What's the story about flex in the MLII action ???

[sagittarius]

Could not help but notice on my scope thread and others, that, some guys talk about the Savage MLII action having too much flex.
If so, what are the causes ?
Is it the way it's bedded, the type steel used, extra heavy bullets, or is it a design flaw ?
Like others have stated, I consider it a pretty "beefy" action and was surprised to read about the concerns with flex in the MLII action.
Do you guys really think flex in the action is causing scope failure ?
If so, what are the cures ?

[rbinar]

Mar 5, 2009 23:45:08 GMT -5 sagittarius said:

Could not help but notice on my scope thread and others, that, some guys talk about the Savage MLII action having too much flex.
If so, what are the causes ?
Is it the way it's bedded, the type steel used, extra heavy bullets, or is it a design flaw ?
Like others have stated, I consider it a pretty "beefy" action and was surprised to read about the concerns with flex in the MLII action.
Do you guys really think flex in the action is causing scope failure ?
If so, what are the cures ?

I saw the posts on scope failure and did not comment because of no experiences with failures that were unjustified.

I still don't know enough about the problem to give an opinion. However the flex of the action would be the last place I'd look.
All Savages are robust in construction but the 10ML is very stiff. There are no guide way for the bolt lugs. There is also no lug ramps. All those areas which would norally provide space for parts are solid steel in the 10ML.

The bolt does not have a strong locking position (the price of no lugs) but it is not needed with a breech plug. So no strength is lost here.

As proof of it's strength is accuracy. With a good barrel the 10ML is extremely accurate. That's not something that would be common with a wimpy action, especially a wimpy action that is subject to considerable recoil.

[Rifleman]

Well as much as I respect and like Rb, I am going to have to share my doubts. . The Savage action appears at least to me to easily demonstrate its flexibility when you apply torque to the action screws. Torque those screws down much over the factory recommended amount and the bolt locks up due to being in a bind. Compare that to alot of bolt actions that you torque in at over twice the amount of the Savage with no bolt bind. It sures seems to flex to me, but if Rb or anyone else can correct me on this, I am certainly open to being taught something.

[corvair]

I think I started all of the flex stuff on the scope post. yes these actions do flex as does Remington, Winchester,Weatherby, TC etc.., etc..,
The dynamics of the reaction of the controlled explosion in the breech are always going to impart a "shock wave" so to speak on all parts of a rifles action. There are many ultra slow motion videos demonstrating this out on the web.

The Savage has some more flex than a Remington, just by design alone but does the Savage have too much flex, I don't think it does.These Savages are just flat accurate!

Look at the loads we try to shoot: 300gr. projectiles hurled at sometimes incredible speeds, 2300fps to 2700fps. Recoil can definately have the ouch factor.

Scope failures because of flex, yes, if you shoot heavy loads enough you can braek any scope. Does the Savage break more scopes than other makes, perhaps, but does anybody really know for sure?

Hope I didn't scare you sagittarius from using a Savage 10MLII.
This is perhaps one of the finest if not the finest factory muzzleloaders on the market today! Bar none! ;D

[rexxer]

Paul

I was just throwing out an idea and not backing it up with facts! I would also guess that a full length bedding job might help but this could be wrong also. It seems like alot of variables inter in play with all the scope breakage. I'm sure even playing with different torques on the action screws would result in different points of impact. But then I look at guys that do have their actions bedded and you still see the scope failures. I have always wondered what the recoil area looked like of a non-bedded Savage where the owner ran a gabillion shots through it.

I still believe alot of scope failure are due to the nature of the beast. We are a select few who would shoot these high recoilers for entertainment. Many guys here don't even back loads off at all during summer,some even increase the speed of them 300 grain pills. I believe as long as we have high recoil,lots of rounds,we will have scope failure.

Some of us guys should hang around the slug hunters forums to see what kind of scope breakage they have over there. They shoot alot of high recoil rounds also. Now if they report low scope breakage then maybe we do have something to address.

So whats the bottom line? Actions can be tweaked,or influenced by different torque on action screws.(fact) But it also seems like people would not shoot the tight groups if action was flexing like rb suggested. ;DI'm so confused!

