1.1 Which 93R17? Savage’s Magnum Rimfire, and the Rifle Documented Here

The Savage 93R17 is not one rifle. It is a model family: the Savage Model 93 magnum rimfire bolt action chambered for the .17 Hornady Magnum Rimfire, sold in more than twenty stock, barrel and finish combinations since the cartridge appeared in 2002. The letters after “93R17” are not decoration. They say what stock, what barrel contour, what metal and whether a scope came in the box, and Savage publishes the key.

The rifle documented in this dive is recorded on its owner’s inventory sheet simply as a “93R17” with a 20-inch barrel and a thumbhole wood stock. That combination does not appear anywhere in Savage’s own catalogue pages. This volume sets out every barrel length Savage published for the family, from the maker’s own model pages as archived between 2002 and 2026, and shows where the recorded rifle falls against them. It does not settle the question. It narrows it to a short list and names what to look at on the rifle to finish the job.

1.1.1 The pattern in one table

These are the properties the whole 93R17 family shares, taken from Savage’s own pages, manual and service answers.¹²³

Table 1 — 1.1 The pattern in one table

	Savage Model 93R17
Cartridge	.17 HMR (Hornady Magnum Rimfire), a .22 WMR case necked to .17
Action	Bolt action, rimfire, push feed
Magazine	Detachable box, 5 rounds (Savage: “only 5-round magazines available for the magnum 93 series”, 2013)
Rifling	Button rifled, 1 in 9 in twist on every model page
Barrel lengths catalogued	16.5, 18, 20.75, 21, 22 and 24 in, depending on model (§1.4)
Trigger	AccuTrigger on every model catalogued from about 2005–06; a non-adjustable trigger on earlier rifles (§1.6)
Safety	Two-position: FULL SAFE fully rearward, OFF fully forward exposing a red dot
Bolt	Matched to the individual receiver; the last four digits of the serial number are engraved on it
Where made	”The majority of the rimfire models” at Savage’s plant in Lakefield, Ontario (Savage, 2013)
Scope bases	Weaver-style two-piece bases; Savage names Weaver #16 and #24 as the fit

The two numbers most worth remembering are the twist and the bolt. The 1-in-9 twist is universal across the family, so twist is never a reason to prefer one sub-model over another. And the bolt is not a swappable part: Savage’s manual warns that bolt assemblies “are specifically matched to a firearm” and tells the owner to confirm that the four digits on the bottom of the bolt match the receiver’s serial number before installing it.² That is how Savage controls headspace on this action, and it is taken up in Volume 4.

1.1.2 Where the action comes from: Lakefield, not Westfield

Savage’s headquarters and service department are in Westfield, Massachusetts. Its bolt-action rimfires are, for the most part, Canadian.

Savage’s Canadian operation began as an independent company, Lakefield Arms, founded in 1969 in Lakefield, Ontario. Savage bought it in 1995. The English-language reference literature records the plant producing 200,000 to 300,000 guns a year, most of them exported to the United States.⁴ In 2013 Savage’s own service desk answered the question “Where are the rimfire rifles manufactured?” with: “Savage is currently manufacturing the majority of the rimfire models in our Canadian facility located in Lakefield, Ontario. We have recently added production of rimfire products in our Westfield, MA facility as well.”³ So a given 93R17 is most likely, but not certainly, Canadian-built; the barrel roll-mark and the maker’s address on the rifle say which.

The family structure follows from the plant. The small action is the Mark II, built for .22 LR and, in its FV varmint version, the .17 HM2 (the Hornady cartridge made by necking down a .22 LR Stinger case). The Model 93 is the same design stretched for the magnum rimfire case, “a series of ‘magnum’ bolt-action rimfire rifles chambered for the .22 WMR ammunition and its neck-down derivative caliber .17 HMR”, in the reference literature’s words.⁴ “93” with no suffix is the .22 WMR rifle; “93R17” is the same rifle in .17 HMR. Savage’s own 2022 service article on bolt removal lists “Model 93/93R17” as one entry alongside the Mark I, Mark II, Rascal and B Series, which is the clearest statement that the maker treats them as one mechanism.⁵

On lineage. This is a Lakefield design brought into Savage by acquisition. Nothing in the Savage or reference sources consulted connects it to any other maker’s rimfire action, and the popular shorthand that ties Savage’s rimfires to other American rimfire lines was not found in any source. The dive treats the 93 as a Lakefield action and makes no stronger claim than that.

Ownership, briefly, because a date in it causes confusion. ATK, the company that became Vista Outdoor, announced its purchase of Savage on 13 May 2013, and on 9 July 2019 Vista sold Savage and Stevens to a group led by Savage’s management.⁴ The 2013 date is a corporate event. It is not the date of any change to the 93R17, and it is not the date of Savage’s semi-automatic .17 HMR rifle, which Volume 3 shows to be a 2015 introduction.

