1.250" diameter common to most other barrels. In this situation larger barrels would tend to withstand greater cham- ber pressures as well. As aforementioned, the Savage
Model 112 long action was factory chambered for the .220 Swift in a fluted 26" stainless factory barrel and the short action was chambered for the .223 Rem- ington. As converted to switch-barrel, both rifles maintained and delivered superb performance. It’s really encour- aging to see factory barrels producing sub-half-minute accuracy as these two rifles now do, particularly the high in- tensity .220 Swift cartridge. My original plan was initially to
add a .22 PPC, a 5mm/35 SMc, and a .257 Improved cartridge to the switch- barrel pair of fine shooting Savage rifles. Each of these new-addition cartridges used the larger .308 Winchester-size bolt face, and the short-action Savage Model 12 was chambered for the .223 Remington. This prompted me to go to Savage Arms and get an additional new .308-size bolt assembly for the short-action rifle. Bill Dermot and Effie at Savage Arms were courteous and prompt in arranging to send the new bolt assembly. As it turned out, I used the short-action switch-barrel, along with the new bolt, to chamber for the .22 PPC Shilen barrel, and the Krieger barrel was chambered for the 5mm/35 SMc. The .257 Improved cartridge was chambered to a Douglas premium 1:12" twist barrel for the longer 112 action. Threading these three barrels for
the 20" pitch Savage thread with a full 1.250" shoulder resulted in a most preci- sion barrel-to-action fit. Conventional chamber reaming was quite routine, using a Pacific Tool & Gauge, Inc. reamer for the 5mm/35 SMc cartridge, and a Clymer reamer for the .22 PPC cartridge, and the .257 Improved 40-de- gree Ackley.
Processing a barrel for the Savage
action while not using their customary barrel lock nut is a basic gunsmithing procedure. I did, however, have to lengthen the cross-slide style extrac- tor in the .308-size bolt head to fit the smaller Lapua .22 PPC cases. Another plus with this pair of Savage rifles is the interchangeability of barrels from one rifle to the other. As an example, I can put the Douglas .257 Improved barrel on either the long action Model 112 or
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the short action Model 12 and cartridge headspacing is right on the money. Most of my 40-X and 700 series
Remingtons enable this barrel exchange to be performed as well. This opens a lot of doors. I designed a tool I call a bolt face comparator, which accurately measures the space between the poste- rior surface of the locking lugs and the bolt face. The new bolt that I got from Savage for the Model 12 measures out within a thousandth of an inch of the Model 112 bolt. Bolt or action length make no difference.
Savage Switch-Barrel PerForMance
Having experience with an array
of switch barrel rifle types, I fully ex- pected the Savage Model 12 short action single-shot and the long action Model 112 single-shot to be top performers. I did my best to obviate any bugs in the gunsmithing department that can certainly lurk around if strict attention to precision isn’t carefully performed. These two actions have very rigid
receivers equal in strength to the much praised Model 40-X Remington or sev-
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