[rexxer]

Sorry-Corvair's a faster typer than me!!!

[youp50]

From my experience.

Model 70 Winchester long action post 64. It came from the factory with an active piece of walnut. Stock was stripped and sealed inside and out. The action was bedded and it shot sub MOA. The following year it shot a string. Bedding was removed and rifle was re bedded with the addition of pillars. Now it is a sub MOA shooter again. Next year it still shoots fine, but the action has flexed enough to wear the jeweling from the bolt. The stock was replaced.

This winter I had two scopes fail. Others have recommended these brand of scopes as worthy of the 10 ML. IMO both of these scopes were destined to fail at high recoil.

IMO the Nikon had something wrong with it from the factory. It was sent back for not holding zero. They cleaned and adjusted the collimator, neither action addressed the underlying issue.

The Leupold was sent in for a tuneup. It returned with adjustment screws belonging to a different scope model. It read 3x9 on a 1.5-5 scope. It did not have positive click stops. Almost like they stuck a set of 'Rifleman' screws on a VX-III.

Both companies have promised to be better this time. Nikon sent a prepaid shipping label. It cost me 15 bucks to ship the Leupy.

I will probably set both scopes back on the ML II for a 'test ride'. Then I think I will refrain from shooting 300 grain bullets at 2400 fps... Unless I gear up for an African plains safari.

[onecardchuck]

rifleman,

I am no expert here I am just trying to add some thinking to your post. I agree if a non bedded factory savage is over torqued you can bend the action. How much I am unsure and will it cause bolt bind I am also unsure. What I have found when I first got my savage before I had richard pillar and bed it is that when I really torqued the actions screws I had bolt bind. I started to realize that most of my bolt bind was due to the rear action screw now sticking up further into the bolt channel and causing much of my bolt bind. I did not attempt to file it down to create less bolt bind, but I did grease it very well which seem to help with a good amount of the bolt bind.

After I had it pillared, bedded, and a third action screw added by richard the now third or rear most screw has no effect on the action at all. Now if I really torque the two forward actions screws and leave the rear bolt holder screw loose I have no bolt bind and that is partly due to the bedding of the action. However if I torque that rear bolt holder screw I again have bolt bind.

Just some food for thought.

[Chris Champion]

My action is not bedded in my laminate stock. The only time I notice the bolt binding is when I over tighten the rear action screw. You can almost feel the bolt "drag" on the tip of the screw. I keep my front action screw at 25 in/lbs and the rear I just keep snug enough so it doesn't come loose.

[smokeless77]

If that is the case with most of the ml's with the bolt bind, maybe savage could do something about it, or suggest a fix.

[lwh723]

Mar 6, 2009 12:22:57 GMT -5 smokeless77 said:

If that is the case with most of the ml's with the bolt bind, maybe savage could do something about it, or suggest a fix.

That's what makes my bolt bind. There's already a fix... adding in a third pillar. I'm kind of suprised Savage hasn't implemented it. Personally, I think Savage kind of dropped the ball on their method of bolt retention.

[Richard]

Wait a minute................If you over tighten that screw (that goes thru the front of the trigger guard) what you are doing, is not necessarily bending the action, just causing it to protrude further into the channel in the bolt! If if protruded too far, its going to hit and bind the bolt. (depending on the original length of that bolt) Nothing to do with bending the action!!!!!!!
After I install the third pillar, ONLY those two (forward) screws get tightened down. The screw thru the trigger guard (which I put a little knurled knob) is meant to be just finger tight! If you go and try to tighten it down with a pair of plyers, it is going to bind the bolt! You just negated the reason for the thumb screw
Richard

[joe21a]

I just did every thing that every one said caused the bolt to bind or would bend the action. I used a shorter bolt on the (steel) trigger guard. I made it as tight as I dare with out the fear of breaking and the bolt still just falls out of the action when the handle is opened. I found no bending of the action that would bind the bolt. A 300 gr bullet with a hot load may be a different store, but the only way to see that would be with a ultra-hight speed camera.

