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Savage LRP short chamber???

Bunnypunter

6.5pewpew
Full Member
Minuteman
Feb 25, 2012
242
19
Northern Utah
Ok, before the elitist start bashing on my Savage, step back and remember that we all gotta start this journey somewhere. Yes, I will own a custom setup one day when I grow up.

Anyway, I bought a new Savage LRP 6.5 Creedmoor and thought I could initally shoot factory 140 Amax's while my reloading setup was being funded. Over the 1 box of factroy ammo I shot, all showed pressure signs and several blew primers. I tried the factory 129 sst's and they shot quite well. I opened up a dialogue with Hornaday about thier loads being to hot and they had me send them in for investigation. Meanwhile, I setup to reload and when measuring COAL for Nosler CC 140s, found that max length was 2.750, not the available 2.810 spec that the factory loads to for Amax's. I called Savage this morning and told them what I expirienced and they want the rifle ASAP. The rep said that the chamber most likley had not been reamed deep enough.

Has anyone else run into this issue with the LRP's or am I just unlucky? Hoping to gather some input and ideas to ask Savage to inspect and verify before returning my rifle.

Thanks for your thoughts in advance.
 
I had a buggered chamber in my .260Rem LRP from late 2012. I didn't deal with Savage warranty service as I had swapped the trigger and had the barrel threaded for my suppressor (voided warranty). I just spun on a Shilen barrel. The original factory barrel eventually had the chamber end cut off, rechambered in 6.5 Creedmoor, and went from a large shank to small shank. That barrel shoots keeps pace with my Shilen. LRP's are massed produced rifles and not immune to defects.

Also, be aware that Hornady has been having some pressure issues with their Amax loadings.

http://www.snipershide.com/shooting.../236169-hornady-140-amax-ammo-old-vs-new.html
 
I witnessed a similar problem with a new Savage Sunday at the range. The gentleman who owned the rifle was having a hard time closing the bolt and factory FGMM was getting jammed into the rifling and he ended up getting one stuck in the rifling and forcing the bolt open left the bullet in the tube. It was a .308 and I'm not sure of the model.

I didn't look for pressure signs on his fired ammo, although I should have.
 
Kinda hard to compare oal between two different bullets hell i've had different lot numbers of the same brand that needed 5 thou longer or shorter oal than previous lot. Get ur hands on 140 amax and figure out what jam length is. Are u measuring from tip or ogive? What tool are u using to establish oal? Lots of variables here to decipher. Yes hornady has had pressure issues lately with 140 amax loads, i believe it stems from subbing out h4350 with hybrid100v.
I had/have that same rifle, factory ammo shot real good at 2825, this was 2.5 yrs ago. Handloads for that chamber had 140 amax at 2.215" from ogive, that set the bullet 20 thou off the lands. Replaced barrel to give the rifle a diet, with mcree and razor it was 19.25 lb, it wears an aics and a sendero-ish contour brux with a dmr scope. Trips the scale at 16.25 lbs with bipod and loaded 10 rd in place.
 
I'm a long time lurker on this board and this thread finally motivated me to register and post. We (myself and a group of shooter buddies) have bought about 6 of these over the past year. 4 in 6.5 CM, one in 243 win, one in 260 rem. Haven't had any problems with the 243 or 260. All 4 of the 6.5 CM's have the same problem as OP. My FIL is an awesome smith and gun builder and has decades of shooting and reloading xp. After much debate, testing, tinkering, etc., we've learned that the 6.5 CM chamber job is very shoddy. If you take a Hornady factory round with a 140 AMAX and chamber it, then open the bolt and close it 5 or 6 times you'll notice several things. The bolt is very hard to work and you may have to pound on it to open it. When you take the round out, the bullet will be very scuffed up behind the ogive. Basically the free bore of the chamber is too tight and very very rough. This leads to major problems with bullets like the AMAX, slightly less with a more VLD shape, and causes way high pressures. So we took a priece of aluminum and made a reamer handle in the lathe, took the action and barrel out of the stock, and then hand turned a sharp reamer a few times to smooth out the free bore. Put a new round in and that problem is now gone. After we fixed that problem, there weren't chambering and extracting issues, but still had pressure signs, leading us to the conclusion that the barrel is also probably tight bored. My next step is to use a barrel conditioning product like Tubbs final finish to try and smooth out the bore and maybe shave a fraction of a thousandth. Other than that, the only way to stop killing brass is to use lower powder charges (which should achieve adequate pressure in the tight bore). But if you aren't hand loading, then the pressure signs will likely persist. Hope that helps.
 
OP,same problem with my son's LRP.Sent it back and they said all they did was polish the chamber.Since we reload it's not a problem,we seat the Amax's at 2800.Your COAL will be different on your noslers compared to Amax's.
 
I Personally know of 3 local savage 6.5 CMs with bad chambers. These guys know rifles too so I know they are NOT the problem. Each has a 243 and a 260 as well with no problem but each of their 6.5CM are bad. You can not use brass after it has been fired in the rifle.

Hope they get it fixed.
 
