Eley ammo and my Savage mkii TR Tactica

[jholcomb383]

i was curious if anyone else has had issues with Eley ammo not a firing in their rimfires? I was running some various ammos with my savage mkii yesterday to try and figure out which round my Savage would group the best because I am sick of running CCI standard.

My best groups were with Lapua Center X, SK standard Plus, and Eley Force. But the inconsistency of rounds to fire with Eley force and target both spook me. Could it be something with my gun??

 

[jholcomb383]

For what it’s worth here is my rig with a Nikon fx1000 4x16 ffp before I swapped it out to the 6x24 vortex diamondback tactical ffp. I bought the 4x16 diamondback for my wife’s mkii Fvsr and really loved the scope for the money, plus Christmas tree

 

[billmeek]

I never had a brand specific failure to fire with the B22 and Mark II Savage rifiles. Mine pretty much would shoot anything. They did show an accuracy preference. I went from CCI and Agulia SV, to SK Standard Plus, then on to SK Rifle Match in the Savage rifles in order to reduce fliers.

If you look at the rounds not firing are they light strikes? Have you pulled the bolt apart and cleaned it?

Something to remember is that they Eley Force is a high velocity ammo designed for power over accuracy.

 

[Eoddave27]

My CZ457 doesn’t shoot Eley ammo that well but seems to love anything made by lapua. That said the Eley ammo you tested were a Supersonic ammo and Eley’s base ammo which I have found isn’t much better than CCI SV. The Savage I had shot Eley Edge and Wolf MT both extremely well. I never looked any farther than those because they shot so well.

 

[jholcomb383]

I never had a brand specific failure to fire with the B22 and Mark II Savage rifiles. Mine pretty much would shoot anything. They did show an accuracy preference. I went from CCI and Agulia SV, to SK Standard Plus, then on to SK Rifle Match in the Savage rifles in order to reduce fliers.

If you look at the rounds not firing are they light strikes? Have you pulled the bolt apart and cleaned it?

Something to remember is that they Eley Force is a high velocity ammo designed for power over accuracy.

I had the issue with both Eley force and Eley Target. Both looked to me (a novice) that they were not light strikes, but those specific rounds would need to be cycled another round in most cases and sometimes up to three times before it would crack off. I tested two Eleys, two SK ammos, the lapua center x, 3 different federal “match”, and cci standard and blazer just to see which direction I ought to start working in. The Eley force grouped in the top 3 but sometimes it would be 5 shots out of ten that wouldn’t fire. Which was annoying to say the least. And no, I have not actually taken the bolt apart yet. Is there anything I should be looking for??

 

[jholcomb383]

My CZ457 doesn’t shoot Eley ammo that well but seems to love anything made by lapua. That said the Eley ammo you tested were a Supersonic ammo and Eley’s base ammo which I have found isn’t much better than CCI SV. The Savage I had shot Eley Edge and Wolf MT both extremely well. I never looked any farther than those because they shot so well.

Attached I have my groups. Nothing cherry picked. I did it at 50 yards out of my lead sled too. I think if anything this told me what brands to focus on and which to avoid for my specific gun. Now I have to do this for the wife’s lol

 

[billmeek]

You only should have to do a basic cleaning on the bolt by pulling the retaining spring on the front then removing the extractor, ejector, and firing pin. The channels where they sit can accumulate a buildup of junk. I use a brush, cotton swabs, and picks to get it all clean. Rather than using a wet lub (i.e. Rem oil) which will capture debris, I'll use a dry lube like Hornady One Shot if I think the bolt requires it.

Just be sure to notate where each part goes before disassembly. I also suggest using this method to put the retaining spring back on so you don't loose tension:

Savage MK11 BV won't extract.

I have a Savage MK11 BV that won't extract the used cartridge. I had the bolt reblued after reworking the bolt handle and adding a knurled bolt knob. I don't really think that is the reason for not extracting the spent cases. Could it be from too much lead and carbon around the chamber area...

www.rimfirecentral.com

That retaining clip can be a pain to get on and off.

