Technique, technique, technique, technique

I spent several hours today with a friend working on zeroing the scope again and again and working on my technique. Several things i have learned over the last few days:

• start where the scope is too close and move backwards
• have your head upright - if need be, bring your chin down on the stock and then move downwards
• find the brightest spot with no shades at all. The two above techniques are basically just helps with that

I have also finally sanded down the part of the stcok where the barrel was touching on the left hand side, so now it is finally free. I managed to get some nice groups today, so I am beginning to feels mildly optimistic about my shooting. I definitely feel less adrift. I ended the day on a group of three around the Bull's Eye - covering maybe the area of a 0.5€ coin.

Accutrigger adjustment

I finally disassembled the gun for the first time just now and had a look at adjusting the trigger pull downwards. Again this is an incredibly primitive assembly. One supposedly needs a specialised tool but a small screwdriver did the job nicely (one needs to turn a spring in a thread). I keep being amazed how Savage get such precision with such primitive means. But it explains why they are affordable.

The trigger pull is now way down and I am looking forward to trying it out.

Instructions can be found here

Shotgun!

My club had a second hand left hand semi auto Remington for sale which I took out for a test drive and could not resist. So I have put down money on it and will be very slowly acquiring it. This is waay cheaper than i foresaw acquiring a decent semi auto shotgun, which is what I wanted.

On scoping again

Well, I thought I had understood it - I hadn't. Today I think I finally got a clue. My score improving by 30 points would seem to be an indicator.

Here is what I learned:

Find the spot in the distance from the scope where you have a clear picture. No back rim of haze around the image, plain clear image. This is more straightforward than one thinks. Where I fell down is that I did not realize that if one goes too far forward things will start to haze up again. I used to keep a bit of a haze around the image because I thought that allowed me to keep things centred. Well, it didn't. keep a clear image in the scope. If it is too dull, go back, if it has rims, go forward.

I should now be able to, with a bit more practice, reliably shoot and 8 or higher. at 50m that is a 1" circle, good enough for shooting bunnies as I am told. Also I am a bit shocked. German hunters claim that 'a beermat with 3 shots at 100m' is good enough. I'd prefer the 1€ coin, thanks a lot. After all we want to reliably kill.

The Savage has been fixed.

Oh and boy does she shoot. As to the problem: turns out that the extractor consists of cheap pressed pieces. A mechanical wizard friend of mine got her working in two hours and now she extracts without any major problems. I fired ~180 rounds last Sunday and had to maybe repeat again for 5 of them and had to extract one with the knife. This is very acceptable.

She is also by now proudly wearing a moderator and a guns sling. I'll post a piccie shortly.

I also had gotten confused about how to use a scope properly which got explained to me last Sunday and wohei all of a sudden my scores are improving majorly :D

I have also gotten an invite to go after rabbits in Wexford and am working on shooting permissions at a colleague's family's neighbour. Chuffed I am.

Experiences with my Savage

I received my Savage in June. I absolutely love it. I shoot better with it than with the club's benchrest rifles. I have not used it much, mostly because the extractor doesn't work, which results in pulling 90% of cartridges fired from the barrel with a screwdriver. I have a kit sitting at home to replace that and then we will see.

I am told that that is a not uncommon problem with Savage. I am willing to accept that for the overall precision, unbeatable trigger.

I have not yet bought a moderator as I don't have a hunting opportunity yet.

OkOK, 338-06 AI it is ...

I hope  have bored everybody to tears by now ;) While looking at cartridges I kept returning to the .338-06 Ackley Improved and I think that'll be the one. Since I want a custom rifle anyway it is no major hassle and it gives a bit more oomph, especially with single base powders. These I want in order to avoid muzzle flash when shooting at night. why that? Well the problem with muzzle flash is not so much that you get seen, but that you get blinded and can't actually see your prey for a few seconds.

Also this gives me > 750 m/s out to more than 250 m which really should be sufficient. 750 m/s is the speed that the KJG needs in order to open properly.

Also the .338-06 AI uses a long action which means that since I want a Savage action I can simply get a 110 for which aftermarket stocks are plentyful.