Ok. I finally had a chance to zero my new savage. Heres the lowdown and results of the outing.

I got a new savage model 11 in 223rem. It is in matte finish which i prefer. It did have a smooth barrel nut which i removed with my pipe wrench and replaced the lug w a SSS lug and stainless grooved nut. The smooth nut did have a lot of thread lock on it and it took some real muscle to break it free bit it finally gave. This rifle is centerfeed and has DBM. The bottom metal is not metal but plastic but seems very sturdy. I prefer the real bottom metal cuz it just feels better but im not sure if i will replace it or keep it stock. The stock is of xourse the plastic type but feels ok. Once i torqued down the screws to 30 inlbs the forend didnt flex to much but ill prob bed it w devcon since it does have pressed in pillars from the factory.

The trigger is a whole nother story......it looks to be the axis trigger. I know its not accutrigger cuz ive had one before and this one does not look like it. Its prob got a good 5 lbs pull and i will fix that soon enough. This range trip was to zero and start load testing.

My load was r-p brass w cci primers and a dose of 25.7 gr of varget topped with a 52 gr amax. The chrono was reading right at 3000fps which is a bit slow for a 52 gr bullet but i got decent accuracy.

The barrel is of course sporter contour and i wanted to heat it up to see how it moved. My poi moved downward once i ran enough rounds to warm it up to hot to the touch.

Here is the best 5 shot group of the morning while i was zeroing the rifle. The one pulled shot was my fault and it was the 5th shot of the group. I got anxious and lost concentration with such a heavy trigger pull. Thanks.





brian