Awesome rifle!! Tack driver!! Thanks Buds!!

Managed a 2.125" grouping of 10 shots at 200 yards during break-in using 68gr. hp, so I'm very optimistic this will turn into a good rifle for bench shooting. Loading the blind box is somewhat cumbersome, but I'm hand feeding it and was going to modify it with a single shot follower anyway. The stock is pretty homely but I'm in no hurry to replace it since the gun seems to shoot just fine as is. Mounted an old Tasco 16x scope on it for break-in, but considering how it is shooting for starters I'm in no hurry to replace it either. Looking forward to see how it responds to heavier loads. Great service from Bud's on this order, and in addition to their good price Savage has a $100 rebate program going on.

This rifle was initially shooting some horizontal strings. I checked the barrel for free-floating and found that there were some high spots on the stock contacting the barrel. Also, the stock to barrel main bolt was loose. Since the stock is synthetic, I simple removed the barrel and action, and used some fine sandpaper to knock down the high spots inside the barrel groove of the stock. It took just a few minutes. I also made sure to tighten the stock-to-barrel bolts adequately. After another trip to the range, I was getting 1" groups with some ammo and 1.5" groups with another. The magazine is internal and does not have a drop-plate. Therefore, to unload it, you put the safety in it's middle position and run the bolt to extract/eject each cartridge. It's taking a little getting used to loading the internal magazine as the cartridges want to roll to one side or the other. This gun is terrific for the price, but if I had it to do over, I would probably buy the same model but with a removable magazine.

As others have said, this rifle is very accurate right out of the box, easy to shoot and little recoil. I'm a bench shooter and this rifle is perfect for me. Service from Buds was excellent.

Excellent rifle in every way, my go to rifle for most hunting.