A friend, for whom I reload, purchased some of the new Hornady LEVERevoloution bullets (30 caliber, 160 gr) by mistake and gave them to me when he discovered what kind of bullets they were. I have a Marlin Model 336 .30-30, so I decided to give them a try.

I loaded a "load test group" (four different charges of IMR 3031) and went to the range to try them. THEY ALL KEYHOLED TERRIBLY!

My 30-30 will shoot just about any 150 gr bullet pushed by IMR3031 very well. What is going on here? I seated these bullets to the cannelure, which is way forward, on these bullets. Would loading them with a different powder (say, Varget) be worth a try? Not seating them to the cannelure?

Has anyone else had this problem? Is it the Marlin microgroove barrel? Any help will be appreciated.

I have never loaded for the 30/30 or used Leverevolution bullets in anything. How hot is the load you have tried with this combination? If you have some room left, pressure wise, you might try pushing them a little harder to see if spinning them a little faster will get them to stabilize. A slower powder will sometimes allow you to get higher velocity which will get them higher RPM spin which in turn will help stabilize the heavier bullets. As far as seating depth, I think the COAL should be set first and the load worked up from there as length will affect chamber pressure, i.e; more pressure = more bullet speed = faster bullet spin = more bullet stability. If that won't work, if you have a different 30cal rifle you might see what they will do in it.

Red: I can't imagine what is wrong. I have spoken to many, many shooters using the factory ammo in their .30 WCFs with excellent accuracy. I handloaded the 200-grain FTX in a Model 8 in .35 Remington with very fine accuracy.

What was the distance to the target?
What velocity range do you think you were shooting these?

What's the twist in your barrel?
Could your twist be too slow?