Goodyear on a GT2 RS!
I had the same experience.
I bought an SSG 08 from EuroOptic. Great guys to deal with. It came with the Versa-Pod. I am bewildered by the thought process that goes into selling a great rifle like the SSG 08 and then sending it with such a low quality POS like the Versa-Pod. That is like putting goodyear tires on a Porsche GT2 RS! It's made of grille metal at best and the fit and finish is terrible. It is a rip off of the Parker-Hale, and for the life of me, I can't understand why Steyr wouldn't go that route if they were trying to keep the price down. The Parker-Hale is better metal and not as much as the Steyr heavy duty (
Fortmeier by the previous post) found on the .338 LM. Maybe the Austrians are still upset that they couldn't cross the English Channel and give it a go back when their man was at the helm in Germany, who knows!
I sold it immediately on eBay for close to new pricing and then bought the heavy duty Steyr bipod that you see on the .338 LM. Now, THIS, is a quality design. Might not have every feature for every shooter but the quality is unmistakable and is appropriate to be attached the art that is the SSG 08.
On a side note, I found all the screw sizes on the SSG 08, if anyone is interested. For my .308 here they are:
Standard Torx T30 for all Torx, including the picatinny rails, other than the scope mount picatinny rail, which is a T15
Allen/Hex Metric 4mm for the hinge area and the cheek piece for-aft adjustment screws; 5mm for two main receiver bolts (I presume you'd never loosen these, and if I remember correctly, the manual says the same).
2 mm for the small stop screw on the muzzle break
3 mm for all the side screws on the fore end and the small screw on the bottom of the bipod spigot.
Open ended wrenches: 22mm for the muzzle break, 19 mm for the mid muzzle break area (this is a narrow area and must have a wrench that is very narrow. The gap here is only 6.87 mm wide so it will take a narrow wrench to fit this area. I'm not sure if the muzzle break is a one piece break, as I haven't taken it off yet for my future suppressor, but I presume you would loosen the break with a 22 mm after you loosen the 2 mm Allen/hex, and then you might use a 19 mm here to remove the break. The only other use i could think of here is for some kind of attachment for the muzzle which is 19 mm wide in the middle section. Maybe this was a bayonet mount of some sort? Any help here would be appreciated.
Wiha-Tools, made in Germany, makes quality tools and I picked up some of their insulated tools for field adjustments, if needed. They are quality eye candy but if you don't want to spend this much, they make great basic allen/hex and torx sets, as well as very thin open ended wrenches.
Great stuff, these Austrians and Germans make.
'Driver