Savage target action: GreTan blueprint vs. Sharp Shooter Supply Time&True

[LA50SHOOTER]

I am looking into getting some work done with my Savage target action and have been looking around. I have talked to Greg from GreTan and I plan on getting my firing pin bushed pretty soon.

I have heard good things about having SSS time a true actions but what are the differances compared to having GreTan blueprint my action.

What i understand from Greg is that i would need a new barrel after his work, i havent heard anything like that with the time and true.

Just looking for some experiences and to hear about the differances between the smithwork. Thanks.

I've Had Greg at Gre-Tan do 3 model 12 Target actions and a 112 (Long Single-Shot Target) for me. Basically, I asked Greg to do everything possible that he could to improve the action. - The cost is not modest but IMO well worth it. - And Yes you'll need to do it with a re-barrel which I was doing anyway. (To upgrade from factory barrels or as a "base-line" build to have a rifle with custom barrels). - I added the Rifle-Basix SAV-2 triggers using the Red springs.
- I am Very Satisfied with what has been delivered and the performance of the actions.
- One thing to consider is the total price one is willing to spend on an action upgrade & if possibly a custom action isn't more prudent.
- I've had 1 done by SSS and it also was a good job but as stated by others who have spoken in the thread, the customer service & waiting just are considerable, and for me not worth it from my standpoint.
- Greg Tannel is First Class in All the Work he does. - His main-stay is bolt action rifles and he works to very meticulous tolerances. - This is a machinist who builds tooling for other gunsmiths to work with. - He has a great attitude when working with the customer. - Simply put I can't say anything at all negative about any work that he has carried out and he's provided services on rifles for me in .50 BMG through .223 A.I. - He is my preferred gunsmith and I have No reservations about having him do any scope of work.
- Ron -

 

[Spook]

is it me or does the cost of the action and the cost of having whomever do what they do to it .... to say nothing of the wait, justify buying a custom action and building from that?

 

[bsekf]

I have had Fred T&T 3 of my actions in the past 5 years, none have taken over 3 months. Follow the directions on the web site for contacting Lisa, she will give you a date and number for when to send the action to them. Or , that's the way it worked for me. If you are also ordering barrels or stocks....... that's a different ball game.

Bill

 

[coyote-slayer]

Same experience here. I re-barreled a Savage 223 with a Shilen Select and could not be happier. Shooting it at 100 is a waste of time. Just one hole.

Does your shilen sing when you clean it lol... mine just sings the whole time I'm sending a soaked patch down it... I love it, to 8 patches with 8 nylon brush scrubs to get it clean lol... with these shilens, it's the first time I have not had to spend half the day cleaning them

 

[mauser284]

I know this is an old thread. I am updating the heat treatment on Savage center fire actions.

They do not come out of an oven glowing cherry red. Even 15-20 years ago Savage was using induction heating using electromagnetic induction machine. You have super high oscillating frequency and electromagnetic lines of force. The second anything is inserted that has the ability to alter and interact with those it begins to heat super fast.

To the untrained eye it will just look like the copper coils one might find in a refrigerator or the water line to the fridge for water and ice maker before everything went to plastic.

There is no residual heat you could touch the coils and they would feel cool to the touch but once you insert a metallic object into the coils it instantly starts to heat the object not the coils.

Back when General Motors still made their axles in house when before Saginaw Steering, Axles and Bearing where split off from GM and made into independent companies GM used similar tech to heat treat the axles. Looks like magic to the untrained eye. Turned a hot miserable job into one that was not bad at all comparatively. I will say this just like the welders that had been on the job any length of time all had sunken looking eye's and dark circles talking old school stick welders it seemed like a lot of the guys doing the induction heating where bald. Just seemed odd that that department seemed to have disportionately higher rate of bald men working in that area! Small sample size though.

Today you have hand held units sold to mechanics to heat fasteners with no risk of open flame and radiant heat that can do damage to surrounding parts. You have units designed for case annealing. All kinds of plans online to help you build your own units. Super energy efficient since very little power is used when not actually heating a part unlike a gas, coal, hydrogen fired furnace/Kiln/Oven.

You can have a lot of effective heating power in a compact low cost package that is just transformers, transistors, capacitors, MOV's, heat sink and some copper coils. It has been used in industry for many many many decades. The machinery can be as simple or complicated as you want to make it and it is not at all difficult to have different stations that selective heat different area's and you can like wise selectively cool different area's of a part as well. Again as simple or complicated as you need or want to make it.

The unit I saw Savage using was about as simple as simple get's.

The one thing I wonder most about though is how modern barrel manufacturing deals with heat treating and normalizing. I can not imagine too many barrel makers have massive furnaces and heat the barrels up to 1200 and then let them air cool in the furnace over a 12 hour period. You would think that something that wasteful can not still be in use! You would imagine that one would tweak the steel formulation to allow for less need for such high heat and long soak times! I think most companies that use CHF barrels only heat treat the barrel blank once with no normalization after hammering. I think I read where 1 European manufacture still does heat treat before and and after.

If anyone has any insight on this I would love to hear it!