The Savage 212 Bolt Action12G

John Robinson
The Savage 212 has a wellproportioned polymer stock and
the integral high efficiency recoil
pad is a welcome addition.
After several decades of owning, using
and testing firearms of all types and shooting them at all
sorts of targets and feral and game animals, it was an experience to
come across a firearm that I had neither seen nor had the experience of testing.
Is it a Shotgun –is it a Rifle?
The Savage 212 Bolt Action12G
The Savage 212
is in its element
in thick bush
and can handle
shots easily out
to over 100m. It
has tremendous
knock-down
performance
with 450gn
slugs and
handles
like a rifle.
I
t is the Savage Model 212 12G bolt action shotgun. So what, you may well
ask. There is nothing new about bolt
action shotguns. Mossberg has been
making its version for decades and has
probably been one of the better known
models of this type, and are not that uncommon in Australia.
My hunting partner has one that is fitted
with an adjustable choke and he uses it as a
backup gun when we are pig hunting and
need to poke around in thicker scrub where
a scope sighted rifle is at a disadvantage.
14 GUNS AUSTRALIA
The main feature of the Savage 212 to
those that have gone before is that it has a
fully rifled barrel and is set up to shoot slug
loads rather than shot loads. This may
seem a little strange to local shooters who
are more likely to use a 12g gun to shoot
anything from rabbits with #4 shot to pigs
with SG’s.
The main driver behind the development of guns like the Savage 212 is the US
deer hunting regulations in some of the
heavily populated Eastern states. In these
areas, the use of shotguns in the whitetail
deer season is mandatory for hunter and
resident safety reasons.
For the average Aussie hunters, who is
used to having a few thousand acres of hunting territory to themselves, the experience
of hunting in the deer season in the Eastern
United States would be quite terrifying.
Some years ago, I happened to be visiting
a friend of mine in Virginia over the
Thanksgiving weekend that happened to
mark the start of the deer season there.
While Virginia may not have shotgun only
rules, the deer season lasts about 2 weeks
and over 300,000 deer licences are sold to
residents over that period.
Hunting is allowed in the national forests,
and I accompanied friend Ron on a ‘deer
hunt’ as a spectator into the local forest in
the Appalachian Mountains not far from his
home in western Virginia. We literally had
trouble finding somewhere to park in the
forest. There were vehicles everywhere with
pickups with 3 or 4 hunters in the back in
their camo gear with firearms protruding in
all directions.
Even after we had walked for an hour on
a trail to get to the top of the range, and set
up on a likely spot, half a dozen hunters
wandered past during our stay. No wonder
all the deer in that part of the USA have
decided to move out of the forest and live in
the suburbs.
In any event, there is some incentive for
American hunters in those areas to use shotguns and slug loads are a more reliable option that any of the letter shot loads.
To put this in perspective, it is worthwhile
having a look at the specification for some
of the commonly used letter shot sizes that
hunters use here. International inconsistencies have resulted in some variations between to nominal sizes of shot specifications
OCTOBER/DECEMBER 2015
1
1. The 212 comes standard with Savage’s
good AccuTrigger. Note the massive
receiver and the Savage lock-nut barrel
locking and head spacing system.
2. T
he rear action bolt is hidden under the
bolt release plunger in the front of the
trigger guard and is a little tricky to
remove and replace.
2
3. Looks like a rifle and shoots like a rifle
– the Savage 212 slug gun.
4. T
he massive bolt of the 212 dwarfs
a standard .308 sized bolt and can
handle the heaviest shotshell loads.
4
3
5. The Savage 212 comes with Weaver
bases fitted but the very long action
puts them too far apart for the fitting
of many standard sized scopes. Offset
rings or a rail will solve the problem.
6. T
he safety is located on the tang behind
the bolt. The recessed sections at the
rear of the ejection port allow single
loading of the fat 12G cartridges.
7. B
olt faces compared = the Savage 212
versus a .308 BSA bolt.
7
5
6
8
8. The 212 action is very long as is the
bolt throw. The Weaver rail has been
fitted to facilitate scope attachment,
as the gun comes without sights.
SPECS
SAVAGE 212 12G
Manufacturer: Savage Arms
Model: Savage Model 212
Calibre: 12G
Action: Bolt – front locking
Magazine: Removable box – 2
round capacity
Barrel length: 22” (56cm) Fully
rifled - 1:36” rifling twist
Overall length: 43”(109cm)
Weight with scope:
App. 7.5lb (3.75kg)
Finish: Satin blued
Stock: Black polymer with
integral recoil pad
Sights: None - Separate
Weaver bases fitted.
Trigger: Savage
adjustable AccuTrigger
Safety: Tang mounted
behind the bolt.
RRP: Under $1000 – shop around
- $A variations can occur.
Distributor: Nioa – www.nioa.com.au
16 GUNS AUSTRALIA
from the USA, Britain, Europe and Australia. The specific Australian sizes evidently
only apply to shotshells made here.
It is pretty obvious, looking at this chart,
that shooting larger game with almost any of
the letter shot sizes is undesirable. For example BB’s only weigh around 6gn per pellet and
you need to get into the SSG range before the
pellets get into a reasonable weight range,
and even SG’s, weighting around 50gn must
be considered marginal on deer-sized game.
