Too Much MOA required

[SKami]

Hi everyone,
I recently joined this forum as I decided to purchase a savage rifle. I bought a Savage M12 LRP .260 rem. I'm having elevation issues. I've mounted two different scopes from rifles that shoot less than 1 MOA with my handloads, so I'm pretty sure they're good. I've used three different style bases - the first was Leupold two piece standard with standard super high rings, and a Burris Fullfield II E1 6-20x50mm (objective bell clearance was about 3/16ths of an inch), the second was a Blackhawk 20 MOA (shimmed under the rear mount pad to .040) and a Weaver Grand Slam 6-20x40mm, the third was an EGW 20 MOA base with Burris Signature Zee Rings, +.020 in the bottom of the back ring and -.020 in the bottom of the front ring, I mounted the Weaver on this one as well. Barrel clearances were always within 1/4 inch at the objective bell. The reason for all the MOA is that my first attempt at sighting in resulted in the bullet hitting the ground 25 yrds from the bench at a 50 yrd target, and no amount of scope adjustment would bring it up.
I'm not looking to get into any pissing contests, and love the looks of this rifle. I have contacted Savage, they are willing to look at it, but I wanted some input before I throw in the towel. The thing is, I've been shooting/reloading for nearly 40 years-I know how to sight in a rifle. Not tooting my own horn, just don't want a bunch of guys jumping down my throat for obvious things, just am stumped.
Another interesting thing, if you bore sight by looking down the barrel-you'd swear the rifle should be shooting 2 feet high. The closest I've come to POA is 4 inches below, with the blackhawk base, .040 in shims and scope bottomed out in adjustment. Any input would be great, although I believe this is a barrel issue, maybe I'm doing something wrong. I find it hard to believe that a rifle would need that much MOA to get it to shoot at 100 yards.
(ammo:Federal Vital Shock 120 BAllistic Tips/20 rounds thru the tube; Nosler Custom 140 Accubonds/6 round thru the tube)

[jonbearman]

I have found with certain savage rifles that the front and back ring of the reciever is off a mile so to speak.Take a one piece mount and put a screw in the front and tighten it down alittle.Now is there a gap under the rear of the mount? If not ,take the screw out and do the same in the back and check to see if the front has a gap.If all is well with no difference between the front and back then the next thing that comes to mind is to remove the barrel and make sure it is square to the receiver face.If you dont want to remove the barrel then I would have to believe the barrel is bent badly.Remove the mount and put a long ehough straight edge inline with the center of the screw holes and see if the straight edge goes straight down the center of the barrel.If it seems inline take the straight edge and hold it against the barrel and see if there is any gap under the straight edge.What I am trying to do is see if it is externally bent or internally drilled crooked.,which you would have to send it back to savage or just eat the lose and get a high quality barrel from northland shooters supply 1-763-682-4296 Jim Can help you out and knows savages as good as anyone.

[1.618]

The reason for all the MOA is that my first attempt at sighting in resulted in the bullet hitting the ground 25 yrds from the bench at a 50 yrd target, and no amount of scope adjustment would bring it up.

Don't take this wrong, but are you sure you mounted the scope mount base pointing the right way ("downhill") rather than uphill?

If bullets are hitting the dirt 25 yds out and the scope is pointed at the bullseye 50 yds away, that means your barrel and scope are pointing away from each other, rather than toward each other, and the path of the bullet will never intersect the line of sight (and the further out they go, the further they will diverge from each other)...or so it seems to me.

[SKami]

I agree, the thing is I use a collimator style bore slighter on all my rifles, I'm very familiar with this particular one ( I know there is some controversy with their use). I couldn't bore sight this rifle for the life of me WITH the collimator, crosshairs were well above the zero point, which indicated I would be shooting low. I hoped it was because of the zero taper in the receiver and the super high leupold mounts at first. Yes I did have the two MOA bases "going down hill", although I really thought about reversing them as I was extremely frustrated. The funny thing about the scope and the barrel diverging-this wasn't actually the case, as I removed the bolt and bore sighted that way. I could line up a target thru the bore, adjust the scope to that approximate POI, and it made matters worse ( the rifle shot even lower). Sorry about being long winded, but I'm trying to explain everything as best I can. I got to a point with the first 20 MOA rest where I shimmed the back by .040, bedded it to the action, and with the scope adjusted all the way, I could shoot about 8 inches below POA at 100 yrds, but this was with 60 MOA in the base, and about 20 in the scope. In order to shoot to even a medium long 500 yards, I'd need almost 20 more MOA (I think). That's an awful lot for a rifle that's technically made for long range shooting, I'd doubt any one makes a combination of scope and bases with that much available elevation.bi truly believe the barrel is significantly warped, or not properly rifled/crowned. I will call NSS if savage won't do anything, as this rifle is the bomb as far as looks, it's beefy, and quite honestly I've heard very good things about them, as with all Savages. Every manufacturer has their issues, so I'm not turned off, just want the thing to shoot well so I can do some load development.

