Not downplaying your experience in any manner, Savage raked you over the coals big time, I know the point of this whole thing isn't to spend more money and be "gtg" on a rifle that by all rights should have been from the factory. Heck, by all rights the $250 Axis rigs shouldn't even have the issues your dealing with. If they are going to the effort to make a rifle, at bare minimum at least make it function properly. I was trying to add sarcasm/humor to the sitiuation, not making a pointed statement, so I apologize for not making that more clear, I realize it was somewhat clouded.
I posted while playing cards with the family and didn't put much thought into it, just kind of laughed in disgust at the whole situation, then had a conversation with my cousin about how not to buy savages (or nearly any other high production factory bolt rifle) for anything but an action. Out of 5 that I have recently dealt with, I'm fairly certain two of them have screwed up throats and another had a dinged up chamber from the factory that physically couldn'tchamber a round, and that is just the savages, have a few experiences with Remington as well. The ones with the suspicious throats, it is very hard to find a solid reading on the lands, and when you do, if you chamber a round it leaves scratches on one side of the bullet, almost as if one land comes further down towards the chamber (as I have seen on other factory savages). I need to purchase a bore scope to confirm, but it seems somewhat obvious. So these $550 rifles will need a minimum of another $350 just to be accurate consistent rifles, when the chamber is reamed off center, I doubt it's possible to just push a reamer in to clean it up.
The one with the dinged up throat that wouldn't even chamber a round was an axis that I paid $250 for, and instead of sending it back to the factory, I paid my smith to ream and finish the chamber properly, about $60. In principle, savage should have fixed it free of charge. If it was a more expensive rifle like yours, I likely would have gone the same route as you, to much dismay obviously. But being it was a cheaper model, and I had very little faith in them fixing a rifle that they sent out like that in the first place, I just had my smith do it.
I suppose the point of all this should be, if you buy a savage, just plan on either buying a new barrel for it or having your smith fix your new rifle to get it in proper functioning order, reguardless of which tier it is in savages line up. Pretty ridiculous that is a consideration.
I am currently working on a friends remington 700 BDL 7mm rem mag that was built in 1974, and it's amazing!! Upon bolt lift, I can hear and feel solid defined functioning, the primary extraction works flawlessly, timing is right, and feeding is smooth as butter. Pretty sad, that almost 50 years later with much better technology, I have to send the same brand new action off to LRI to have the timing advanced and primary extraction fixed because in this day and age Remington can't consistently make an action that is capable of EXTRACTING a round. That isn't even taking into account the chamber issues that Remington has that mirror your Savage.
Again, my comment wasn't meant as a directive or a quick fix, it was in jest, as the products that make it out both Remington and Savage doors these days (maybe others) are past the point of out of spec, and to the point of flat laughable.
"Buy with the intent of fixing".
......obviously just joking and in reference to a 22 page or maybe more thread about brand bashing....some of you may hevechecked it out.
