30/30 loads with out gas check

[oldfart1956]

Jpen like you I didn't want to mess with gas checks when I first got into this. I even went so far as to ream 2 perfectly good Lyman molds to remove the gas check. (please don't ever do that!) Then I actually tried it. Since I run all my cast bullets, except the tumble lube designs, thru a Lee push thru sizer ($18 at Titan Reloading) I figgered out it takes exactly no extra time. The aluminum checks work as well as the copper for me. Just thumb press one on a bullet and shove it thru the sizer. Considering all the time I spend gathering up lead, smelting and making ingots, then actually casting bullets...the cost of the check is nothing. Lots of vendors here sell them. I find the copper ones at gun shows! No one seems to know what they are! I run them in a Marlin 30/30 from pootin' velocity up to low/mid level jacketed speed. Never had an issue with accuracy or leading. So try it without but consider a check. Seriously. Audie...the Oldfart.

[GabbyM]

Gator checks are very economical and I've used maybe fifteen thousand of them. People mostly think I'm lying when I quote group size. So they must work. Nothing wrong with having tow loads for a rifle. One for plinking at 100 yards and another for hunting. With Lee molds at under $25 that's not a barrier. I quite loading plain base in a rifle simply because I don't even know how many guns I own. When I shoot rifle I want some range to it. Otherwise at fifty and under I use a revolver. There is crossover of course.

Probably the most economical route for a small game pinker plus big game hunter. By a plain base mold of about 150 grains. Load it with fast shotgun powder at sub sonic. This will be the most accurate as if you go just above sonic you'll get the transition wobble. As someone wrote above, you have about 357 revolver power there. It will kill deer. But why? then just buy a box of 150 grain factory ammo once every few years. Check sight to POI and go with it. My experience with 30-30 and 30-06 plus the 222 Rem is all sorts of ammo shoots to POA. 38 Special revolver is pretty good about anything shooting to point of aim also.

As a hand loader. You could buy a 100 box of Sierra 150gr Pro Hunter bullets. 170 Grain for black bear. Load em up to max charge. If you do black bear and deer just use the 170 gr for all. Life should be simple. Then cast up your plain based bullets and shoot them. Personally I'll make a thousand gas check bullets in a day and then spend a couple years shooting them up. Along with the other half dozen calibers I shoot.

Lots of people killing deer with 300 black out at sub velocity. Any way you look at it you are putting at least as much hurt to the deer as an archery setup. Few times carrying out a deer from a half mile away when you could of dropped them close will convince you to spend the two cents on a gas check. That's what it amounts to.

[Screwbolts]

Good morning all, If I remember correctly the Gas Check wasn't developed until 1908.

Now knowing that everything before 1908 that was cast or swaged was Plain Base. Cast with PB seemed to work very well.

I have harvested several deer with a PB version of the NOE 311-265 FN RD, that being in a 30-30 with a 1-12 barrel, using 15 gr. of 4759, 1500 FPS croneied. Deadly combo.

I believe your LEE 170 FN with the same load would work great.

Ken

[Wayne Smith]

Jpen, I will go along with those who said go ahead and do it. We greatly overestimate the killing need - and it's getting worse, not better. However I would recommend you find a plain base mold to do it with. I think you will find a great deal less frustration in the doing.

[Motard]

have this Lyman Mold 311241 that has the gas checks shanke removable and can drop 155 pb boolist as well as 178 casted lubed and checked. I have been tring various loads on my win '94 but could never convinced my boolits to run under 1800 fps (well with the full loads I can manage with the powders I have, whaiting to end them so I can buy different faster propellents). So I have been reinstalling the gas check shank on mold and not planning to remove againg. I have also fiddled a little with seating the gas check, I mean tryng to seat them as square as possible before running in the lee sizer thinking they would be grabbbed unsquared. Nothing more wrong. The less seated just push them all the way in the shank and crimps. Works fine to me.
Ps cause I have not experienced any leading I have also come to the idea that gas checks scraps the lead while riding the bore.

[popper]

165gr FN sans check @ 1250 did OK from my 336 @ 50. ~MOA, no recoil to speak of using IIRC 20gr LeverE powder. Not sure I would try it for deer - too many variables in the shot placement. Unique didn't do as well.

[quilbilly]

I have been pleasantly surprised at how well my 30/30 shoots with the Lyman 130 gr plain base boolit sized to 309. I have had the velocities up to 1400 with several powders without problems but primarily keep the velocities around 1250 with Trail Boss as short range coyote killer. At 40 yards it gets 11" of penetration in my test media (soaked, compressed phone books) which is a lot harder than a deer so it would work out to 75 yards. There are better projectiles for that purpose. It is really fun to shoot and economical as well as an excuse to use up my excess Trail Boss.

[Ric-san]

Anyone know if the Lee 170 grain is also good in a .308 bolt gun...? Just trying to figure if the boolit can pull double duty in both my .308 and 30-30. Thanks...

[Screwbolts]

Anyone know if the Lee 170 grain is also good in a .308 bolt gun...? Just trying to figure if the boolit can pull double duty in both my .308 and 30-30. Thanks...

YES, it is good in all of mine, 30/30, 308, 30-06. Being the LEE is a clone of Lyman's 31141 it is very good in all my 30 cals.

