One bullet for two rifles

[megasupermagnum]

I am looking to cast for two .30 caliber rifles. One is an older Winchester model 94 .30-30 win in fantastic condition. The other is a new Remington 770 .30-06 spfd, and well, its a 770. I slugged the bores of each, and found the 94 to have a land to land diameter of about .3086", and the 770 .3073". I am looking to cast the Lee C309-170-F. Now, I noticed the 770's bore is rough and tapered. The Muzzle is tight, and it gets looser toward the breach. It's very possible it will never be good. It does shoot 1.5 MOA with a federal 180 grain factory load. My instinct is to size to .310", but how would .0027" or so oversize affect pressure and accuracy? In the 30-06 I'm just looking for a practice load in the mid 1000's fps. To those who have used this bullet in a lever action, how well does it feed?

[centershot]

That boollit feeds fine in my Marlin, considering the 94's feed mechanism you shouldn't have any problem at all!

How much taper is in the 770's bore?

[megasupermagnum]

I don't know for sure. I tried a fishing weight from the breech, but I couldn't get it started right. When I go from the muzzle, it starts tight, but then becomes noticeably looser as you go. The model 94 was nice and even the whole way. Maybe it has something to do with the 94 has a shiny smooth bore, while the 770 is about like 80 grit sandpaper. I decided to buy a .310 sizer, and will see how it goes in the 770.

[largom]

I would fire-lap the 770. Will not hurt it! The .310 sizer should be fine. I shoot my 30's as cast at .311

[Outpost75]

You always want to size cast bullets to THROAT size, NOT to barrel groove diameter.

Most .30 cal. rifles do well with .310". Some rifles with very tight, minimum chambers and tight throats might need .309, but that is by far the exception.

Worn barrels which have been shot a great deal with full-charge jacketed loads will likely need .311" or .312".

With a minimum SAAMI chamber you can't go above .312" without neck turning cases to get safe release clearance.

A bullet which I use with good results in both .30-30 tube magazine rifles and .30-'06 boltguns is:

209760

[country gent]

The rough may or may not be a problem, only some shooting will tell the story. Ive seen some pretty rough bores ( inspected with a Hawkeye Bore Scope) shoot pretty good. Also Shooting may smooth them out as time goes on and round count goes up. As to the taper smaller to the muzzle is desirable and helps with accuracy. If the taper was the other direction ( smaller at the breech than the muzzle ) then this would be a concern. Most barrel blanks in straight contours are marked as to breech end so the "taper is in the right direction.
Start out sizing to throat (if the rifle will chamber rounds with that big a neck dia) and work from there. A firearm is a thing unto itself and takes some testing to know what works best in it. With both rifles the one bullet should be good and size to what each like with the load each likes should be capable of fine accuracy from both rifles.

[Hick]

I do just you are talking about with my M1 in 30-06 and my Win 94 in 30-30--the Lee 309-170F. When I want low velocity I use it plain based (just leave off the gas check) and for higher velocities I use a gas check. The bullet feeds fine in a lever action.

[megasupermagnum]

I'd rather not take castings of the chambers. I've done it a couple times now, and it's not fun to do alone. Both guns have hardly been shot. What happened to the old .001-.002" over land diameter? I'm just looking for plinking ammo. I'm not going to fire lap the 770, but thanks for the idea. Both guns are my dad's, and he needs cheap ammo to practice with. As it is now, I can barely get him to the range to shoot a single box. I don't own any 30 cal rifles myself, so no worries there.

[Dan Cash]

1. I th9ink you are confusing land diameter and groove diameter. The measurements you have given sound like groove diameter (the groove dimension is the large dimension on the slug).

2. You could size your bullet to .303 and patch up to .311 or .312. Would work in either rifle and would sure smooth the Remington bore.

[runfiverun]

the rcbs 30-150-fngc will work fine in both guns.

[megasupermagnum]

1. I th9ink you are confusing land diameter and groove diameter. The measurements you have given sound like groove diameter (the groove dimension is the large dimension on the slug).

2. You could size your bullet to .303 and patch up to .311 or .312. Would work in either rifle and would sure smooth the Remington bore.

I guess I should have stated bottom of the lands, aka groove diameter. I think most people will figure it out.

I think I'm over thinking the whole thing. I already bought the mold, I'm just going to see how they shoot.

[Motor]

You are lucky it isn't tapered the other direction. ;)

I shoot the same bullet in several rifles and calibers. I even made a trim die to flat point the nose for use in tubular magazines.

Like the post above, I size all of my bullets for bores that are "supposed to have" .308" groove diameter .311" and have great success and zero issues with any of them. The bullet (not that matters) is a Lee 160gr 2R TL.

I shoot it sub sonic as well as super sonic in the following calibers.

300 BO
7.62x54R (Both Russian and Finn rifles sized according)
30-30 Win
7.5x54 MAS
.308 Win
30-06

I may have forgotten one or two but you get the picture.

I wouldn't let that taper in the Remington bother me at all. Lead is very forgiving and the fact that it gets smaller towards the muzzle is a lot better than the other way around.

