Thread: The little pig that could...

So most of you guys know I love the Savages. Easy barrel changes, simple bolt design...

A while ago, I had an opportunity to pick up a long action lefty for a bargain, and grabbed it

Not 100% convinced about the awesomeness of the 270 Win caliber (sorry Ryan), I hatched a plan to turn it into a light-weight bush piglet.

My 7mm-08 SA Savage that is the rifle I take to gong shoots lives in a pillar bedded Boyds stock and has a Shillen barrel (another TM bargain I picked up for $ 75, haha).

So the plan was to take the original factory 7-08 barrel, screw that into long action, and run it in the blind mag plastic stock. Leupy VX3 3.5-10 CDS and DPT can would complete the project. All good so far.

The rifle turned up on my doorstep at 09H30 on a Friday morning, the same day I was supposed to leave for the Taranaki hunting comp run by Gillie. So what do I do ? Well, unscrew barrels on both actions, put the Shillen on the SA and the shorty factory barrel on the LA. Oh, I forgot to mention that in a fit of bravery/stupidity, I had decided to turn down the now 14 inch factory barrel to get more weight out of it - amazing what you can do on a 1940's Myford ML7 ! Most of the 14 inch barrel is now a 0.625 pencil profile., haha. So after a mad dash to the range to zero it, I was off to New Plymouth. The one concession I made to the safety gods was to wear a full face-shield for the first shot... Got me some strange looks from @Puffin who happened to be at the range that day. Told @Gillie the story that night and he just looks at me and shakes his head...

No surprises, the rifle did not shoot all that well, and I spent most of the day missing plates. Obviously the barrel did not like my attempts at weight-loss, or it REALLY did not like 162 gr AMAXes.

Spoke to Gillie's dad about the barrel, and he reckoned that he has never had much joy turning down stainless barrels

Fast forward a couple of days, after some more research, I decided to make a brass lap, and give the crown a bit of a touch-up. Still no joy, basically shooting 3 MOA groups.

The final attempt was to feed it something much lighter. Ordered 120gr Pro-Hunters, and loaded a ladder with those.

Success !!! Shot some tests with these today, 5-shot groups off a daypack, so mimics what the rifle will be used for. Low shot in D was the monkey behind the rifle, so ignoring that one, it was 1.2 moa 4-shot group. Got to be happy with an avderage of 1.5 off a daypack, especially considering what I was seeing before.



It weighs 3.2kg scoped and suppressed, so much nicer to carry than the 4.7 kg gong rifle.

I still have the original 22 inch 270 barrel, so next up will be working up a load for that one using some 150gr SST's