Something else you can do is contact Savage and request a new extractor, ejector, firing pin, and retaining spring. They will send you a single replacement of each for free. I'd compare the new parts to the ones installed and see if there is any significant wear.

 

[Eoddave27]

Attached I have my groups. Nothing cherry picked. I did it at 50 yards out of my lead sled too. I think if anything this told me what brands to focus on and which to avoid for my specific gun. Now I have to do this for the wife’s lol

Wow, that doesn’t look like the way my Savage shot. Mine shot everything pretty decent and some things exceptionally well. Most or the ammo I tried would shoot around 1/2” at 50 yards with some shooting better and a few shooting worse. Below is a 10 shot group with CCI SV. I never thought to shoot a 6x5 with it or take a bunch of pictures of the groups. This is only one group but the photo was pretty typical of the rifle. It was my first 22 so I didn’t think it was anything that special. Pretty much every Savage I have owned was very accurate and the 22 was no exception.

I don’t want to make any assumptions about your shooting ability but you may want to try shooting off a bipod with a rear bag. The reason I say this is when I tried using a lead sled my friend had unless the parallax on the scope is dialed in perfect it was difficult to get a consistent sight picture. When you get behind a rifle and stay on the glass the whole time you will not get that shift you do while using a lead sled and moving your head back and forth. That just isn’t what would expect from a Savage. I had some functional issues with my magazines but accuracy with that rifle was never an issue. It was a tack driver.

 

[jholcomb383]

I do typically do my shooting off a bipod and an Armageddon Game Changer. I was just doing a quick ammo test that day, and admittedly I may not have been running it right. Most of the ammos only got 10 rounds through so one could argue that the barrel didn’t really get the chance to get used to the round. I will be doing more extensive work with the top three that I have mentioned before, and likely finalize on SK and Lapua and give the rest of my Eley force to someone else

 

[Eoddave27]

I do typically do my shooting off a bipod and an Armageddon Game Changer. I was just doing a quick ammo test that day, and admittedly I may not have been running it right. Most of the ammos only got 10 rounds through so one could argue that the barrel didn’t really get the chance to get used to the round. I will be doing more extensive work with the top three that I have mentioned before, and likely finalize on SK and Lapua and give the rest of my Eley force to someone else

That could defiantly be an issue. With my savage when I changed ammo I had to shoot a full 10 round magazine before the rifle would settle down. I only had that issue when changing brands and lube. I could go from SK to Lapua with no problem for instance because they are both made by Lapua with the same lube. Now if I switch from SK to Wolf it was a whole different story. When I switched from SK to Eley I got some crazy velocities too. I was shooting Eley contact after SK which is usually right at 1100 FPS. The first 5 rounds after the SK I was getting 1150-1175 FPS out of the Eley. After that it settled down to where it should be. This wasn’t just in the Savage either. I saw the same thing in my CZ457.

I hope you can get it sorted out. As I said earlier accuracy has never been an issue with any of the Savage rifles I owned. Just keep an eye on those magazines. When mine started getting old I had all kinds of reliability issues which is why I ultimately sold it. My friend who bought it got new magazines and it shoots as good as ever. Until those magazines go bad anyway. There are fixes posted online for them which I tried but was never able to make the old magazines as reliable as I needed.

 

[Near miss]

I do typically do my shooting off a bipod and an Armageddon Game Changer. I was just doing a quick ammo test that day, and admittedly I may not have been running it right. Most of the ammos only got 10 rounds through so one could argue that the barrel didn’t really get the chance to get used to the round. I will be doing more extensive work with the top three that I have mentioned before, and likely finalize on SK and Lapua and give the rest of my Eley force to someone else

Yes, a test of 10 of each ammo will show you no ammo capabilities, it is merely a proof that switching ammo does not work. Also, I have understood that test bench should absorb 100 of recoil to make it smooth / even close to human shooting it.

I am testing lots (SK Biathlon and SK LRM) this weekend and I bought 50 or 100 of each lot, and shoot them after shooting some of the same ammo from the previous lot. The problem is that we know there will be an effect but not when it ends.