[whyohe]

that was kind of the reason for my post on one or two piece bases. but to my suprize there really was no significant differance in failures. my thinking was that the one piece would possibly stiffen the action a little bit on the heavier recoiling loads. even was just looking to see if a one piece would help just even lessen vibrations transfered to the scope. was pretty suprizing to me the results.

[rbinar]

Mar 6, 2009 5:23:08 GMT -5 Rifleman said:

Well as much as I respect and like Rb, I am going to have to share my doubts. . The Savage action appears at least to me to easily demonstrate its flexibility when you apply torque to the action screws. Torque those screws down much over the factory recommended amount and the bolt locks up due to being in a bind. Compare that to alot of bolt actions that you torque in at over twice the amount of the Savage with no bolt bind. It sures seems to flex to me, but if Rb or anyone else can correct me on this, I am certainly open to being taught something.

I am not familiar with this problem. None of the actions I have will do what you describe. The only time I ever remember the bolt binding in a Savage was with a plastic stock and an extra tight rear screw. This screw has the bolt guide tit on it and that can interfere with the bolt if you tighten the screw extra tight. But even then the screw can be adjusted to prevent that.

The 10ML receiver is basically a 1.35" tube with .35" walls. Only about half of the tube is used over the bolt cut out but that's still enough to make it very strong. I think you'd probably brake the 1/4 X 28 screws before you could produce any noticeable deformity.

[rexxer]

whyohe- I agree, I thought in your poll you would have seen a difference in one piece compared to two piece.


I still believe in many of the non-bedded Savages the point of impact will change by changing the torque of the action screws. This is not the only action that this would effect. Some of the older bench rest crowd, Sinclear,Hart,Mcmillian found adjusting their action screws they could fine tune their rifles.Then they decide they could drill out their action screw holes larger through the stock and fill with epoxy to form pillars. I believe thats how the pillars came about.

The Savage action also rides on pillars but sometimes the manf. tolerance negates the good.

[12ptdroptine]

Mar 6, 2009 6:14:55 GMT -5 rexxer said:

Paul

I was just throwing out an idea and not backing it up with facts! I would also guess that a full length bedding job might help but this could be wrong also. It seems like alot of variables inter in play with all the scope breakage. I'm sure even playing with different torques on the action screws would result in different points of impact. But then I look at guys that do have their actions bedded and you still see the scope failures. I have always wondered what the recoil area looked like of a non-bedded Savage where the owner ran a gabillion shots through it.

I still believe alot of scope failure are due to the nature of the beast. We are a select few who would shoot these high recoilers for entertainment. Many guys here don't even back loads off at all during summer,some even increase the speed of them 300 grain pills. I believe as long as we have high recoil,lots of rounds,we will have scope failure.

Some of us guys should hang around the slug hunters forums to see what kind of scope breakage they have over there. They shoot alot of high recoil rounds also. Now if they report low scope breakage then maybe we do have something to address.

So whats the bottom line? Actions can be tweaked,or influenced by different torque on action screws.(fact) But it also seems like people would not shoot the tight groups if action was flexing like rb suggested. ;DI'm so confused!

I have a Marlin 512 Slugmaster with a Leupold VXII 2x7x33 I think... Rifle scope with about 6-7 years on it..Till now (if my Savage works out) It has been my "Go To " Slug gun.. After I took the Tasco off it has been Old Faithful. 2" groups @100yds with ounce and a quarter slug's Drop

[ozark]

With the heavy barrel free floating from the end of the receiver it would be dificult to believe that there was no flex during recoil. It is claimed that if a rifle is leaned agains a tree or wall that it will take a set and storing them horizonal is discouraged for the same reason. I suspect that the scope does flex along with the receiver but would imagine that it is designed to accept this without encuring damage. The scope is probably put under stress ninty percent of the time it is mounted. One could tackle eliminating receiver flex or create a scope that permitted flex without damage. Since most of the scope is meerly a tube it seems to me that permitting the scope to flex without any damage would be the route to take. Long scopes probably flex more than short ones . But most of us never have problems so saying that flex is the principal cause of scope failuue may be a false assumption. Just musing. OZark

[smokeeter]

Mar 6, 2009 16:58:13 GMT -5 Richard said:

Wait a minute................If you over tighten that screw (that goes thru the front of the trigger guard) what you are doing, is not necessarily bending the action, just causing it to protrude further into the channel in the bolt! If if protruded too far, its going to hit and bind the bolt. (depending on the original length of that bolt) Nothing to do with bending the action!!!!!!!

