Need mold recommendation for 336 30-30

[Bphunter]

I tried a couple of bullets in my Marlin 336 without much success. Groove/bore slugs to .3095/.301. That might explain why the Trueshot .309 bullets shot poorly. I purchased a Saeco 305-3AE (.303 British?) mold that someone here recommended but discovered that the nose is too wide and engraves heavily. I actually pulled a boolit upon extracting one of the rounds. My Marlin 336 is 2003 vintage and has a really short throat. The rifling engraved to .115" from the case mouth. I looked at the RD molds (311-165 & SC311-165) and decided they may also engrave on the nose, although the SC version looked more forgiving. I do not want a bullet that has to be forced into the chamber. Is there a decent bullet out there that is accurate and can be seated in the crimp groove as intended? I may try the Lee C311-170 and/or the Lyman 311041 next, but any advice is welcome!

[bigarm]

I will be interested in your responses as well.

[ballistim]

NOE is making the copy of the Ranch Dog design, it's the 311-165Gr. RF (RD) which has been said to have been designed for the 336, do a search and you'll find quite a bit.

[Slow Elk 45/70]

Yes the RD molds were made using the Marlins for their specifications and yes there is little throat in them....Most of these rifles like a fat boolit...I use .311 boolits in my 30/30 cal marlins . I don't understand the specs you give for your groove/bore dia..but what do I know.. I'm sure someone will comment with better info than I have provided. Good Luck and welcome to the insanity.

[Bphunter]

NOE is making the copy of the Ranch Dog design, it's the 311-165Gr. RF (RD) which has been said to have been designed for the 336, do a search and you'll find quite a bit.

Believe me, I have searched a LOT on the NOE 311-165 molds. I found many who think they are very accurate, but also many who complain about excessive lever force to chamber them, particularly in Marlins. I found some Lee custom molds that cast 311041 clones at .311 diameter, so that looks pretty interesting. I think my gun will tolerate a .301 - .302 nose without undue chambering force, so thats what I'm looking for. If someone could tell me with certainty that the SC311-165 would chamber freely in a Marlin 336, I would buy that mold in a heartbeat!

[Bphunter]

Slow Elk, what bullet are you using?

[ballistim]

Believe me, I have searched a LOT on the NOE 311-165 molds. I found many who think they are very accurate, but also many who complain about excessive lever force to chamber them, particularly in Marlins. I found some Lee custom molds that cast 311041 clones at .311 diameter, so that looks pretty interesting. I think my gun will tolerate a .301 - .302 nose without undue chambering force, so thats what I'm looking for. If someone could tell me with certainty that the SC311-165 would chamber freely in a Marlin 336, I would buy that mold in a heartbeat!

I have a Lee 6 cavity copy of the 311041 and have cast them up but haven't tried them out yet, had cast them to try in my .308 & 30-06, hadn't thought about the 30-30. I can tell you that the Lee mold cast nice boolits though.

[btroj]

I have both the old style RD mould by Lee and an early NOE version of the 165. The NOE is a tiny bit different in the nose and I have to trim cases a bit short to crimp in the groove. Not a big deal really.
Both bulelts shoot very well, I just prefer the NOE version as it has traditional grooves.

[RickinTN]

" If someone could tell me with certainty that the SC311-165 would chamber freely in a Marlin 336, I would buy that mold in a heartbeat!"

I can tell you with a pretty high degree of certainty that it won't. It would be a good idea to try a few samples to be sure before buying the mold. If you will send me your mailing address by PM I'll try to get a few samples out to you. I have another bullet which I use in my Marlin 336's that works quite well. It is the Accurate 31-180R as I recall. It doesn't have a crimp groove and was actually designed for a long throated 308 rifle which I own but it fits my 336 throats like a glove and shoots very well. It would be easy enough to order a version of this mold from Tom at Accurate molds with a crimp groove placed properly for your rifle. I can include some samples of it also.
Rick

[358 Win]

I can provide samples of the Lyman 31141 (older mold) if you want. Mine weigh 178 grains fully dressed with lube and GC. I can size them to your specification and I use Hornady GC's. The alloy I use has proven accurate up to 2300 fps in one of my .32 Specials with zero leading when using Javelina NRA formula alox lube. Send me a PM if you want any.
358 Win

[C. Latch]

If Rick isn't able to send you any of the SC311-165 (RD) bullets, let me know and I'll send you some. They work fine for me in my '75 vintage 336.

