I have a 99 Savage Hi-power with the original barrel and stock, now I don't want to wreck the original rifle but I would like to get more use out of it. I was thinking along the lines of extra barrels and fore-ends in " similar " cartridges. My thoughts are a 219 Zipper Imp. a 6.5 Zipper Imp. and possibly a standard 30.30.
Has anyone done any work with these rifles??Would this be possible with a slight change to the magazine follower to feed all four cartridges?? Would the action be strong enough??



......the last round is acfually a 35.30, but you get the idea

You can get into trouble with older guns sometimes, and it is an older gun with steel that may be inferior to one degree or another..Lots of folks I have known opted to rebore and rechamber them to 250-3000 or 25-35 or 30-30. The 30-30 would be the most practicle in that ammo and components are always available and pressures would be tolerable for sure, and why complicate things?

But, If it were mine and if the bore is still good, I would make brass out of 30-30 cases and buy some .228 caliber bullets and just enjoy it. case forming dies are available from RCBS as are reloading dies, I recently saw where .228 cal. bullets are still available from some outfit, bullet availability would be my determining factor.

My brother shot a heck of a lot of deer and antelope with his Hi Powewr many years ago and I shot a few with it myself..Its a decent killer on deer size game up to about 200 yards or so.

The early models with the square bolt at the rear had a tendency to crack and changing calibers requires new rotors and cartridge stops which aren't easy to replace and are hard to find.

plus one on SRT, parts are very hard to find and its guess and by gosh or rotors as to will they fit or not, they are not marked and can be tricky to modify..The best at fixing 99s is Dennis Olson in Plains, Mt.

Both RWS and Norma make 5.6X52R brass. Very good brass that will last forever with moderate loads, which is a good idea with 100 year old rifles. Hornady makes 70 grain 228 jacketed bullets and RCBS has moulds.

I used to make my brass from 30-30 cases, but a lot of work with a high failure rate even with annealing.

30-30 brass is prone to failure as is 25-35..It works best if you anneal it of course, but I use a file trim die from RCBS for 25-35s..Run the 30-30 case thru the file trim die, inside neck ream it to remove a formed ring at the shoulder, then full lenth resize it in the 25-35 full length die...Same for the 22 Hi-Powder I would think...Trying to run a 30-30 in a 25-35 die is a recipe for disaster for sure, about 90% failure as a rule...I have not use RWS or Norma, but that's probably better brass to start with for sure. WW and Rem brass is good brass but NOT IN THE 30-30, never has been for whatever reason..