Oh BTW, I totally switched over to powder coating. All my loads shoot at least as good as they did with lube. The best part is how clean everything stays especially the semiautomatics. ;)

Motor

[megasupermagnum]

The point looks pretty flat to me. I bought the mold so I could use it in a tube magazine. It's the Lee 309-170-f if you missed it.

[gwpercle]

I use the Lee C309-170-F in a Winchester model 94 (30-30) and a 1903-A3 Springfield (30-06) with a two groove barrel. Size the boolits .309 , gas check them and use in both rifles. Alloy is COWW - Lead (50-50) + 1% tin.
Load both to around 1600 fps and shoot at 50 yards max. for fun and tin can shooting . Works well in both of mine.
Gary

[Boolseye]

I size mine to .311" for my .30s. Shoots great.

[yeahbub]

I second largom's comment and others about lapping the 770's bore a bit. Some 600 grit to smooth it up some, no biggy, say 10-15 rounds. The taper you mention is precisely how it should be, looser at the breech and tighter at the muzzle, which improves gas seal as the boolit goes up the bore. Shoot it first, though - it may be fine as-is. The boolit you've chosen should work well for both. As others have commented, the boolit should be sized to seat the front driving band in the throat on chambering with slight resistance, usually .309-.310, possibly .311 if worn. Only experimentation will tell what works, but you're on the right track.

Another candidate for economic plinking is Lyman's 311466, a Loverin style with plenty of lube aboard and useful with or without gas check for the velocities you intend. It's a round-nose, so I flatten the points with a flat nose punch in the lubrisizer to use them in a tubular mag. Just a thought.

[megasupermagnum]

You just jam round nose bullets with the flat punch and it seems to flatten it out enough? That's an interesting thing to add to my bag of tricks.

[yeahbub]

To make the noses consistent, with a flat nose punch in the ram, the boolit is pushed into the die so the ram/top punch hits the top of the die. The stop screw under the die is then tightened up against the sizer die pin. Then the bullet is pushed up a bit in the die and the stop screw turned farther upward maybe 1/4 or 1/2 turn, thus making the distance between the nose punch and the die pin a touch shorter than the boolit. Then the boolit is once again seated all the way down in the die and the handle given a bump with your hand to get the ram to contact the die - nothing too energetic. You'll get a feel for what it takes with your alloy. This will flatten the nose a repeatable amount and create boolits of consistent length. The usual flat I make is .100 diameter on the 311466. It's safe in tubular mags and only shortens the boolit .060 or so. If you take it too far, the ogive will start to look ugly. The linkage on the Lyman 4500 definitely isn't meant for heavy work, but they stand up to this well enough.

[P Flados]

I have cast the Lee 170 & found that I could not get it to feed through a 94 Winchester when crimped in the groove using normal cases.

The Lee 150 did great for both feeding and shooting.

If you want to use the Lee 170, you may want consider trimming brass shorter than typical to get you AOL down to where it will feed.

[megasupermagnum]

I have not casted any yet, so have not tried in mine. Is there any reason I can't just seat them deeper than the crimp groove?

[Boolseye]

well, the thing you need to watch out for is pressure increase.
That boolit is a bore rider in my Marlin 336A 30-30, engraves the rifling right up the nose.

[P Flados]

I would not worry about pressure, remember the old start low and work up thing. Also, all standard book data will use OALs that do not exceed the 2.550" that 30-30 guns were designed for.

More important is tube feed magazines and crimp.

I would not load rounds for a tube feeder without a good crimp in the crimp groove.

I have seen reports that some people can get Lee 170s to work normal in their Model 94s. I just know of my own single gun example where my OAL was probably 2.580", book OAL max is 2.550" and my OAL would not work at all.

Since I also had the Lee 150, I did not bother continued efforts with the Lee 170. Since the Lee 150 is easy and a sure thing, it is really not a bad choice at all.

I looked back & saw that you have the Lee 170 mold. Just play with OAL (and associated brass trimming) to get reliable feeding or do the single feeding for plinking. The trimming required will probably be little or nothing more than "normal".

For someone thinking about the Lee 170 for a 30-30, I would recommend they load up a dummy round with any bullet they have to approximate a Lee 170 with a 2.580" OAL and see if it will work in the gun.

[Motor]

I agree with P Flados. The crimp is to prevent the bullets from moving from recoil when loaded in a tube magazine. Many guys don't use an effective crimp on cast rifle ammo they only "crimp" enough to remove the mouth flare.

Seating depth on a rifle round (the size of 30-30 or larger) using typical cast bullet pressure loads is not effected much by seating depth. The amount of casing capacity is simply too large compared to the small difference the seating depth makes.

I'm actually shocked that the Lee doesn't have the crimp groove in the correct location for the 30-30. That's strange. That bullet should work well in your other rifles.

If your Mosin Nagant is a Russian model you'll want at least .312" diameter but probably more. For my 91-30 I use them as cast with powder coating or if I'm using a gas check I install it with a .314" push through die after powder coated. ;)

Motor

[HangFireW8]

You always want to size cast bullets to THROAT size, NOT to barrel groove diameter.

No. This is not a hard and fast rule. Good results can be obtained other ways. What's more, some lever actions won't chamber/function correctly with fat boolits.