[Bphunter]

Here's a look at how much the SAE 305-3AE engraves. The nose diameter measures .302:

[jmort]

This is a good explanation by Ranch Dog from NOE Froum

Greetings fellows, the big difference in to two is the bore riding nose of the later version.



Prior to 2010, Marlin's had a lot of slop in them. Some of that slop was the large chamber throat. There might be several theories about why they cut it but I believe it was to resolve chambering issues associated with lever action feed. The original bullet simply plugged the oversized hole.

Around 2010, the period that the serial number appeared on the side of the receiver, Marlins started to tighten up. My personal view is that this happened with Marlin's association with Hornady and that outfit's desire to send a pointy bullet out of the Marlin barrel. The chambers started to tighten up (and the feed issues started to increase).

This really whacked Remington in the **** as they believed they could CNC a rifle around a spec drawing and put it together. You can get it together but then the darn thing won't feed, which they found out. Slowly they learned how much slop to cut in the action to get the cartridge from the tube to the chamber but they kept a SAAMI spec chamber. Mossberg and Rossi do the same thing.

Back to my two bullets. If you have a Mossberg, Remlin, or Rossi; the latter version of my bullet is best for you. If you have a "JM" Marlin with the serial number on the side of the receiver, the same thing, I would use the latter version with the bore rider nose.

In order to get the original bullet to feed in these rifles, you are going to end up sizing the bullet down to get it to reliably feed into the chamber because the huge throat in the chamber is not there. You can size that original down but you start to cut the bullet down at the ogive. I also do not like sizing down the Micro Bands, I like keep that as close to design as possible, because the start to disappear with sizing. In theory, I can produce a clean drawing of a TLC-311-165-RF, either version, and show that it can be reduced to .309" and still have bands left for lube. In reality, as the bullet passed through a sizing die, excess alloy through shaving or compression, moves to the Micro Bands and you are left with little area for your lube. This leads me to state if your particular needs requires any of my designs to be sided down greater that .0015", choose NOE's standard lube groove versions.

The Winchesters have a fairly large throat but it leads down to a SAAMI spec bore quickly. My dad shoots it in is M94 but it has to be sized to .310" to get an effective OAL.

So back to the the question of which 30 caliber bullet to use in your 30-30 Win rifle:

• The original TLC311-165-RF, use with:
  
  • "JM" Marlins that don't have the serial number on the side of the receivers.
  
  
• The revised TLC311-165-RF with the bore rider nose:
  
  • "JM" Marlins that have the serial number on the side of the receiver.
  • Mossbergs
  • Rossi Rio Grandes
  • Winchester M94

In the applications use the bullet as cast or sized to .311". Size it down to .310 only if you have issues with chambering. Using these recommendations will eliminate 99% of the issues surrounding which bullet to shoot. These are outstanding bullets, I have seen them take hundreds of animals, deer and hogs, on my ranch.
http://noebulletmolds.com/smf/index....pic,115.0.html

[Bphunter]

Thanks JMORT, I did run across this jewel of knowledge and I have the 1st category of Marlins, which would seem to predict the TLC311-165-RF as the best choice for my rifle. Unfortunately, the drawn dimensions for this bullet don't go into much detail concerning the nose diameter. I'm going to calculate the tangent ogive in Excel to see how the chamber interference compares to the SAE 305-3AE. My gut impression tells me it will require some force to chamber. I think the 311041 or Accurate 31-180R might have a better chance, but hopefully I will be able to try some of these before committing another mold. Thanks to some very generous members on this forum, I will have a chance to see how well some of these designs chamber before I make another mistake. Anyone need a Saeco 305-3AE mold?

[TXGunNut]

I have a "pre-NOE" RD TL 311-165 and it works quite well in my 336. Good luck in your testing.

[geargnasher]

Just make a pound cast of the chamber and then you'll know.

Gear

[fatnhappy]

Anyone need a Saeco 305-3AE mold?

Not sure if you're saying that in jest or not, however if the price is reasonable I'll relieve you of it.