I agree, it's probably the screw binding on the bolt and not the action bending.

[jeremylong]

Yup same thing was happening with mine and I sanded about .020 off my action screw and I can torque as much as I want with no bolt stretch interference. I would venture to say that action on the MZ is stronger than the standard bolt action rem.

At any case this is a bunch of whoo haa about nothin. Shock is shock. That scope is way flimsy compared to the action.

Check this out. This is an FEA done on a 6PPC and amplified 1,000 x's. So movement is greatly exaggerated but it shows everything relative.

www.varmintal.com/apres.htm

[Al]

Mar 7, 2009 0:31:11 GMT -5 jeremylong said:

Yup same thing was happening with mine and I sanded about .020 off my action screw and I can torque as much as I want with no bolt stretch interference. I would venture to say that action on the MZ is stronger than the standard bolt action rem.

At any case this is a bunch of whoo haa about nothin. Shock is shock. That scope is way flimsy compared to the action.

Check this out. This is an FEA done on a 6PPC and amplified 1,000 x's. So movement is greatly exaggerated but it shows everything relative.

www.varmintal.com/apres.htm

Jeremy, nice link, gonna take me a bit to digest it, but theory sounds right. When the big light hits, things are going to move.

my opinion (and it's a early morning one), action flex is a result of poor bedding or lack of. My 338-378 Weatherby gave me fits when I got it, the full length aluminum bedding block made very little contact with the action, so I relieved it and bedded the whole thing, my fits went away. I bed every gun right off the bat now.

Scope failure has some variables, quality of the scope and mounting being #1, how many of us check our bases for level once they are screwed on with a straight edge, then check the bottom of the rings when they are mounted? I always assumed they were even, but I was in for a suprise once I mounted some scope algining rods I made up simular to these. www.brownells.com/aspx/NS/store/ProductDetail.aspx?p=833&title=SCOPE%20ALIGNMENT%20RODS ,
I've had ring/base combo's off as much as .025 from each other. (that's what causes the ring marks we've all seen) Burris has nailed that with their posi-line rings.

I'm not a fan of windage bases, think about it, if the front ring doesn't move, all we are doing is adding stress to the scope tube by adjusting the rear screws. I do like wide rings spaced out as far as possiable, Warnes and the Leo PRW's have been my choice, clamped on steel bases. Having a stress free mounted scope is just as important as a stress free action.

[Rifleman]

Absolutely if the rear/bolt retention screw is too tight/too long it will make full contact with the bolt and make it bind. No argument from me there. Really at that point it acts like a set screw and has nothing to do with the torque on the action. Matter of fact you can cause the bolt to bind with no other screws even in the action if you adjust the rear screw in so far that it makes full contact with the bolt.
However even with that screw shortened so that it does not touch the bolt, you can tighten the action screws enough so that it will put enough tension on the action to to cause the bolt to bind up even if there is no contact between the bolt and the rear action screw.
If the rifle is full length bedded and bedded correctly this becomes very difficult to replicate and no doubt, it is the right way to have a rifle set up. I believe it is one of the indicators for a Savage to determine the quality of a bedding job. However if the rifle is not bedded well, it will demonstrate the flexing/ binding with improper action screw torque. Again I am stating that is with the rear action screw allready shortened and not making contact with the bolt. Every non glass bedded rifle I have tried this on demonstrates this. Of the fully glass bedded rifles I have tried this on, only the rifles that had sub par bedding jobs would still demonstrate this tendency. However you would be surprised how high of a percentage that turned out to be.
Some wag might say at this point, well Rifleman, better quit bedding your own rifles, as it sounds like you do not know what you are doing. That would be correct except for I have never bedded my own rifles or anyone elses for that matter. I was spoiled early on in my shooting career by the match USMC armorers who bedded my comp rifles and figured out right away that there were folks who could do a much better job of this then I. Does not bother me a bit to pay someone else to do a job for me that they can do better then me. However the problem is that apparently the rifle is a little more difficult to bed right or that I have just had some bad luck, because as I have stated before I have had a very small percentage of the rifles that were bedded done so well that I could really crank the action screws down and not show some flexing of the action.
What this demonstrates to me is quite simply this. Unless the action is fully supported, it will flex.