Ken

[Ithaca Gunner]

Lyman at one time made quite a variety of .30 plain base molds from 90gr. to over 250gr. but those days are long past. For a cast game bullet you can't do better than the RCBS 30-180-FN in a production mold. Yes, it takes a gas check and mine weigh in at around 195gr. out of the mold, but it's one of the most accurate bullets I've ever cast and with it's big meplate does some real damage. In a .30WCF I would say any medium burn powder that gets you around 1900fps will take any deer size game in the U.S. at normal .30WCF ranges.

Gas checks are cheap, why loose a game animal over a few cents?

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

I moved your thread to a more appropriate forum.

[gnoahhh]

If I were to wish to deer hunt with a plain base .30 bullet, I would find or have made a 190-200 grain flat nose with a meplat wide enough to tap dance on (or better yet, a hollow point). Then work up a load that combines accuracy with as high a velocity attainable without leading, using a bullet alloy of around 10bhn or a bit less. I would keep my shot under 100 yards if I could, and take pains to place the bullet exactly where it counted. Such a bullet would give great penetration and decent expansion. But, it would be a borderline stunt IMO. Better to use a gas check design and drive it faster- the deer is a noble beast and doesn't deserve to be the subject of borderline performance when a better solution is at hand.

In my early days of shooting cast bullets, around 1970, I shot a deer with a .30-40 Krag, 311241 155gr. PB cast of WW+lead (probably 8-9bhn), and 10gr. Unique. That deer died hard even though the shot went where it was supposed to- right behind the shoulder blade and into the chest cavity. The next time with a slow bullet was in 1980 with a Browning BR-78 '06 and an early NEI 308-180, sans gas check, at around 1300 fps. Again the animal died hard even with that slug in his chest. I swore never again would I try to stunt shoot them with under powered loads.

[MT Chambers]

I have enough trouble getting accuracy with the 30/30 in my Marlin, so for me a GC is a must, note that using those reduced loads for hunting will require sight changes and a very curved trajectory.

[Doc Highwall]

I really think you are going to have trouble shooting a plain base bullet much over 1400 fps with an alloy that will expand. With a alloy that is soft like Lyman #2 or softer for hunting, a gas check will allow you to shoot over 2000 fps and you would be much happier, both on the accuracy and the game animal performance.

[TXGunNut]

I like the idea of a PB 30-30, I've had a Project Thutty-thutty going on for awhile and it's really been fun. Found a nearly new 336 cheap, put an inexpensive red dot sight on her and rounded up all my range pickup and the once-fired brass I squirreled away when 30-30 ammo was $7/box. I use exclusively WW alloy and the recipes call for less than 20 grains of powder. I finally got a PB mould and will be breaking it in soon. Obviously the theme for this project is cheap, easy fun and it truly has been. It's not a hunting rifle but it could be if needed, it has more energy than a subsonic 300 BO but I generally prefer a bit more oomph.

[Doc Highwall]

I bought a Ruger No1 in 30-30 Winchester just for cast bullets, and I have a 311041PB, SAECO #315 that I removed the gas check feature so it is a plain base mould, and a NOE 308-403 PB, NOE 311-180 FN-PB and some others. Right now I have been using between 8 grains to 10 grains of unique in loading this rifle.

Here is a picture of the Ruger post #29.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...-Ruger-1/page2

Here is a picture of my Browning Traditional Hunter in 30-30 Winchester post #16

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...885-with-scope!!

[Rattlesnake Charlie]

OK. Anyone who has pushed a 150+ gr plain based bullet from the .30-30 cartridge in excess of 1500 fps, please respond with your results.

This thread has been all over the road, in-and-out of both ditches, sometimes even farther into the fields, and the question the of the original OP remains unanswered.

Time to refocus.

[Bird]

OK. Anyone who has pushed a 150+ gr plain based bullet from the .30-30 cartridge in excess of 1500 fps, please respond with your results.

This thread has been all over the road, in-and-out of both ditches, sometimes even farther into the fields, and the question the of the original OP remains unanswered.

Time to refocus.

Pushed a 173 grain plain based to supposedly 1550 or so fps using unique, or that is what is quoted in the LYMAN reloading manual using a max load. Accuracy was ok, but dropped back 2/10 of a grain of powder for best accuracy. 2.25'' groups at 100 yds. Bullets were Bear Creek, the ones with their black coating, and a 24'' barrel 94 winchester with an aftermarket 1 in 10 twist barrel. No leading.
Tried pushing bullets faster with other powders to no avail. Groups opened up and barrel leaded.
Green dot powder more accurate than using unique, but velocity was 1350 fps, and ran out of elevation with rear tang sight. This load grouped 6 to 7'' lower at 100 yds.

[Recaster]

I have been working on a new load with a lee c109-170-F boolit. Cast from lyman#2 and having the base coated with powder coating weighs @ 176 grains. Shot from my marlin 336 with micro-groove barrel at 50 yards, does about 2 inch 10 shot groups averaging 1665 fps. No gas check and no leading.

[Motard]

Here are some range tests I am doing with Lee 309-170-F and Mihec 154 .308 Hunting Boolits. Speds varyng from 1400 up to 2000 dip lubed and thumble lubed lead. No leading at all
http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...39#post3498439
Hope it helpes