Thoughts or opinions ?
Guns & Shooting
Savage Axis vs Mossberg Patriot
Have no experience shooting the Patriot, but I do have some with the Axis. Here is my opinion...
If you have the resources to do so, spend the extra $75 and buy the Savage 110/10, especially if you are buying a short action caliber (.243, .308, 7mm-08) because the Axis is built on a long action only. Yes you can buy an Axis in .243 but it will have the bolt throw of a .270 or .30-06. The action is not as smooth as the 10/110 either. My wife shoots a Savage Model 10 in .243 and the gun shoots 1/2" groups at 100 yards. A lot of this is due to the better, pillar bedded stock you get with the Model 10 and at the time I bought hers the AccuTrigger was not available in the Axis line. I am a Savage guy through and through, but the Axis line just doesn't do much for me. Accuracy was OK but the gun itself felt clunky to me.
I have both..
Savage .308, first gun went back for chamber/firing issues. Cabelas ended up buying it back and gave me a new gun. I've shot 25 rounds with that gun without fail.
Savage youth .243, 100 rounds no issues
Traded my .308 Rem jam-o-matic for the Mossberg 30.06 last year and have only shot a few rounds out of it. No issues, nice feel and fun to shoot. I added a Vortex scope to this gun.
Junk.
I had 2 friends buy Axis's for their son's first gun. Last year one of them lost their first buck. Firing pin failed.
Second one didn't get past the firing range. Firing pin and clip issues.
They learned a lesson the hard way.
Spend the extra money and buy a Browning, Remington, Ruger, Winchester, or Weatherby.