Problems with my new .22

2568 Views 18 Replies 7 Participants Last post by Orange Boy, May 16, 2009

Orange Boy

Discussion Starter · May 8, 2009 (Edited)

The gun is a brand new .22 Savage MKII Bolt Rifle with the heavy barrel. The load was Eley Sport .22 RF LR 40 Gr. standard velocity. The gun was thoroughly cleaned and lightly oiled the evening prior to its debut at the range today. Same for the bolt (except the surface where the bolt meets the back of the cartridge was not oiled). Action felt new and tight, but smooth prior to its first shoot.

The problem was many failures to eject...at least 12 and maybe more in the 100 I shot. The back of the cartridge case would ride back on the bolt and stay there hung up on the ejector claw. I'd have to dig the case out from the end of the bolt with the tip of my little finger before I could close the bolt and chamber another round from the magazine. It helped to eject without a problem if I aggressively pulled back on the bolt with a "snap" rather than a relaxed motion...but it still happened a few more times.

Being new to .22 rifles I'm not sure what to make of this. Fussy or bad ammo...break in period...something defective? I'm not even sure if this is something that warrants returning to Savage or maybe there's a fix I could try? What do you all think?

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Orange Boy

Discussion Starter · #3 · May 8, 2009

Thanks for the tip Brownie :thumsup

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Orange Boy

Discussion Starter · #9 · May 8, 2009

John Hatcher said:
+1, My friend and I also had problems with that ammo.

steve66 said:
I would try different ammo

Mac45 said:
Savage has a reputation for quality, so I would expect it to be an ammo issue. I would try ammo from Remington and Winchester.

This is exactly what a the rangemaster told me yesterday. I picked up some Remington ammo last night and will try it today and report back. I'll send it back to Savage if I have to, but I'd really rather not be without it as I've got the .22 bug now.

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Orange Boy

Discussion Starter · #10 · May 9, 2009

Well I got some fresh Remington .22 Champion High Velocity and shot about 100 rounds. There were only 2 FTE's and they were near the end of the session. I think with better ammo and a break in period I will probably be OK with this rifle.

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Orange Boy

Discussion Starter · #13 · May 10, 2009 (Edited)

Hey Brownie...somebody on that other forum still thinks I may need to swap out the extractor and asked for a closeup, so I obliged with the shot below and also I added another picture of a "burr" like compression thing that has been happening in another area of the bolt. It seems to be metal rolling over from blunt impact. Anybody see anything wrong (or right) with these photos? I haven't a clue...but I'm learning as fast as I can.

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Orange Boy

Discussion Starter · #16 · May 10, 2009 (Edited)

Any ideas if that bumped in metal part is normal? Anyway, I just wanted to post over here too as this I consider my home base :thumsup

Update: I'm told the bumped in metal is from where the sear acts as a stop to the bolt and is considered normal.

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Orange Boy

Discussion Starter · #17 · May 13, 2009

Well my FTE problem is solved. Turns out someone in the forum Brownie pointed me too (BTW thanks Brownie) noticed that the ejector rod that rides the bolt was sitting low in the channel by 1-2 mm. This meant that it was hitting the base of the cartridge low and sometimes slipping off causing the cartridge to just sit in the ejector claws and never pop out of the gun. The ejector guide is mounted to the receiver, so I removed the bolt and was able to carefully bend the ejector guide up a hair. What a difference a millimeter (or 2) makes. Now I can pull the bolt back slowly and "ping" out comes the case with a snap. The real test will be at the range. I have an assortment of ammo to run through it.

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Orange Boy

Discussion Starter · #19 · May 16, 2009

Just got back from the range and put about 150 rounds of ammo from 3 different manufacturers. Bolt was pulled back slowly each time to facilitate an FTE...but not one in all those rounds. Better than the 10% I was getting last week. I also took the bolt apart and smoothed all the stress points as well as the machined burrs etc. Made a big difference in the feel...no more of that gritty feeling when working it.

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