Savage Edge 7mm-08; Houston we have a problem.

W

WWWJD

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A kid I work with at the office asked me to take his rifle to the range today, to put a decent zero on it. He's only got 50 yards to play with off season, and he wanted to know how it flies at 100, 200... etc. I couldn't even get it zeroed.

This is a pretty light rifle; plastic stock, plastic bolt handle?! and the trigger is like pulling a car out of the mud; very heavy. It's not an accutrigger by any stretch of the imagination.

After 5 rounds of factory Winchester CXP2 140gr at 100 and 5 totally incoherent hits.. I began to pay attention to the brass. There's some serious monkey business going on with the primers, and based on what the brass is doing toward the case head, I'd think it's a crappy chamber. They all did this (unfired vs. fired):

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I've never owned or shot a rifle that did this. Is there anything that can be done aside from seeing if Savage will fix it? Or is it even a problem? Personally, it made me nervous shooting after this revelation, so I quit. I'd think that a weak piece of brass would ruin someone's day in this case. I understand that it was bought as a combo deal for $350'ish... but good grief!

What do you guys think?
 
The primers aren't unusual. I've seen plenty of factory ammo do that with primers. The cases don't look toooo unusual either. Generous chamber perhaps but not that crazy.

Measure the cases and see if they're within SAAMI spec.
 
It was shooting about a 14" group at 100 yards... IDK what to tell him.
Click to expand...

Did you do anything to check the scope? If it is the one that came with the combo, I have seen reports that they are hit or miss on quality. I have not really seen any commentary about the rifles themselves being inacurate, though.
 
Nothing obvious on the scope; I checked tightness on the mounts last night, bore-sighted in my usual manor on a telephone pole down the street off my dining room table. For kicks, and to check general alignment, I centered the turrets prior to bore-sighting. It wasn't more than a few full twists off in any direction. It was also looking good at various powers. This isn't the scope that came on the combo... but based on bore sighting, I don't see how it could be a scope problem (unless the guts are just rattling around in there). It's a Barska 6.5-20 x 50 AO. Guess I should have included that detail in the original post.
 
There's a first time for everything but I've never seen a rifle that shoots 14" at 100. Heck, I've never seen one shoot 7" at 100.
You should be able to do that without a scope, just sighting down the mount itself.
Step one for me would be giving it a good cleaning and oiling (trigger too) and then trying a different scope.
 
Out of curiosity, did the kid tell you anything about the rifle? I'm wondering if he shot, got roughly the same results and wanted to see if you could do any better with it.

I'm going with broken scope. I had a Simmons that sat on a .30-06 that was good then one day at the range it was doing the same thing.. couldn't even keep them on a standard piece of paper at 100 yards.

The little 'ring' near the bottom of the case is interesting, but I don't think its the cause of problem. I'm certainly not a gunsmith, not by any stretch of the imagination. Good call choosing to be safe, just incase though!
 
Since that is factory ammo I would say not to be too worried about it..as far as gun did you go over every screw and make sure they were tight?? Make sure screws on scope mount are not over tight...also years ago I had a scope on my 30-40 krag that my cousin droped by acident..just before a hunt. So took the gun out late that night (leaving in the a.m.) and put 20 rounds thru it or so. My group loosened up about 1/2 at 100 yrds but I played it off on rushing to check gun. Got set up at camp and decided to go out for a couple of hours before dark and bam, theres a nice buck in front of me. Pull up to shoot and miss. Miss so bad I didn't even know where the shot went. When I got back to camp decided to go out and do some more precision shooting. 2 or 3 would be in tight group and 1 or 2 would be 4-6" out constantly...had me stumped. Took it to a gun shop and come to find out my recticals were broken but just holding on enough that things "looked" alright.
 
Alright guys. Thanks for the feedback. I'll ask him if he's still got the other scope; try that one (if it's not broken, not sure why he swapped it out.)
 
If the scope is a Barska, it needs to be swapped out. 90% chance the grouping is a scope issue and 10% (or less) that it's the rifle. I've had a 'name' scope die slowly and it was on a new rifle. Took me a zillion wasted reloads before I realized that the scope had to be the issue. If it had been a rifle I'd had for years, then I'd have known right away that it had to be the scope or mounts. But on a new rifle, you have no history. Gotta swap out the scope.
 
I just wanna pipe in here a moment, you say 14'' groups at 100 yds? 14 inches, 1 ft 2 inches?

Dude how did it ever get past 25 yds?

When test firing "other peoples" rifles, specially one you never saw shot before,, ALWAYS TRY 25 yds first,,, this will tell you more than you realize what your dealing with from the getgo!!;)

P.S. Peetza, you don't oil triggers, you clean them. If you oil them crud will follow and leave the trigger performing badly. Trigger makers say clean our triggers in "white gas" (coleman fuel) and lubricate it with Naptha, which is lighter fluid actually... You will get the best performance this way!:)

Oh and congrats I guess on becoming TFL Staff, you deserve to be on the Staff man!!:)
 
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Yeah, that was poorly worded....

Peetza meant clean and oil and don't forget to clean the trigger. Seems like most people never get into that part of the gun.

Although.... Peetza cleans and oils with the same product (Eezox), so my trigger is lightly oiled, though it is an amount that's indiscernible after a couple hours.


Thanks!;)
 
He's going to get a different scope sometime soon. If its an improvement, I'll be sure to follow up!
 
Had an issue with an old Tasco World Class years ago, every time I pulled the trigger it was hitting somewhere else. Sent the scope in for repair and it worked fine afterwords. I lost all faith in that scope and ended up replacing it anyway. I'll bet replacing the scope solves the issue.

Stu
 
I have a savage edge in 270 win , It is very accurate for what it is . I get easy 2 inch groups at 100 yards without even hardly trying. I think with a little effort I could get down to less than an inch so Im guessing it may be the scope.........................LOUD
 
I have an axis in 308 and i've shot sub moa with it using american eagle FMJ. Also mine doesn't have a plastic bolt handle.
 
I purchased a Savage Axis in .30-06 which is the same gun as the Edge. Trigger was absolutely awful. Pulling a car out of mud is putting it nicely. I messed around with some handloads to try to get anything decent out of it. In 150 rounds my best 3 shot group was 5 inches. They took it back and sent it to Savage as defective; I used the credit to get a decent rifle. Mine came with a Bushnell scope on it and had to locktite it because the mounts and rings that came with it were not good at all. Then when I tried to zero it I could only adjust it about 3 inches in any direction before it would stop moving the bullet. I've heard of people taking the trigger apart and taking the spring down a half coil at a time to adjust it lighter but I don't know if that's the best idea. The problem with the trigger is how it releases the bolt. Every time you fire the gun you have to release the entire mechanism that releases the bolt. If he has to shoot further than 50 yards I'd tell him to get a new gun..
 
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