[1.618]

The funny thing about the scope and the barrel diverging-this wasn't actually the case, as I removed the bolt and bore sighted that way. I could line up a target thru the bore, adjust the scope to that approximate POI, and it made matters worse ( the rifle shot even lower).

Wow, that *IS* strange. I never heard of such a thing. The bull was centered in the bore (by eye) and centered in the crosshairs and yet it still shot "off"?

Every rifle I've ever boresighted (I do it the old fashioned way) has put the bullets within an inch or so of the bullseye (I use a one-inch black square) at 20 to 30 yards.

Sorry, I don't have a clue what could be wrong. Gravity anomaly?

Good luck and please let us know what it turns out to be. That's a head-scratcher and no doubt very frustrating!

[SKami]

Honestly,the only way I new where the bullets were going was due to the wet conditions, at the point I decided to bore sight thru the bore, I had moved the target slightly closer so when I shot a splatter of mud hit the target ( I actually thought it was a bullet hole at first, and had it solved ;( ) but just mud splatter-that's what's got me so confused. The bullet seems to be taking quite a nose dive out of the barrel, my bench is the typical 30+ inches tall, the target I was shooting at is about 3x3 feet, and stands starting a foot above the ground. No way my barrel was pointing anywhere near POI, which would be the ground!

[eddiesindian]

wow....this is strange indeed.
I read everything youve written and (to me) it all points to the barrel.
When it gets to this point....anything is possible.
Sure is a harsh feeling when you cant get things going the way your used to.

[barrel-nut]

These threads are happening a lot lately. Something is amiss at the factory. SK, I'd send it back, even though I'd hate to have to go through all that trouble. But what you're describing is definitely abnormal and not acceptable in a new rifle.

[Westcliffe01]

I recently helped a friend build a 6.5x47 Lapua. Bought a new model 12 LPV chambered in 243 Win (stainless with 26" fluted barrel). Same day bought a Shilen match barrel from Midway chambered in 6.5x47 Lapua 1:8 twist 26" varmint contour. Visit to the friends place once his packages came in, screwed off the factory barrel, cleaned all the action threads of all the blast media that Savage leaves in there, and screwed on the new barrel, recoil lug and NSS barrel nut. Also fitted a 20MOA steel Warne base.

More than a month had passed and he had meanwhile bought a Viper PST 4-16x50 FFP scope for it and got the scope mounted but not sighted in.

This last Saturday we went out to the farm and set up on shooting mats in the prone position with steel targets at 160 and 320 yards out. We bore sighted the scope on the 160 yard target and after bore sighting only had to correct 4MOA left and 2MOA up to be on the steel. Now 160 yards is a long way to be boresighting especially when the target is not all that big, but I have done this several times.

First of all, I cannot believe that you can have the bore aligned with the target at 50 yards and have the scope aligned with the target and shoot into the ground at 25 yards. Your typical target is 2 ft or more off the ground. A shooters bench is closer to 3ft (30-32"). But lets just work with 24" since it will illustrate my point. At 50 yards, to hit the ground directly at the base of the target requires being low 24" or nearly 48 MOA. To hit the ground half way to the target, at a distance of 75 ft, is a decrease in elevation of about 91MOA relative to your aiming point.

Given that the field of view in most scopes is a lot less than 91MOA (from edge to edge, let alone center to edge) unless you have a 1x or 1.5x scope, which I am assuming is not the case, it should be clear that what is being described is an impossibility.

The best thing to do is ensure that the elevation on the scope is centered before you start. Then remove all shims under bases and with the Z rings, get the scope and bore sight to align again. The rifle needs to be held fixed for this operation so that the only thing that moves is your eye from scope to bore and back. The colimator style boresighters are useless as far as I am concerned and most of the time all they will do is damage your new pristine bore.

The only other thing you might want to check is that the factory tightened the barrel nut. I never had a problem with the factory sending out a loose barrel, but I did get a rifle in a private sale where the barrel was loose. Still hard to believe one could be off by 90+ MOA, but it would certainly group bad and might be bad for your health in the longer term...

