halcon

This is a few picture of a sako shooting Federal premium ammo . worth looking at .

http://www3.telus.net/drswebspace/SAKO%20BLOW%20UP/

Briman

Being that bolt actions have been made for at least 120 years, and all of the kinks have been worked out of bolt action designs for most of that time, there is simply no excuse to build a rifle with bad metallurgy or improper heat treating, especially since the pitfalls of each are well known and modern rifles are producing 60,000 psi not 6 inches from a shooter's face.



You can have those, its not like they are going to run out of them or more won't be made.

luckypunk

sorry driftrider I was refering to this, it talks about tikka on page 3, (a 30.06) this is from page 9 in the accurate reloading post and is actually from another forum. I think the steel must be a bad batch divided between the 2 or 3 brandnames:

The following is taken off a post on CanadianGunNutz, frankly I too am totally amazed at the reaction the company has shown to this issue. There has been at least well publicised failure that looked identical to that on page 1 up here, just amazing the reaction.

"To all who have these rifles in stainless regardless of caliber.I just got off the phone with the Tikka rep for Canada and they gave me the serial number block for the recalled Tikka rifles. The serial numbers range from 419140 to 461951.These are in the Tikka T3 stainless rifles , I'm not sure of the serial numbers for Sako rifles but both rifles use the same barrel manufacturer. It took me about an hour of persuading to get the serial number list from the Tikka rep.The steel that is used in the making of the barrels is in question not the receivers.Apparently the steel has a high content of sulfur or some other additive to make the steel workable upon forging and finishing resulting in brittle barrels.Other people with these rifles have called or emailed Tikka and they will tell you your gun is not affected by the recall.The rep kept telling me the company policy and saying the rifle I was about to buy was not affected by the recall but it clearly fell within the serial number block he provided. They told me that everyone who bought one of these rifles will be getting a letter stating the recall and how to send it back.At first they were doing barrel replacements and now they are replacing the whole gun .Covering their asses I say !!
Here is the contact number for Stoeger Canada, they are the Canadian distributor for Tikka and Sako rifles. 1 800 263-1945 ask for Peter.
The American distributor is Beretta USA at 1 800 636-3420 . I checked berettausa.com and there is nothing on the site about the recall, I guess I'm not surprised by that. :shock:HOLY CRAP THATS 42,811 recalled rifles!!!!No wonder its not all over the papers !!"

My Manberries are still sucked up tight just thinking about it...

speedgator

Thank you for the info, greatly appreciated.
I had previously read the review on the Vanguard vs Tikka, the reason I'm still leaning towards the Tikka is the free-floated barrel. Perhaps I'll just wait a few months and buy a Tikka that's been built recently and not affected. Or, maybe Weatherby will get Howa to build theirs with a free-floated barrel and I can just buy that instead.

oldelkhunter

What is the hoopla over a fully free floated barrel. All my stock remingtons and my one stock howa are not free floated and they are terrific shooters.

Moose_Maximus

I'm sure Sako makes a fine product, but that is sure one scary photo. I hope nobody got hurt.

TerryM

I called the Canadian Importer of Sako/Tikka today myself as I was concerned about my Finnlite and the service rep admitted to me that yes there was e recall on the 40000 series serial numbered rifles due to defective steel in the barrels. She only admitted to 2 rifles that exploded but that would scare the hell out of me if my serial # matched the recall. The earlier ones (like mine) are unaffected.

White-tail-deer

Sako can keep their rifles. They certainly aren't being very proactive with this very serious defect. I mean the whole rifle blows apart!!! I'd say that's pretty serious!!!

speedgator

oldelkhunter, from what I have read it seems to be a desireable feature. When the barrel heats up isnt't it best if has some roome to "breathe"? Would you kindly excuse my ignorance and tell me the pros and cons? I'd greatly appreciate it.

Briman

Free floating is not about giving the barrel room to breathe, but to allow it to expand freely as it heats up without added stresses.

The problem is that hammer forged barrels (the cheapest, most common, and most flawed way of making a barrel) leaves all kinds of internal stresses in the barrel which cause 2 things- bad harmonics and uneven metal expansion/warping as the barrel heats up. Pressure bedding the front of the barrel dampnes the harmonics somewhat and prestresses the barrel and directs its expansion as it heats up. With a good barrel that has cut or button rifling or better yet, has been stresse relieved through cryo treatment, you absolutely want the barrel to be free floated. Since most factory rifles are made as cheaply as possible, they are pressure bedded by default. Its worthwhile to try to freefloat them, but there is a chance that this will hurt accuracy.