[ET]

This is one interesting educational topic I have been following. I know the basic concept of compression and shear forces but am surprised at how much of a role it plays with rifles. The one area that seems to stand out to me is length of scope with larger calibers that have heavy recoil. Here the laws of leverage from resulting external forces also seem to apply.

A few points made about keeping the front scope ring as far forward as possible and the spread of the scope rings as far as possible sounds like good advice after reading this thread.
I can also appreciate the amount of engineering and quality components that need to go into the construction of a good scope to withstand resulting recoil.


Ed

[KerryB]

Very good thread and lots of well thought out replies. I haven't owned any of these rifles with the synthetic stocks, only laminated because i figured the plastic models just aren't rigid enough to support the barreled receiver properly. I know however that lots of guys do exhibit excellent accuracy with the synthetic stocks. The only synthetic stocks that i will allow on any of my rifles are the models with full length bedding rails (H. S. Precision, McMillan, etc). All of the 10MLII's that i have owned have been pillared and bedded. One of these (HB LE #007) was bedded by Henry/Bill Ball and the others were bedded by myself to duplicate their excellent quality as closely as possible. I have had problems with a couple of these rifles with the bolt binding when the bolt retention screw was tightened a little too much, but a slight reduction in screw length corrrected the problem in both instances. I fully believe that an unbedded or inproperly bedded receiver can indeed be flexed by overtightening the receiver screws. I don't know if this would cause scope failure or inaccuracy issues. I do believe that if the bedded actions were experiencing flexing to much degree that we would see the results of this reflected in some degree of cracked and crumbling bedding. I have never heard of anyone ever experiencing this sort of problem with their bedding at this point. I figure the best you can do is get a quality pillar bedding job done, use a full length scope base, use the heaviest built scope tube that you can find and shoot the lightest loads that fill your needs. If you still have scope failure, then you probably do need to switch brands. I personally have used many different brand scope on these rifles and have never seen the first failure, but now i have probably jinxed myself by saying so! ;D

[encoreguy]

All actions will flex some we know, I do not think that the Savage is weak in relation to others. Bottom line is I think it comes down to the scopes. The optics market, like everything else is very competitive. Particularly price competitive and companies have had to "cut corners" to stay competitive. Some of these cuts are just better processes that do not hurt anything, others reduce the quality and integrity of the scope. The scope company that you trusted 10 years ago is not the same company today. I am not saying that it may not still be a great company, but things have changed. There have been many acquisitions over the years and IMO many times this has not been a good thing. Bottom line it does not matter how good a product is, if it doesn't sell an is not profitable the company either has to make changes or close the doors. Many of the products and parts that were made in house are now subbed out to save money. This means less control over the product. Over the years, I have been a big Burris optics fan, but I do believe that the Fullfield II's on my guns that are 5-10 years old are different than the Fullfield II's today. Same with my Nikon's, Leupold's and Tasco's. Like my dad used to say, "they don't make things like they used to". Cheap sells and profit margins rule. So let's put the blame on scope failures where it belongs on the optic company's shoulders. Maybe if they have to replace enough of their scopes for free it will affect their pocket books enough to fix their short comings.