[limige]

Ten to one its a bad barrel. Send it in and dont sweat it. Ive read several threads like this over the past year or so.

Get a magnifying glass and a light and examine the rifling inside of the crown. Sometimes there's visable roughness associated with this.

[SKami]

This is what has me in a state of utter confusion. I've purchased 4 other rifles in the past two years, a different brand but about the same cost-all bore sighted with the same collimator, and all sighted in with 3 or 4 shots. I am not trying to turn this into a "Bash Savage Thread". I love this **** thing, just want it to shoot well. On the bench, you could look at the rifle and tell it was above level, ie the barrel was slightly pointed up-I even put a carpenters level on to check, the thing is I put a level on the receiver as well, without the scope mounted-everything seemed about right. I am not a gunsmith, obviously, that's why I'm here! I will send it back to Savage and keep all posted. I truly hope to be back showing pictures of tiny little groups at 200 yrds(??), and truly be in the savage brotherhood. If anyone has any other insight, please feel free to post.
I wish I had a bore scope, and all the other tools to check these things, but I do not and unfortunately there are no gunsmiths that close to me to be able to have it checked.

[chukarmandoo]

Hope you get it figured out.

[SKami]

Westcliffe01 your math is spot on, with the first 20 MOA rest, and .040 in shims, plus the 20 or so MOA in the scope, I ended up about 8 inches low at 100 yrds-that's 88 MOA in my book. I use a wheeler scope install kit with levels to install all my scopes, the first attempt used leupold standard bases and super high rings ( No MOA built in) could not bore sight this combo with the colllimator. The closest I could get was the #8 grid with all of the available scope elevation - that translates to 32 inches low at 100 yrds! I did a test with another rifle I own that shoots 3 touching at 125 yrds, I put a target on my wall, 14 yards away from rifle, mounted it in a lead sled, bore sighted thru the bore and translated that to the Savage. This took a lot of elevation out of the scope, but ended up the same way - shooting way low, something in the barrel is causing the bullets to nose dive, it does not seem possible if you were looking at what I am either, I can't for the life of me justify it, it just makes no sense.

[sharpshooter]

If it is that far off, you should be able to tell with a naked eye just by sighting down the side of the barreled action in all directions. If the barrel is out of alignment with the receiver, it will be obvious.

[Westcliffe01]

No still a math problem, 8" low at 100 yards is just about 8MOA or 32 clicks on a typical scope.

I cannot see how it is possible to look down the bore and have the target centered in the bore back and front, yet hit the ground 25 yards away. If the barrel was bent that much I am not sure you would be able to see out of it. I just did the math on that. With a .243" bore and 26" barrel, the field of view from centerline to the edge of the muzzle is 16MOA. So top to bottom is 32moa. So there is just no way the muzzle could be pointing down 90MOA because you would be 60MOA past the point that you could see any daylight out the bore.

There is something wrong with your setup. Go to the hardware store and get a 3 foot straight edge (steel rule) bring it back, take everything off the reciever and first lay it on just the barrel. Top and bottom. It should be obvious by comparing top and bottom if the barrel is bent. Then lay it on the top of the receiver on edge, not flat. Now see if the receiver is aligned with the barrel. If you have a caliper you can measure the barrel taper so you would know how big a gap to expect at the muzzle to the straight edge. For a barrel to be off 90MOA (1.5 degrees) the muzzle would have to be low by 0.68" (26" long barrel) and I am sure that is close to the diameter of the muzzle. The .68" would be the difference in measurement from a straight edge laid on the top vs the bottom of the receiver to the muzzle.

Westcliffe01 your math is spot on, with the first 20 MOA rest, and .040 in shims, plus the 20 or so MOA in the scope, I ended up about 8 inches low at 100 yrds-that's 88 MOA in my book.

[Patch700]

Would be nice to see some close up pictures of the base and ring setup.... Not for nothing but I have seen first hand what happens to things that get shipped in cardboard boxes , if you don't think a barrel can be bent during shipping go hang out at a post office for a couple hours lol.

[Hotolds442]

A mounting base made for a round back action and installed on a flat back could cause the rifle to shoot extremely low, but it would still hit paper at 25 yards if the scope was able to be adjusted to the bore using the bolt removed sighting method. You've used three different bases, and two different scopes with the same result. Game over. Send it back to Savage and let them make it right. It should be very obvious to them when they put it on the bench using their sighting system that there is a very real problem with the rifle. If they can't find a problem, then the same person who let it leave the factory is the one trying to make it right lol. It's been mentioned a couple of times here already, but this issue has been seen quite a bit lately.

