Target Sports

PROJECT RIFLE: SAVAGE REVAMP

Created on 29th May 2009

VINCE BOTTOMLEY soups up the Savage BVSS Factory Rifle for F/TR Class

F-CLASS continues to grow in popularity as more and more shooters discover the fun of ultra long-range rifle shooting. However, the prospect of paying around £4,000 for a custom-built rifle chambered for a competitive cartridge like the 7mm WSM, and a spare barrel (they will barely last a season), is just not acceptable to many competitors. The GB F-Class Association was not slow to recognise this and included an F/TR Class for the 2007 season.

F/TR Class uses exactly the same target, course of fire and rules, but it is restricted to rifles chambered for the 308 Win (or 223) cartridge, and the front-rest must be a simple bi-pod rather than the benchrest-type adjustable pedestal used by most Open class competitors. A back-bag may still be used, of course. The only other rule deviation is the weight limit - 8.25kg rather than 10kg for Open class rifles. This is still generous and will admit any existing 308 factory rifle I can think of, but the weight of the scope and bi-pod must be included.

This year only a dozen or so shooters are competing in the league's F/TR category, but in 2008 the league winner will receive one of the fabulous new Savage 308 F/TR rifles. This is an exceedingly generous offer from UK Savage importer Garlands Ltd and North West Custom Parts (who specialises in after-market stocks, barrels and triggers etc for the Savage) and will hopefully tempt a few more of you to have a go.

Stuart Anselm, proprietor of North West Custom Parts, is shooting in the F/TR league this year, partly to showcase his Savage products. Although he is currently heading the F/TR standings, he quickly found the limitations of his 12BVSS factory Savage and the 308 Win cartridge. Most of the league shoots are at 800yd and beyond, and the target is just over half the area of the usual Bisley-style 1,000yd target. At the Diggle round of the GB league last September, a gusty 25mph wind blew most of the 308 shooters clean off the paper, and with the final league round at Bisley only a few weeks away, Stuart approached me with a few ideas for improving his Savage without taking it too far away from the factory offering.

Stuart's idea was to junk the 26" factory barrel and replace it with something longer and heavier, but before we started tearing down the Savage, I wanted to see just how good - or bad - it was. At 100yd, I was astounded by the accuracy of this budget rifle. Off the bi-pod, Stuart was printing three-shot groups around half MOA with impressive regularity! I wasn't confident that we could significantly improve on this - even with a custom barrel.

After shooting a few rounds over the chronograph, we spotted an area where there could be room for improvement - Stuart's 155gn Sierra Palma Match bullets were just making 2,800fps. This is not nearly fast enough to stay super-sonic all the way to 1,000yd, so accuracy could be compromised. We need a muzzle velocity of at least 2,950fps, preferably 3,000fps, to guarantee a supersonic terminal velocity and, at the same time, this additional speed will usefully assist the wind-bucking ability of our chosen bullet.

You may wish to query our choice of bullet. Why not go heavier - a 175 or even a 190 grainer - if most of our shooting will be at 1,000yd? The Match Rifle guys are famous for getting the most out of the 308, and drive heavy bullets at impressive velocities from ultra-long barrels out to 1,200yd. Although heavier bullets retain their velocity better, they need a barrel with a faster twist and the faster you spin that bullet, the more it will reveal its irregularities. Fine, maybe, if you are using custom bullets but Stuart wants to stick with readily available commercial bullets.

The Savage's factory 308 twist-rate is one in 10 but this can be reduced to one in 14 if we use the 155gn bullet exclusively. Stuart has plenty of contacts in the USA, so I left it to him to source a barrel. A couple of weeks later, he turned up with a 33" Pacnor stainless-steel ‘super match' blank. The Pacnor profile tapered from 1.2" at the breech to just a tad under an inch at the muzzle. Thirty-three inches was a bit longer than I had in mind but we can always chop it!

Don't forget, we are using the standard Savage stock, and the bedding-area is not massive with the Savage action - the rear action-screw is forward of the trigger meaning that the rear tang is effectively free-floating. Having said that, for a standard factory item, the wood-laminate stock is not half bad. The back-end is a bit of a compromise but it's quite solid with a good deep forend, hopefully capable of supporting the heavy Pacnor barrel without flexing.

Although our Savage action is one of the solid-bottom types, the stock still has a massive cut-out for a non-existent integral box-magazine. The first job is to fill this hole with Devcon. This will vastly increase the bedding-area and probably make the stock a little bit stiffer. We will then hog out the whole area where the action sits to make way for a proper bedding-job. This is time consuming but not expensive, so will not add significantly to the cost of our project.