1.1.3 Reading a Savage model name

Savage’s service desk publishes the letter code.³ The entries that matter for the 93R17 family:

Table 2 — Savage's service desk publishes the letter code.[^faq] The entries that matter for the 93R17 family

Letter(s)	Savage’s meaning
B	Laminate stock
BT	Laminated thumbhole stock
F	Synthetic stock
G	Hardwood stock
V	Heavy varmint barrel
SS	Stainless steel
L	Left hand
XP	Package gun (scope mounted at the factory)
SR	Suppressor ready barrel (threaded)
T	Rimfire peep sights

So a 93R17 BTV is a laminated thumbhole stock with a heavy varmint barrel, and a 93R17 BTVS (catalogued later as BTVSS) is the same with stainless metal. A GV is a hardwood stock and a heavy barrel; an FV-SR is synthetic, heavy and threaded.

Two cautions. The code describes the rifle as it left the factory; a restocked rifle keeps its model name and loses its meaning. And the code is not applied with perfect consistency: the “T” of the 93R17 Classic T stands for its thumbhole, not for peep sights, and the TR, TRR-SR and BSEV names do not decode cleanly from the table. The model pages are the authority; the letters are a guide.

1.1.4 Every 93R17 Savage catalogued

The Internet Archive holds 247 captures of savagearms.com pages whose address contains “93r17”, from July 2002 to 2026. Each model page was retrieved as archived and its specification block read.¹ The figure and table below are the result. The years are the dates of captures, not production dates; a model can have been made before its first capture and after its last.

Table 3 — 1.4 Every 93R17 Savage catalogued

Model	Barrel	Stock, in Savage’s words	Thumbhole	Captured
93R17 GV	21 in	”Monte Carlo style walnut finished hardwood with cut checkering”	no	2002–2024
93R17 FV	21 in	”Synthetic with positive checkering”	no	2002–2024
93R17 BVSS	21 in	”Laminated hardwood”	no	2003–2024
93R17 F, FSS, Camo (early)	20.75 in	black synthetic; Realtree Hardwoods HD camo	no	2003–2004
93R17 FXP, GVXP (early packages)	20.75 in	synthetic; walnut-finished hardwood; 3-9×40 scope fitted	no	2006
93R17 F, FSS (later)	21 in	synthetic	no	2012–2024
93R17 BV	21 in	”Brown laminated hardwood with wide beavertail”	no	2006–2024
93R17 BTVS / BTVSS	21 in	”Brown laminated vented thumbhole”, stainless	yes	2005–2026
93R17 BTV	21 in	”Brown laminated vented thumbhole”, blued	yes	2009–2025
93R17 BTVLSS	21 in	laminate thumbhole, stainless, left hand	yes	2012–2018
93R17 BSEV	21 in	wood laminate, thumbhole, stainless	yes	2012–2018
93R17 Classic T	24 in	”Satin lacquer American walnut thumbhole stock with wraparound checkering and contrasting black forend tip”	yes	2008–2012
93R17 Classic	24 in	walnut with checkering	no	2007–2010
93R17 TR	21 in, later 22 in	wood, tactical	no	2012–2018
93R17 TRR-SR	22 in	wood, tactical, threaded	no	2010–2024
93R17 XP camo, XP snow camo	22 in	synthetic, scope package	no	2008–2018
93R17 FV-SR	16.5 in	synthetic, threaded	no	2014–2024
93R17 Minimalist	18 in	laminate Minimalist	no	2024

The pattern is stark. Every thumbhole 93R17 was catalogued at 21 inches, except the walnut Classic T at 24. The only sub-21-inch lengths other than the short FV-SR and Minimalist are the 20.75 inches of five early rifles from 2003–2006, and none of those had a thumbhole stock.

1.1.5 The 20-inch problem

The owner’s sheet records “20"" for this rifle. No 93R17 on any archived Savage model page has a 20-inch barrel. The sheet is not corrected here: the barrel may have been measured differently, the rifle may have been restocked, or a variant may exist that Savage’s website never listed. Any of those would make the recorded figure honest and the catalogue silent. The question has been put to the owner.

What can be said is which catalogued rifles come closest, and how to tell them apart on the bench.

Table 4 — 1.5 The 20-inch problem

Candidate	Why it fits	Why it may not
93R17 BTV	Thumbhole; “wood” is a fair description of laminate; blued	21 in, not 20
93R17 BTVS / BTVSS	Same stock; stainless barrel and bolt	21 in; stainless metal is obvious
93R17 BSEV	Laminate thumbhole, stainless	21 in; stainless
93R17 Classic T	The only solid walnut thumbhole, the most literal reading of “wood”	24 in, the furthest from 20
An early 20.75-in rifle restocked	20.75 is the closest barrel length	No catalogued 20.75-in rifle had a thumbhole; a restock would have to be shown

Four checks settle it, and none needs a tool beyond a rod and a tape.