[Guessed]

Wellll,, it's been a 12 hour graveyard shift and now I'm drunk, so I been thinkin' ; Has anybody tried 'claying' the objective bell/ barrel clearance similar to a piston and valve to see if recoil compresses the clay in the gap.
And if I were to try and measure action flex vs. screw torque, I'd torque the screws correctly, hang the gun in a vise allowing me access to the screw and mount a DI on the other end of the bench so the indicator stem contacted the muzzle parallel to the screws. Then I'd over-torque one screw at a time while watching the dial. I'd do this at work on our granite inspection slab, but as soon as I uncased my MLII the rest of the crew would look at each other and say,"I just knew this would happen some day" and call the SWAT team.

[chuck41]

Over torque on the rear pillar screw can certainly cause bolt problems on some ML10 rifles. Binding and etc., but I really doubt if the Savage action is affected much by the torque.

When I first got my rifle, it would bind the bolt if that screw was torqued just a bit too much but the problem was easily fixed by a couple strokes of the end of that screw on a file. The end of the screw was rough and if you looked at it carefully from the side the end of it was not square and had a little rough protrusion. After fixing that, no more problems regardless of the amount of torque on it.

Like RB and encoreguy said, the Savage action in comparison to other rifles is pretty stiff. I would suspect that if you think you are flexing the action, you probably do have a problem, but whatever the heck it is, it is most likely not actually from flexing of the action. At least not with those wimpy little pillar screws anyway. Now if you had a good old hardened 3/8" bolt to tighten down it just might be another story. ;D

[olegburn]

I put 1 pc. scope base on my Savage with the thinking that it may stiffen action up. Rifleman has 1 pc. on one of his builts and SW,DaveD I believe too. That feels to me a better system.
But then what troubles me is that screws on bases are pretty thin and may not stop the flexing.
Military sniper rifles I read somewhere are re-drilled and oversize those screws and I thought it is good idea.
Next step is silver soldering 1 pc. base to the receiver and put screws for extra safety.
If the action flex is a factor in scope failures that might be solution.
As far as accuracy affected-as long as it flexes the same every time it should not be a problem.IMO
olegburn

[sagittarius]

Jmo, all rifle makers should offer integral bases like this awesome BAT action.

[Dave W]

Mar 7, 2009 9:58:55 GMT -5 encoreguy said:

All actions will flex some we know, I do not think that the Savage is weak in relation to others. Bottom line is I think it comes down to the scopes. The optics market, like everything else is very competitive. Particularly price competitive and companies have had to "cut corners" to stay competitive. Some of these cuts are just better processes that do not hurt anything, others reduce the quality and integrity of the scope. The scope company that you trusted 10 years ago is not the same company today. I am not saying that it may not still be a great company, but things have changed. There have been many acquisitions over the years and IMO many times this has not been a good thing. Bottom line it does not matter how good a product is, if it doesn't sell an is not profitable the company either has to make changes or close the doors. Many of the products and parts that were made in house are now subbed out to save money. This means less control over the product. Over the years, I have been a big Burris optics fan, but I do believe that the Fullfield II's on my guns that are 5-10 years old are different than the Fullfield II's today. Same with my Nikon's, Leupold's and Tasco's. Like my dad used to say, "they don't make things like they used to". Cheap sells and profit margins rule. So let's put the blame on scope failures where it belongs on the optic company's shoulders. Maybe if they have to replace enough of their scopes for free it will affect their pocket books enough to fix their short comings.

I feel this statement has more do to with the scope problems than the action flexing, the flexing may add to the problems, but I also feel that profit margins rule and quality has gone down on the whole.

A .45 shooting 2600+ with 200gr bullets is far easier on the shoulder and scope than a .50 or .45 pushing 300's at 2300+, a .45 pushing a 200gr bullet at 2900 still does not equal the torture test of the 300's that many here are putting on their equipment according to a recoil calculator. The more you shoot, the more you increase your odds of scope problems, the severity of the load will only increase the odds I feel. Saying that, the guys shooting .45's with 200gr bullets should experience less problems than guys shooting sabotless or shooting 300's out of a .50. IMO the problem is three major factors-number of shots, recoil, and quality or lack of from scope manufacturers.

Here is a link for recoil calculations for anyone interested.
www.handloads.com/calc/recoil.asp

Great thread and posts.