The factory stock already has two steel pillars in the action screw holes. These are a tight press-fit and the first job is to knock out the pillars and re-install them with Araldite when the holes have been relieved. I've seen these pillars actually cause a stock to split; the factory installs them much too tightly. We also need to open up the barrel-channel to ensure that our new heavy barrel is generously free-floating - not just for the obvious reasons but also to assist with cooling. While the stock was in the milling-machine, I was inletting the underside of the forend for an Anschutz-type accessory rail, which is an improvement on the factory sling-swivel for carrying the bi-pod.

Although I like Savages, there is a draw-back - the trigger. Savage has recently addressed this with its new patented Accutrigger. The Accutrigger would be perfect for F-Class shooting but Stuart wants to use the Rifle-Basix SAV 2 trigger as he installs these when upgrading customer Savages. This trigger is not cheap, around £130 (from Tim Hannam), but the old factory trigger is just not suitable for serious competition work as it is not easy to reliably re-work. The SAV 2 can be adjusted down to about 4oz but I'm setting this one at half a pound - plenty light enough for shooting a rested rifle.

We can now put some costs on the project:
• £130 for the SAV 2 trigger
• £250 for the Pacnor super-match barrel
• £20 for bedding-compound and sundries

This totals £400, and the initial cost of Stuart's secondhand 12BVSS Savage was £450, so we will be looking at £850 for our upgraded F/TR rifle. If you were to attempt a similar project, you would obviously have to factor-in the gunsmithing costs. If your Savage bolt-head isn't compatible with the 308 case, no problem - fitting a new 308 bolt-head is literally a five-minute job costing under £30.

Of course, some will question the ethics of going down this route for an F/TR rifle. If shooters start to build special rifles for the class - it's happened in America - won't it defeat the object of an economical starter class? Shouldn't we simply use an existing factory rifle? Well yes, I agree to some extent, but better-quality factory kit like the Sako TRG or the Blaser LS93 will be even more expensive - though still only around half the cost of an Open class custom rifle.

Really, the all-new purpose-built factory 308 Savage F/TR rifle is the way to go. For under £1,200, it offers a solid-bottom action with small ejection-port, the excellent Accutrigger, 30" stainless-steel barrel and a good quality laminate stock. I've had a brief play with one and I was astounded by the accuracy. They must be the ideal rifle for F/TR class and at a bargain price. But back to our project.

We chambered our barrel with what Pacific Tool & Gauge describes as its ‘308 Palma' reamer. This reamer complies fully with the SAAMI specification but the leade and freebore are ground to suit the 155gn Sierra Palma Match bullet. Although I'm a great fan of Lapua bullets, the 155gn Scenar is a bit longer than the Sierra, so would reduce powder-capacity slightly with our chamber. Of course, you could exploit the 308 chambering even further by increasing the freebore to maximise case-capacity, but Stuart has no wish to stretch the rules in any way. Fortunately, our Savage action proved to be fairly true and we finished the barrel at 32" with a 90º recessed crown.

Finally, we must check the overall weight. Remember, the F/TR Class limit is 8.25kg - or just over 18lb - with scope and bi-pod. We have half a pound to spare!

It was now less than a week away until the final round of the GB F-Class League at Bisley and Stuart had barely time to run-in the barrel and sort out a load. The final choice of powder came down to Vihtavuori's N540 and N550 double-base powders. In theory, the double-base powders are claimed to offer increased velocity without increasing pressure. Can this be possible?

We started load development with 44gn of each powder and worked up the load very slowly. It soon became apparent that the same load of N540 was making about 80fps more than the N550. The magic 3,000fps was attained and the final accuracy-load was marginally over 3,000fps, with flattish primers but easy bolt-lift. It was a very warm day for October and I'm happy that this load will be safe come the warmer weather. Don't forget, these loads were safe in our rifle - they may not be safe in your rifle. Always start low and work up the load in small increments. Be safe!

The rifle performed exceedingly well in its debut at the final GB League shoot at Bisley which was also the European F-Class Championship. At the 900yd stage, Stuart was one of only four shooters to score a ‘possible' 75 out of a field of Europe's top 89 F Class shooters - and that's on the Palma target with the one MOA bull as opposed to the Bisley two-minute variety! Stuart was also the only F/TR shooter to record a ‘possible' over the weekend and I'm pleased to be able to report that he clinched the first ever GB F/TR League Championship. Having said that, Stuart would be the first to acknowledge that it was persistence rather than performance that gave him victory, but you've got to be in it to win it!

The F/TR Class is a sensible way to start your F-Class career, or a great option if you already shoot F Class but prefer not to enter the Open class ‘arms race' and wish to return to some sanity. The F/TR Class offers that much vaunted level playing field and is a great way to enjoy shooting long-range rifle competition. And don't forget, a brand-new Savage F/TR rifle is up for grabs in 2008.