Savage Impulse Predator

[Shoots100]

I've had my Impulse predator .243 rifle for a couple of weeks now.

I've been using Blaser rifles for years and I think Savage has done a decent job with the first American made straight pull rifle.

I've been a proud member of the barrel nut community for decades and am happy that Savage was the first American manufacturer to do this.

It's no Blaser by any means, but it cost's less than what a Blaser Barrel/Mag insert cost's, So maybe American sportspeople will take a look at it, instead of the traditional turn bolt.

Out of the box it was functional, but it needed to be taken apart, cleaned and properly lubed.

I usually do this with every new firearm I receive.

I also wanted to see how well the rifle was assembled and what the deal was with the new style barrel extension feature.

Fit and finish was more than acceptable.

It uses a modified 110 Accufit stock, with and a field adjustable Accutrigger.

No more taking it out of the stock if adjustment is needed.

The trigger pull out of the box was 2 lb's even, with both of my pull gauges.

A little lite for my tastes for a hunting rifle, but it passed the drop test's, so I'll leave it that way for now.

After being cleaned and lubed, the rifle operated smoothly and without any issue's.

As most Savage rifle enthusiast's know, the weak side of savage rifles are the factory extractors and in some models, the extended detachable magazines.

Although they've gotten better in the last few years, it's SOP that your going to swap extractors from the get go and your going to have to tweak the magazines.

Not with the Impulse, the extractor is twice as big and beefy.

It extract's and ejects with authority.

The Predator model also uses AICS magazines, which are IMHO, the best rifle magazines available.

Win Win for us.

One negative I have with it, is that it's barrel heavy, like most American rifles.

All the weight is in the barreled receiver.

I don't know why Savage didn't offer the Predator model with a fluted barrel, like they did with the Big game model ?

With larger caliber's, I welcome the weight to mitigate recoil, but I prefer a lighter rifle with the puny calibers, especially with a rifle that I'm going to be mounting heavy thermal and NV scopes onto.

Proof research and Savage have teamed up, creating the Savage ultralite models offered with carbon wrapped barrels, so I'm either going to get the barrel fluted, or buy a proof barrel in the future.

The only part of the rifle that's not ambidextrous, is the receiver port.

It's right side only.

Being I'm a southpaw, I was worried that brass ejection would be an issue, but I've had no ejection issues, as the brass is ejected straight out. 

I switched the bolt handle to the left side, which took a couple of minutes the first time.

At the range, I swapped it back and forth multiple times to let evil right handed shooters try it.

After a brief tutorial on how to operate a straight pull rifle, all of them really liked it.

When I say operate it, I mean I had to remind them that you just need to pull straight back, not up and back, which binds the bolt of a straight pull rifle.

For most turn bolt shooters, rifle operation is ingrained in the memory and it took a minute or two before they got used to it.

As per Usual with most Savage rifles, it was accurate out of the box with my proven reloads, even on the wet and windy day I tested it.

Even though it's heavy, It's a keeper and as with most Savage rifles, there should be aftermarket options available soon.

Pro's ;

Made in the US of A

It's a Savage

It takes Proven AICS magazines

It's accurate 

Con's ;

It's barrel heavy

It's heavy in general

10 rd AICS mags rattle around (5 rd mags don't)

The cheaper Pmags don't fit

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited April 18, 2021 by Shoots100

[SpacemanSpiff]

Im looking at one of these pretty hard for my next rifle purchase. Ive been reading good things on it so far. Glad you had a good experience. 

[Dinsdale]

Good review.

Long time Blaser owner, and have owned other strait pulls. I find it easy to swap back and forth between action styles and different safeties; but not everyone does.

What's the lock up mechanics between bolt and barrel?

[Shoots100]

No bolt/barrel lockup, the ball bearings on the bolt lock into the receiver when the bolt handle is pushed forward.

Heym first used this lockup style in their H30 rifle.

Blaser's dual rail bolt guides make it super smoothe.

The Impulse bolt rides on the bolt release, so it's not as smooth as a Blaser, but it works.

Here's a pic of the bolt.