[SKami]

Westcliffe01 that would be true if the scope was mounted with a ZERO MOA base, but it is not, I have a shimmed 20 MOA base under it, that by my math is building in 60 MOA before I start. And only then did I see it start printing on paper. I realize 8 inches is only 8 MOA, or 32 clicks on a 1/4 MOA scope, but I have bottomed the scope adjustment as well and still barely able to get on paper. The fact is sighting in a rifle is generally not rocket science, I've never had any issues sighting in any other rifle I own or have owned, no expert, not trying to be, but something here is way off and frustrating. To me any way, a rifle labeled LRP shouldn't require that much to get it zeroed at a 100 yrds -you'd never be able to shoot this rifle at 1000, there's not to many scope/base combinations made with the MOA required to shoot THIS rifle at 500 yrds, let alone 1000.
After a lot of searching, I did find a thread on another sight that included a similar rifle and a similar frustrating issue, ultimately Savage fixed it in stellar fashion, although the details were not disclosed, and I fully expect that they will either fix it or tell me I'm an idiot cause I did something wrong, but up until this point it's got me all buggered up. Had I only tried one base, one scope - I'd be sure that was the problem, but two different scopes off of known accurate rifles, and three different bases and I'm thinking there's an issue with the rifle.
I did have UPS pick it up-so now we will see, but I'm confident it will be remedied-I'm already looking at a Vortex Viper for it, and being my first run in with the accutrigger, I thought it was pretty sweet, also I'm kind of interested in the Hog Hunter-neat brush gun!

[GaCop]

These threads are happening a lot lately. Something is amiss at the factory. SK, I'd send it back, even though I'd hate to have to go through all that trouble. But what you're describing is definitely abnormal and not acceptable in a new rifle.

Agreed, the rifle needs to be looked at by Savage for possible barrel replacement.

[SKami]

Westcliffe01 I reread your reply, and I get what your saying, basically, I shouldn't be able to look through the bore and line up the cross hairs with that much of a difference, right? I am in agreement and that's why I'm so befuddled-maybe age is getting to me! The one thread I referenced, the shooter was using a laser style bore sighter, and had nearly the same problem, except his POI was left and low-some 2ft at 25 yrds with the scope maxxed in windage adjustment. If the barrel were warped that much it would seem to me the laser would have indicated it. Any way I will find out, and believe me I WILL admit it.

[Ol' BW]

What you didn't know is you have a "trench gun". It will shoot around the edge of the trench so you don't have to stick your head above the edge. You stay below line of sight! You are supposed to fit it with a periscope. :D:D

I think what I would have tried that would have proved the problem was the barrel is I would have put the gun in your lead sled took the scope and bases off, took the bolt out and put the bullseye centered in the barrel and locked the gun down so it couldn't move from where you pointed it and just shot it. If it still shot low, pack it up and send it back. I know you did similar, but taking the scope/rings/bases variable out completely proves it is not the scope.

I don't think you admitting a problem is gong to be as difficult as getting Savage to tell you what the problem was after they fix it. Most times from companies you get the " we fixed it" and not the "here's what we did wrong the first time."

BW

[SKami]

I thought about doing that, and probably should have. I think Savage will fix it, whether they tell me what's up or not is still a question. I do know that in some of the other research I've done, that people have been reserved about publicly saying what savage told them, which is fine as long as they get it straightened out. I'm not looking to give savage a bad name, all companies have qc issues to one extent or another-"stuff" happens. I've gone ahead and ordered a new scope for it, anticipating a good shooter, a vortex 4x16x44, hopefully I'll be posting pics of little groups in the near future. And if it turns out to shoot as well as I've read, I will probably replace some of my other calibers with a savage-I like the barrel interchangeability, and my Brownings don't really have that option!

[Ol' BW]

Yep your right! Can't swap barrels on just anything. That's why I have a Savage in layaway, now your story has got me kinda nervous. I have several swap barrel H&R Handi Rifles. If a Savage is the V-8 Chevy small block of the gun world, the H&R is the flathead Ford of the gun world.

BW

[SKami]

Always wanted to build a flat head, did lots of V-8's, never a flat head though! I wouldn't worry too much about Savage-they're pretty darn good shooters from what I've read, did a ton of research before I bought one. The problem is more to do with our computer driven lives, it's easier to see the bad, the good ones don't get as much "attention"- guys/gals just quietly win competitions with'em!

[Kill N Grill]

I wonder if the bore diameter is too small. May have the right chamber but wrong bore. Having a 260 chamber and a 243 bore??