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Old 04-28-2022, 5:55 AM
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waveslayer waveslayer is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Surferchris1 View Post
Well, sounds like your off to a good start. Unfortunately this little corner of Calguns isn't very active.
  • .308 is fine for what you're doing. It's not what I'd choose to compete with, and not necessarily what I'd recommend to my friends; but if it's what you have you can learn a lot with it. It'll probably be a long time until it's holding you back. Don't listen to anyone that tells you it isn't a workable cartridge for recreational long range shooting.
  • Snipershide might have an attitude, you don't have to like it, but it's probably the single best resource we have.
  • Accurateshooter.com is a little more civilized. It seems like more benchrest guys; but there is value to us in what the benchrest guys are doing.
  • If you would consider yourself "good at math" buy and read all of Bryan Litz's books. Start with Applied Ballistics for Long Range Shooting, then read Accuracy and Precision for Long Range Shooting. These books might seem expensive but they've saved me so much money! They test all the variables so I don't have to test them myself. I personally like the engineering/scientific approach.
  • If you don't like math, skip Litz's book and get Ryan Cleckner's book. I mean Cleckner's book is good either way, I've even seen him post here.
  • Erik Cortina, F-Class John, Applied Ballistics, Winning in the Wind, Vortex Nation and Impact Shooting are pretty good YouTube channels.
  • Someone will probably recommend TiborasaurasREX's Sniper 101 YouTube Series. It's alright but don't take it too seriously. It wasn't bad 10 years ago when there wasn't much information out there, but I think there's better content and resources now. Also, he's just kind of a tool.
  • What ballistics calculator are you running? I've tried several and personally like BallisticsARC the best, Hornady is probably second and has some cool super accurate drag curves if you shoot Hornady bullets. Applied ballistics app is very highly regarded but I haven't used it personally. I've got all my data in BallisticsARC already and don't want to switch now; but if I was starting from scratch that would probably be my pick.
Now about your gun specifically, because I also have a Savage 12 (that was at one time) chambered in .308.
  • My Savage worked very well with Sierra 175gr Tipped Matchkings and about 44.5 grains of Varget. (But of course start low and work up your own load) This load stayed supersonic to about 1100Y and gave me 10.6 Mils of drop at 1000. It also shot 168 Grain TMKs, and 178 Grain Hornady ELD-Ms well.
  • I tried heavier and lighter bullets, but I couldn't push the heavier ones fast enough and I actually got more drop at 1000. And the lighter ones scrubbed velocity too fast and didn't stay supersonic to 1000. 175gr was the sweet spot for me.
  • The Acutrigger is pretty good, at least as far as stock triggers go, but this $7 spring from gunshack lets you dial it a little lighter if you want to. (It's an OEM Savage part that they use on their "Target" and "Varmint" models.)
  • Some of the bolt lift kits make a minor improvement, but don't expect a drastic change.
  • Some people complain about extraction problems with Savages. I've never had a problem, but I do replace the ejector and extractor springs every few years on most of my guns that I shoot a lot. It only costs a few dollars and I consider it regular maintenance.


Excellent post

My wife thinks I only have 3 guns
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