Just one rifle owner's experience...

[D Lee]

This is strictly a FWIW post, nothing more. Hoping it might in some way prove helpful to someone in Google land.

Over the last year or more, approaching 80 y/o, I’ve put a lot of work into reducing my rifle inventory. For Coyote to Elk, I couldn’t make 1 rifle / cartridge do all the work. Would excel on one end, not the other.

My Laminated SS Tikka 30-06 is exceptionally accurate and will handle the bigger game w/ 180 or 200 gr Partitions. For Coyotes and Deer? As the 270 was gone, I looked at replacing it with another 270. Decided to go with the 6.5 PRC instead. With high hopes / expectations, the NEW Springfield 2020 Waypoint was in the safe, unfired, sight-in ammo loaded. Wrong turn.

Last week, wife and I left for a short vacation. While there, I found a rather long thread on the 2020 rifle in 6.5 PRC. Owners NOT happy. Not with their new rifle and even more unhappy with the horrible Springfield customer service. Not just 1 owner, multiple owners. Same problems with the rifle and again, very disappointing customer service. Hard to recommend SA after that.

Came home on Sunday. Returned the unfired rifle yesterday. Left with a Tikka .270 Win, which I should have kept for a LONG list of good reasons. Lesson learned.

Slept better last night.

Coyote: 110 gr V Max @ 3,350 fps - .5 MOA (5 shot groups) previously confirmed.
Deer: 140 gr Accubond
Back up rifle for Elk: 150 gr Partition

Thanks for visiting with me.

Cheers.

 

[SAUMan]

I'm glad you were able to return it!. I am surprised... we'll maybe not in this day and age... that Springfield would have horrible customer service or policies for taking care of their customers. I, too, love the beautiful Tikka Stainless Laminate, and finally got one last year in .270 WSM, then immediately regretted it before firing. I knew how stout the recoil was going to be, and I have bad shoulders already. I did something a little off the cuff and sent the barreled action in to Unknown Munitions, who sent it back 4 months later, wearing a new ACE cut-rifled barrel chambered in 6mm/6.5 PRC. 24' barrel in 1:7.5 twist matching the contour of the factory barrel so I can use my beautiful laminate stock. Formed 1 round after finally acquiring all the proper tooling through trial and error (bushings/dies). Figured out I loaded that 1 way too hot. Haven't gotten around to making more yet.

I will say this and let the pieces fall where they may. I've read direct comparisons by others who did not own up to having the same experience I did, but my Weatherby 307 is SMOOTHER than my stainless Tikka! You heard that right. I really couldn't tell the difference until I tried to rapid cycle both several times. Maybe I just got an exceptional one. I don't know. The 307 seems to have pretty tight tolerances, too. That is, not much wobble in the bolt/raceway. While I am not a fan of the 6.5 RPM round mine is chambered in, the action and trigger are about as good as I've gotten without going full custom. I'm wondering if I swapped the RPM barrel (which has printed 1/2" groups with preferred load) to a .240 Wby 1:7 5 twist, which gun wins the 6mm heavyweight bout???

To your point, I had a similar issue with a Christensen Traverse in 6.5 PRC. Bought it on a super sale and never Fired it. Then a buddy of mine wanted it worse than me and gave me what I paid. He figured out that gun has a tight spot just in front of the chamber which causes pressure to spike quickly rendering the cartridge incapable of fulfilling it's true potential. He researched and found it to be a known issue like yours. He hasn't fired it since, and probably won't.

The moral of the story is that new and fancy isn't always better.