1. Laminate or walnut. Laminate shows parallel plies of alternating colour wherever the stock is cut through: the edges of the thumbhole, the vents in the forend, the barrel channel. Solid walnut shows continuous grain. A black forend tip on walnut points to the Classic T.
2. Blued or stainless. A stainless barrel and bolt are the “S” or “SS” in BTVS and BTVSS.
3. Measure the barrel properly. Barrel length for a rifle is taken with the bolt closed, from the bolt face to the muzzle: a cleaning rod down the bore to the bolt face, marked at the crown, then measured. A tape laid along the outside from the front of the receiver to the muzzle reads short by the length of barrel inside the receiver and the bolt-face recess, and is the most likely way a 21-inch barrel becomes “20”. This is a hypothesis about how the sheet’s figure arose, not a finding.
4. Read the roll-mark. Savage marks the barrel with the calibre; the model designation, where present, and the maker’s address (Lakefield or Westfield) are what to record.

1.1.6 Does it have the AccuTrigger?

The sheet says the trigger is “factory”. On this family that is not one thing.

Savage launched the AccuTrigger on its centrefire rifles in 2002.⁶ It reached the rimfires a few years later. The earliest archived 93R17 BTVS page, captured in December 2005, already reads “with AccuTrigger” and lists “New AccuTrigger” among the features; the 2007 printed catalogue says of the 17 series that “every model in this series comes with the added adjustability and safety of the AccuTrigger”; and the BTV page captured in 2009 reads “now with AccuTrigger”.¹⁷ Every thumbhole 93R17 Savage catalogued therefore carries it. The earliest 93R17s, from 2002 to about 2005, did not, and Savage describes that earlier trigger plainly: “The average trigger weight on the original rimfire trigger is 4-6lbs. The trigger is not considered to be adjustable.”³

The AccuTrigger cannot be added later. Savage’s answer to “Can I buy an AccuTrigger for my firearm?” is that it “is not retrofittable to a gun that did not have it originally. The receiver is machined differently so it is not compatible with other receivers.”³

The visual test is the trigger itself. An AccuTrigger has a narrow blade, the AccuRelease, standing proud of the centre of the trigger shoe; the shooter’s finger has to depress it before the trigger will release the sear. A plain trigger shoe with no blade is the earlier trigger. Volume 4 explains what the blade does and why it is not a trigger-shoe safety of the Glock type.

For the rifle documented here, whether the trigger is an AccuTrigger is not recorded. If the rifle is any of the thumbhole models in §1.5, it should be.

1.1.7 The rifle documented here, as recorded in September 2026

This is the unit, as distinct from the pattern described above. It comes from the owner’s inventory sheet, last modified 17 September 2026 and read for this dive on 19 September 2026. The owner has stated that the sheet’s statuses are current. Where the sheet is blank or ambiguous, this dive says so rather than guessing. Optics in particular move between rifles, and the entry below says only what was fitted at that date.

Table 5 — 1.7 The rifle documented here, as recorded in September 2026

Item	As recorded	What it means here
Model	93R17	Sub-model not recorded (§1.5)
Barrel	20 in	No catalogued match; see §1.5
Stock	Thumbhole, wood	Laminate or walnut not recorded
Trigger	Factory	AccuTrigger or not is not recorded (§1.6)
Scope	Vortex Crossfire 4-12×44	Fitted as of September 2026. Generation and reticle not recorded; Volume 6
Scope mount	”M”	The entry is a single letter and is not interpreted
Modification	”Bolt Release”	Not explained on the sheet; see below
Suppressor	none recorded	The rimfire can used on other rifles is not listed against this one; Volume 6

The “Bolt Release” entry. On the Model 93 there is no separate bolt-release lever: Savage’s manual and its 2022 service article both release the bolt by holding the trigger fully rearward with the safety off.²⁵ Savage’s own B.MAG, by contrast, does have a separate bolt release. So the note may record an aftermarket part, a repair, a habit of use, or something else entirely. It is recorded here as written and not interpreted. The same entry appears against another rimfire on the same sheet, which suggests a deliberate note rather than a slip, but that is not evidence of what it means.

