind the 6XC, this lady has no fear. We gave her a few tips on how to hold it since she's never shot a pistol like this with a rifle scope. After getting settled in she got three good hits on the small plates at 500 yards just like she'd done it a million times before. She just looked around as if to question us on why it seemed like a big deal. You’ll see in her video clip when it went off she looked up and knew she got a hit the moment it went off. Now that is calling a shot, do it right and you just know it’s going where it was supposed to.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgX85Cjd7_M
It was a great day and looking back I've been trying to sort it all out. I know the gun is going to be a good shooter and that was shown by how well these exceptionally skilled pistol shooters were able to sit down and instantly make the gun perform to its full potential. It's really nothing special and with just a few quality components that anyone can buy it'll shoot right up there with a lot of custom built rifles at extreme distances. I'm hoping I was able to put into words without it sound like bragging since everyone that shot it shot it well. Just an exceptional day that may never happen again but one that will be remembered when the next match rolls around and I somehow forgot how to shoot and can't hit a thing. I know it'll happen but that's part of competition, some days the medicine works and other days it don't.
DaleT and Randy are also putting together similar guns and they are both very qualified pistol shooters. When the XP-100 barrel shows up my son Chris will probably play with it and I expect it to perform the same as this XC so he'll keep me on my toes for sure. He's a fast learner and will soon bypass me which I'll enjoy seeing. As we were putting stuff away JD had us shoot some of his 300 whisper rounds out of a suppressed Contender using a brass lead free bullet that looked interesting. Blackie pulled out his 50 Alaskan with incendiary rounds.
A few years ago Dennis (SSK gunsmith) let me shoot one at a steel plate hanging by chains. They had just returned from out West demonstrating it to some company and it was sighted in for some far distance and Dennis said to hold about 3 feet low on this 100 yard target. At the shot a there was a huge flash and when the smoke cleared it had broken the chains and the target was gone. If there has been one time I regretted not having a video that was it. It broke the chains and the target was lying on the ground. It was like something out of a movie scene.
Back to Blackies 50 Alaskan shots, every time the gun went off a really cool red streak shot out and arched to the 200 yard line with a huge flash, boom and a cloud of smoke would drift away. What a cool way to end a great day. Was having such a great time I totally forgot I had my video camera for the flash-boom. I’ll make sure to get more of that next trip out.
I’m hoping the XP-100 shoots as well as this Savage, I canceled my order on the McGowen barrel and the replacement from Jim at NSS should be here this week so I’ll either add the testing results to this thread or make a new one with a range report on it and also how the whole Rem-Age setup works in the new 7fingers stock. I think they may have a lot of possibilities and being able to change the barrels on our Remingtons as easily as our Savages is very interesting. I’d have loved to see if the McGowen barrel would perform as good as it does on this Savage. Maybe someday down the road I’ll retry getting one but after saying it would be 10 to 12 weeks and with 12 weeks gone by and calling and still not getting a timeline on when it would be started I had to move on. It might have been started the next day or another 5 weeks but will never know.
These LR pistols are sure fun and glad we stumbled onto Rayners and the 1000 yard matches to keep stretching the limits of these guns and getting to meet a new group of shooters that keep pushing the limits on what we can expect from our equipment. If anyone in the area would like to join us for just a fun day of ringing steel don’t be bashful about shooting these distances, it’s actually easier than it sounds and you probably have a gun you can start off with.
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