Brand new Savage Scout .308 throughly cleaned (bore and bolt) with bore and bolt pretty dry after cleaning.


Fresh loaded factory cartridges will chamber and extract/eject just fine. Action cycles fine with loaded factory ammo.


Fired cartridges stick in the chamber. Bolt can only be opened with the help of a mallet and sometimes a cleaning rod and WD-40 is needed to tap the fired cartridge and push the bolt open.


Once the fired cartridge is out and examined, the primer strike looks perfect and there are no striations, marks, cracks or dents on the fired brass. If I hand feed a fired cartridge into the chamber and close the bolt, the bolt once again does not want to open. The bolt handle comes up but I cannot pull it back without the help of a mallet.


Do you have any suggestions on how I can diagnose and fix the problem?