This brings us back to the concept of the
Savage 212. With smoothbore shotguns, reasonable accuracy can be achieved with slug
loads out to 50m and beyond. In the previous issue (July-Sept 2015) of GUNS Australia, Bob Shell wrote a comprehensive article on slug loads and their performance,
well placed as he is in the USA to have firsthand experience with their use, and had
achieved some good medium-range performance with slugs.
The Savage 212 has a fully rifled barrel
with a rifling twist rate of one turn in 36”
(1:91cm). This seems slow by conventional small calibre rifle standard, but is typical of larger bore firearms firing short, fat
projectiles.
A 12G shotgun bore diameter is normally
0.729” or 18.53mm, prior to choking. There
are two basic designs of rifled slugs; those
that fully fit the bore and those that are in a
sabot. In the latter case, the sabot projectiles
are commonly 0.50” (12mm) in diameter.
The full diameter slugs usually have rifling
ridges cast into the sides of the slug, which
do not do much in the barrel, but impart
some sort of a slow spin to the projectile as it
flies through the air.
These types of slugs are also of the Minie
Ball design that proved so devastating in
the American Civil War in that they have
a solid conical or rounded head with a hollow skirted base. In the muzzle loading era,
this made the bullet easy to load into the
rifled bore and the skirt sealed the bore
tightly when the powder discharged. A
variation on this types of slug is the Brenneke classic slugs that were developed late
in the 18th Century and are still in use today. They have a fibre wad fixed to the base
of the slug that contributes to their stability
and allows them to be used in guns with
fixed chokes.
With a smooth bore shotgun, the ballistic advantage of this type of slug is simply
that is front heavy and this tends to stabilise it in flight.
Saboted slug loads are reported to not
shoot well in smooth bore barrels while the
full diameter slugs are capable of shooting
groups around 100mm at 50m. Another disadvantage of many shotguns is that they do
not have any conventional sights, so aiming
precision is compromised.
This is not the case with the Savage 212.
It is devoid of open sights of any kind and
comes with a set of Weaver bases so that it
can be fitted with a cope.
First impressions of the 212 is how riflelike it is. Apart from the fat 12G barrel that
gives it deceptively heavy appearance, it is
OCTOBER/DECEMBER 2015
actually quite light and handy and handles
as well as any centrefire sporter.
The 212 test gun had a 22” (56cm) barrel
and an overall length of 109cm, with a
weight (empty) of 3.3kg.
The bolt action is conventional in design
but massive in proportion, with two large
front locking lugs and a bolt big enough to
accommodate a .600 Nitro Express. The
trigger is Savage’s AccuTigger that has set a
benchmark in economical and effective
trigger design that has been followed by a
number of other gunmakers.
The 212 has a 2-shot polymer box magazine, giving the Savage a 3-shot capacity. The
polymer stock is fitted with Savage’s integrated PAD recoil pad, which is fortunate because recoil is an issue with this outfit.
The massive receiver is drilled and tapped
for scope mounts and comes, as mentioned
above, with two Weaver type bases already
fitted. The problem with this setup is the size
of the action. The bases are about 150mm
apart and only scopes with long tubes can be
fitted between a set of standard rings.
To test the 212, a scope had to be fitted, so I
needed to come up with an alternative arrangement, which was no big deal. I had some Weaver/Picatinny type rails in the spare parts collection and only needed to drill a couple of holes in
one of the rails to get it to fit the Savage action
using the screws that came with the gun.
This opens up a number of sighting options as red dot or holographic sights could
now be fitted to the Savage using the rail, as
well as fitting any conventional scope.
OCTOBER/DECEMBER 2015
I put a 2-7 Barska AR scope on the gun to
test it. The AR (Air Rifle) scopes are ruggedly constructed to handle the jarring recoil of spring and pistol air riles, so was expected to do the job on the 12G 212.
In discussing the project with Nioa, the
Savage distributors, we decided to put some
letter shot loads through the 212 as well as
slug loads for which it is primarily designed.
As well as two types of Federal slug loads,
Nioa supplied three Eley letter shot loads;
AAA, BB and SG to see how they would
work from the rifles barrel.
The Federal Truball slugs are in the premium range and have a listed muzzle velocity of
1600fps and a weight of 1oz (454gn). They
have a ballistic coefficient of 0.064 – about
US Size
UK Size
EU Size
Aust Size
1
BB
1
BB
BB
A
the same as a beer can – but are still travelling
at about 1000fps at 100m. More importantly,
if sighted in 75mm high at 50m, the point of
impact is only about 75mm low at 100m. At
50m, the slugs energy is around 1300ft-lb and
is still around 800ft-lb at 100m. The standard
Federal rifles slug load is a similar weight but
does not have the additional design features
as those of the Truball slug, as can be seen in
the photos. Ballistically, its performance is
similar. The lead component of both type of
slugs is identical, but the Truball has the addition of a polymer ball embedded in the hollow cavity at the back. Not sure what it does
but must have some beneficial effect on the
performance of the slug – it may act like a
crude boat tail and improve the external ballistics of the slug.