Well this just sucks. Sounds like I'm not alone. I'll let Savage take a crack at it and see what they come up with. I know quite a few people with this exact rifle and thiers shoot amazing. I'll keep y'all posted as to what the end result is. I'm going to be reloading regardless of whether it will take factory loads or not. Unfortunatley, one of my objectives with buying this particular setup was to be able to purchase match grade ammo if I ever got in a component pinch. So, heres to hoping they make it all possible to do both.

BTW, i do understand that ogive will be differant on all bullets. Bottom line, a factory chamber should fit the round it was designed for.
 
I just boxed up my brand new 12LRP and shipped it back to Savage because it exhibited the same symptoms listed above. Factory Hornady 140 was doing 2875fps. Bullets were jamming into the lands and getting scuffed aft of the ogive. Couldn't group better than 1.75moa. Definitely a shoddy chamber. Its very disappointing as my other two Savages are great shooters. I'll post up my outcome once Savage gets back to me.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk
 
I witnessed a similar problem with a new Savage Sunday at the range. The gentleman who owned the rifle was having a hard time closing the bolt and factory FGMM was getting jammed into the rifling and he ended up getting one stuck in the rifling and forcing the bolt open left the bullet in the tube. It was a .308 and I'm not sure of the model.

I didn't look for pressure signs on his fired ammo, although I should have.
U probably talking about me If this occur in dayton
 
My Savage 10T in 308 caliber showed the exact same issue.

http://www.snipershide.com/shooting...k-lands-rifling-very-puzzled.html#post3151854

For the past month, there have been 2 instances of live rounds getting separated between bullet and case, spilling powder all over places, when I tried to umchamber the live rounds.

Curious to know what's going on, I used Honardy OAL gauge, inserts and modified case to measure the case bottom to ogive distance allowed in my rifle. The number shows that there should be 0.020+ inches of clearance from FGMM or Black Hills rounds to the lands. Then how come the bullets can get pushed into lands/rifling and got stuck there?

From what you guys were describing, this isn't really the lands that is biting the bullets. Instead, it is the chamber opening?
 
at least for me its not the ammo. i dont reload,tried winchester 168gr match, pmc, and fed match 175gr. none work
 
FGMM 175gr and Black Hills 168gr both got separated and bullet stuck in chamber.

Norma 168gr works fine.

I think both Norma and Black Hills are using 168gr SMK, so I am a bit puzzled by why one of them does not fit while the other works fine.
 
Savage LRP short chamber???

OP,

I've got a 6.5 Creed 12LRP that exhibits pressure with factory loaded 140 Amax ammo as well. Extractor marks often and blown primers occasionally. Unfired ammunition chambers and extracts without issue. I've checked my ogive to lands distance and found it to be around 0.009", so the bullets aren't jammed in my rifle. Velocity is 2850 fps. Accuracy at 100yds is around 3/4 MOA, but it shot 1/2 MOA at 1000m the one time I took it that far with this over pressure ammo.

In looking at the ammo thread, it seems this problem isn't exclusive to Savage 12LRP's. I don't have any lead to slug the bore with, so I don't know for certain that I do or don't have a tight bore. Hopefully I can find some H4350 in stock somewhere and start hand loading until Hornady gets their ammo right. The shitty part is I was hoping to use the once fired brass to reload, but it's only use is scrap after the pressure it's seen.
 
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Hopefully I'll have an update from Hornaday and Savage soon. Thanks for all the replies. Love the gun but it's gotta be shooting safe and straight with factory or hand loads.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
I'm a long time lurker on this board and this thread finally motivated me to register and post. We (myself and a group of shooter buddies) have bought about 6 of these over the past year. 4 in 6.5 CM, one in 243 win, one in 260 rem. Haven't had any problems with the 243 or 260. All 4 of the 6.5 CM's have the same problem as OP. My FIL is an awesome smith and gun builder and has decades of shooting and reloading xp. After much debate, testing, tinkering, etc., we've learned that the 6.5 CM chamber job is very shoddy. If you take a Hornady factory round with a 140 AMAX and chamber it, then open the bolt and close it 5 or 6 times you'll notice several things. The bolt is very hard to work and you may have to pound on it to open it. When you take the round out, the bullet will be very scuffed up behind the ogive. Basically the free bore of the chamber is too tight and very very rough. This leads to major problems with bullets like the AMAX, slightly less with a more VLD shape, and causes way high pressures. So we took a priece of aluminum and made a reamer handle in the lathe, took the action and barrel out of the stock, and then hand turned a sharp reamer a few times to smooth out the free bore. Put a new round in and that problem is now gone. After we fixed that problem, there weren't chambering and extracting issues, but still had pressure signs, leading us to the conclusion that the barrel is also probably tight bored. My next step is to use a barrel conditioning product like Tubbs final finish to try and smooth out the bore and maybe shave a fraction of a thousandth. Other than that, the only way to stop killing brass is to use lower powder charges (which should achieve adequate pressure in the tight bore). But if you aren't hand loading, then the pressure signs will likely persist. Hope that helps.
Same thing here with my dads 6.5cm. I cleaned up the freebore with good reamer. Still the same problems with pierced primers. Has to be a tight bore, although i didnt notice it being tight when test fitting the bushings to dial in the barrel. About ready to ditch the barrel and put a bartlien on it. 41.8 g h4350 is just too hot.