A SAVAGE OVERHAUL

There are a lot of things my .308 Norma Magnum could do well. Making it past the bouncer at a .280 Ackley Improved-only club wasn’t one of them.

Thankfully, it was no ordinary .308 Norma Magnum. No. It was a Savage, which means it can be whatever the hell it wants to be ... almost.

Go from a .308 Norma Magnum to a .280 Ackley Improved? Sure thing. All I needed were a few simple tools, some basic parts, a little mechanical common sense and about an hour of my time. One thing I didn’t need, however, was a lathe to transform my magnum long-action rifle into a streamlined .280 Ackley Improved.

But a .308 Norma Magnum to a .280 Ackley Improved? you ask. You can’t do that, Mr. Gun Writer, because those two cartridges use two completely different bolt faces.

Yes, I’m well aware of this emphatic mechanical fact. I can almost hear some of your heads exploding as you contemplate just how in the world I thought I was going to be able to make a bolt-action