1.1.8 How the rest of this dive is organised

• Volume 2 — The cartridge. The .17 HMR: its ballistics from the makers’ own tables, a wind-drift comparison against the .22 WMR and .22 LR computed from those tables, and its terminal niche.
• Volume 3 — Why this is a bolt gun. The .17 HMR semi-automatic problem, from Remington’s recall notice and Savage’s A17, and why a bolt action is untouched by it.
• Volume 4 — How it works. The 93 action and the AccuTrigger, part by part, with diagrams; what Savage does and does not publish about the barrel and headspace.
• Volume 5 — How to keep it working. Field strip and what Savage says not to strip; cleaning a .17 bore; maintenance; malfunctions and repair, and what goes back to Savage.
• Volume 6 — On the rifle. The Vortex Crossfire, mounts, suppressing a .17 HMR, and the Michigan position for hunting use.

The general .22 rimfire material, including rimfire manufacturing, suppressor fouling and small-game terminal performance, is already covered in the hub’s .22 Rimfire dive and is linked rather than repeated.

1.1.9 What could not be verified

• Which sub-model the rifle documented here is. No catalogued 93R17 matches a 20-inch barrel with a thumbhole stock. Owner questions are listed in the dive’s working notes.
• Production dates for any sub-model. Only website capture dates were available; Savage’s printed catalogues other than 2007 were not consulted.
• Whether any 93R17 variant was made for a distributor or retailer outside the website catalogue. Such “special” runs exist in Savage’s service vocabulary, but none with a 20-inch barrel was found.
• The meaning of the sheet’s “Bolt Release” and “M” entries.

1.1.10 Bibliography

Footnotes

1. Savage Arms model pages for the 93R17 family, retrieved as archived by the Internet Archive (CDX index query over savagearms.com, 247 captures of URLs containing “93r17”, July 2002 to 2026), each page’s specification block read directly. Key captures: 93r17gv.htm (2002-07-19); 93r17fv.htm (2002-10-16); 93r17f.htm (2003-02-04, 20.75 in); 93r17BTVS.htm (2005-12-06, “Brown laminated vented thumbhole”, 21 in, “with AccuTrigger”); 93R17gvxp.htm and 93R17FXP.htm (2006-01-10, 20.75 in); 93r17classic.htm (2007-11-21, 24 in); 93R17Classic_T.htm (2008-01-27, 24 in, walnut thumbhole); 93R17BTV.htm (2009-03-22, 21 in, “now with AccuTrigger”); /firearms/model/93R17BSEV, 93R17TR, 93R17TRRSR (2012-05-22); /firearms/model/93r17-* (2018-08-07); /firearms/model/93-93r17-* and 93r17-* (2024). Accessed 2026-09-19. ↩ ↩² ↩³

2. Savage Arms, Instruction manual — Mark I, Rascal, Mark II, Model 93 and B.MAG (rimfire bolt action), savagearms.com/DAM/assets/pdf/Manuals/manual_rimfire_boltaction.pdf, as archived 2022-12-19 (PDF created 2016, revised 2019). §2 two-position safety; §3 installing the bolt, including the matched-bolt warning and serial-digit check; §8 B.MAG bolt release. ↩ ↩² ↩³

3. Savage Arms service FAQ, service.savagearms.com/hc/en-us/articles/ (answers dated 11 April 2013 unless noted), as archived 2020–2024: “Is there a larger capacity magazine available for the 93 series” (214237263); “What do the letters in the Savage Arms model names mean” (214237303); “What is the average factory trigger weight on a non-accutrigger rimfire” (214237803); “Can I buy an Accutrigger for my firearm” (214239543); “Where are the rimfire rifles manufactured” (214238423); “Where can I find scope bases for my Savage rimfire” (214239863); “Are Savage actions control round feed or push feed” (214238983). Accessed 2026-09-19. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵

4. “Savage Arms”, English Wikipedia, consulted 2026-09-19 — Lakefield Arms founded 1969 in Lakefield, Ontario, bought by Savage in 1995, 200,000–300,000 guns a year; the Mark II and Model 93 series descriptions; ATK’s announced purchase on 13 May 2013; Vista Outdoor’s sale to a management-led group on 9 July 2019. Secondary source; the Lakefield production figure is attributed to it and not repeated as fact elsewhere. ↩ ↩² ↩³

5. Savage Arms blog, “How to Remove the Bolt in a Savage Bolt Action Rimfire Rifle”, 31 March 2022, savagearms.com/blog/post/how-to-remove-the-bolt-in-savage-rimfire-rifles, as archived 2025-03-20. Lists “Model 93/93R17” with the Mark I, Mark II, Rascal and B Series. ↩ ↩²

6. Savage Arms blog, “AccuTrigger Anniversary: Celebrating 20 Years”, 9 January 2023, as archived 2024-09-01 — AccuTrigger launched 2002. ↩

7. Savage Arms, 2007 Catalog, savagearms.com/images/pdf/catalogs/SavageCatalog2007.pdf, as archived 2007-10-12, “17 Series” pages. ↩