The 212’s AccuTrigger was fine out of the
box and it did not take long to get the gun
hitting on point of aim. I was glad about that,
as the relatively light 212 is not a lot of fun to
shoot off the bench with 454gn slug loads.
Accuracy was frankly amazing with both
the Federal loads, and they grouped more or
less in the same place when shot interchangeably. I shot one group at 50m that was hardly
bigger than about 25mm. It looks a little
strange shooting tight groups with projectiles
that cut .70 calibre holes. At ranges out to
100m, the 212 was easily capable of shooting
Diam.mm
Pellets/oz
Pellet wt. gn
4.09
71
5.47
4.50
55
6.25
BBB
AA
AA
4.83
42
7.30
T
AAA
AAA
5.16
36
12.15
5.59
27
16.2
F
#4 Buck
#3 Buck
#2 Buck
21
20.8
19
23.0
7.23
14
31.25
7.62
11
39.75
SG
8.38
9
48.5
00-SG
8.64
8
54.5
9.14
6
73.0
SSG
#1 Buck
SSG
0
SG
00
000
6.10
6.83
SSSG
LG
GUNS AUSTRALIA 17
Accuracy was consistently excellent
and ragged (and
very large) holes at
50m were delivered
by the Savage
ABOVE: The Federal slug loads shot
consistently with rifle-like accuracy.
Ragged big-hole groups were produced
consistently – no spotting scope
required to see where the hits are
when sighting in.
BELOW: Both types of Federal slug
loads shot well. The Truball slugs
use the same lead projectile but have
a polymer ball embedded in the
hollow base.
BELOW RIGHT: The Savage 212 was
tested with Eley letter shot loads (AAA,
BB and SG) as well as the slug loads,
but the rifled barrel did not work well
with the shot loads.
18 GUNS AUSTRALIA
with rifle-like accuracy and with a bit of Kentucky windage, shots out to 125m would be
quite feasible. After my initial tests, I recruited
some friends to assist with the testing as recoil
off the bench was not much fun, so that was a
good way to share the pain.
Accuracy was consistently excellent and
ragged (and very large) holes at 50m were
delivered by the Savage from both types of
loads in three-shot groups.
The not-so-good news came with the letter shot loads. The patterns with the AAA’s,
BB’s and SG’s were badly blown and could
only be considered partially effective at
ranges well under 20m. At ranges over 25m,
the patterns from each letter shot load could
be measured in metres rather than centimetres. On that basis, the multi-purpose application for the 212 would be limited to bagging the occasional rabbit at 15m.
I took the Savage on a hunting trip to the
New England area of NSW but luck was out
in finding any pigs close enough to shoot at
with the slug loads, or close enough to shoot
at with anything, for that matter.
12G shotguns are well known for their
very effective performance on appropriate
game at moderate ranges. Apart from their
acceptable muzzle energy, there is no substitute for big holes, and the .70 calibre holes
made by a 12G shotgun slug are about as big
as they get in this part of the world.
We had a problem with the box magazine
that came with the test gun in that it had
trouble feeding the top cartridge from the
2-shot magazine. The flat fronted shotshells (of any type) continually jammed on
the way out of the magazine. A second
magazine was shipped from Nioa when ad-
vised of the problem but that did not solve
the feeding issue. The feed ramp area of the
212 was then carefully checked and the
front edge of the feed ramp was found to
have a very sharp leading bottom edge.
This was smoothed off and polished with a
small abrasive wheel and the sharp edge removed and the Savage then functioned
correctly with both magazines.
One side issue that appealed to me with the
bolt action Savage was a firearms safely matter.
My mate and I hunt on quads and usually carry
two rifles on racks on the machines. We have
hunted together for over 30 years and have a
basic rule that the guns are always carried with
the chambers empty. It only takes a second or
two to load a bolt action gun while a multibarreled shotgun is much slower to get into action. For this reason, bolt action repeating
shotguns fit well in that application.
In addition, the magazines for the Savage
212 are quite inexpensive and quick to
change, so there is an option of having plenty of backup loads ready to go.
Taking the Savage 212 apart for complete
cleaning has a couple of tricks involved. To
remove the bolt, the AccuTrigger needs to
be pulled to the rear, and there is a spring
loaded plunger at the front root of the trigger guard that has to be fully depressed, and
these two actions allow the bolt to be removed from the receiver.
To get the action out of the stock, what
looks like an action screw at the rear of the
trigger guard is not! The front action screw is
in the normal position at the front of the magazine housing, but the rear action screw is concealed under the bolt release plunger in front
of the trigger guard. It is a bit of a juggle to pull
the plunger back far enough to insert the hex
wrench into the screw socket and hold it out of
the way while unscrewing the action bolt.
I really enjoyed the opportunity to test
the Savage 212, as it led me into some new
territory that I had previously not experienced. It is a fairly specialised outfit, given
that it works very well with slug loads only,
and with them its performance is remarkable. If you are looking for an outfit with very
reliable knockdown power at moderate ranges, a .70 calibre 450gn slug travelling at
1600fps will not leave much standing.
OCTOBER/DECEMBER 2015