Several months ago I began restoring an old Marlin 336 in 30-30 Winchester (a gun I traded a golf club for while in college back in 1978). I had the steel re-blued, refinished the stock and forearm and am installing ghost ring iron sights. It will also have Warne QD rings with a Redfield 4X scope (also 20+ years old).

This is more of a winter project than a primary whitetail gun, but I do plan on using it some this year, perhaps in my tree lounge in the hard woods (50 yard shots typical).

I was hoping to hear from those that have hand-loaded for their 30-30's and was wondering what your experience has been. Do you acheive greater performance over factory 150 and 170 grain loads? Is it worth the effort?

Many thanks for your feedback.

I've had good luck loading my own -- I get around 2130 fps and slightly better accuracy than the factory stuff if I use 170-gr. Nosler or Sierra bullets and W-748 (a grain less than book max, whatever that is). Factory stuff chronos about 2000 fps even in my 20" 94.

Kan, I'm not the worlds greatest authorities on 30/30's but I've owned a couple and reloaded for them. Mostly I've reloaded with Lyman's 311291 cast bullet. What I can tell you is the 30/30 is a great cast bullet rifle...which means if you go this route you can cut your shooting cost greatly without really sacrificing much, if any, performance.

By shooting cast bullets they become fun rifles that you can shoot all you want and not be a terrible drain to your resources, financial or reloading.

Biggest complaint I had against them was there was GREAT variation in cases! Some thick, some thin, some this length, some that. But then I never bought any brass...just picked a lot of it up because most 30/30 shooters don't reload. This gave me my prime resource for free. I love following NON-reloaders around. Hee,hee.

Enjoy. Sounds like a fun project.

I have had very good results with Sierra 170's and W748. I have 2 M94's equipped with receiver sights and they both will outshoot some of my much more expensive scoped rifles.
C.G.B.

Last year I played around with loads for my Winchester 94. 36.5 grains of WW748 with the Hornady 150gr RN produced 5 shot groups of 1.5 inches off the bench with iron sites. That was dang sure good enough for me. Avg velocity was 2348 fps.

I have loaded the 30-30 quite a bit and it normally is possible to pinch a little accruracy out of one over factory stuff....but is is worth it...You can shop around Walmart and places like that and buy the stuff cheaper than you can load it...I bought 14 boxes of 170 gr. Silvertips at the last gun show I went to for $3.00 a box..and they had them on sale for less than $6.00 at our local discount store...

The .30/30 is not so easy to load for, compared to say a .20/'06. The reason is that the case is somewhat fragile, particularly the rather thin neck brass. However, although you cannot "hotrod" it much (go to an Ackley Improved .30/30 for that), it is about the ideal round for shooting cast bullets. The Lyman 31141 with the flat nose is a great .30/30 bullet in the heavier weight range, and there are several lighter flatnose designs as well. The .30/30 will drive a cast bullet at velocities a little faster than factory loads, and with excellent accuracy.

I've had great luck with the 170 grainers using various powders. The accuracy is noticeably better than the factory ammo. The velocity is about the same.

Kanatak; You should have good luck with a 336 Marlin. In my expierance the marlin is a little stronger action than the 94 Win, but more important is that it doesn't spring & lose accuracy as you approach max loads. If your Marlin has a micro-groove barrel you can forget cast bullets, but 170s shoot well & 150s will give you very respectable accuracy & range.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Kanatak:
[
i have shot more deer with the 30-30 than any gun i have; the shots where mostly under 50 YDS and with reloads. great gun for woods hunting.is it worth it yes;just my opinion by the way it is a Marlin 336 carbine.

Havn't fired a factory 30-30 round in years. All the above are valid points. The cases are fragile it does handle cast well, you can't steam it up much (well, you can, but you better know what you're doing). In addition get the Lee factory crimp die, and set your regular dies not to crimp. Use the Lee crimp die, and 99% of those crumpled cases will vanish. Barnes now makes a hollow X point for the 30-30, I took two deer with it last year. All shots passed through, even the odd angle shots. I'd call the performance of the Barnes un remarkable, for that limited experience(deer was no deader than any other bullet would have done).

I have had good luck with the Speer 130 grain Flat Nose and the Hornady 150 grain round nose.
A young hunter I helped took his first whitetail with a 130 grain Speer handload. Using BLC-2 and Hogdgons #26 manual loading data, one can work up a surprisingly fast load and still keep the pressure somewhat low. The 130 grain load had little recoil. I have found that Remington and Winchester in that order are the best brass to use for that loading while Federals weigh 10-12 grains more and accuracy was not in line and pressure limits were reached sooner with the Federals.

Hi Canatak,
It tried the 100gn hornady /130gn sierra both worked
well and got quite good performance. The only problems I had were: if you did not chamfer the case mouth enough, when you tried to seat the bullet it crumpled the case, the 100gn loads were loaded one at a time.
good luck

Griff

Sxr6. I must heartily disagree with you. Marlins will shoot cast lead with good accuracy. It does take a bit more work though. Just cast the bullets a bit harder than normal and size to .310" in diameter. You have to play with the hardness some to get an alloy that doesn't jump the rifling, but otherwise they shoot just fine. They'll shoot close enough to take deer out to 150 yards.
Paul B.

Kanatak,
I got my 30/30 Wincheter because my Son-inLaw sold it for the price of a golf club.
We are both very happy.
I bought a box of factory ammo just to have as a gauge to measure my handloads against. I still have half a box. 30.5 grains of#IMR#3031 powder behind a 170 grain Hornady will shoot inside any group(in my gun)shot with these factory rounds,and gets 2100FPS.
By all means,hand load for the 30/30,if you can.I have had NO trouble with collapsed cases,unless I got careless. It's also an ideal choice for shooting cast bullets.
good luck,
Frank

hot core........what is a "2-diameter bullet"..??

I have used a 30-30 most of my life, reloading 95% of the time. I too, agree that the Hornady 150 gr round nose is a very good bullet. I use mostly bolt action and single shots, so I have gone to a pointed bullet. But, I have used a few hundred Hornadys over the years. The Winchester Silvertip is a good bullet as well. I have found IMR 4064 and H335 to be the best powders so far.
I would not be happy with the 30-30 if all I had to use was factory ammo.

Thanks everyone. I found a RCBS 30-30 die set on GunBroker.com and will be reloading this old cartridge for the fall season. I really appreciate all the feedback and will let you know how the load testing goes.