Winchester 94 out past 100 yards

[bob208]

yes I remember the 80's and 90's when the .30-30 would not even get a clean kill on a groundhog at 25 yds. even if you could hit it. remember the old 94 was less accurate then a smoothbore.

with Skeeter and Elmer gone the gun mags. just became sales brochures for the latest and greatest.

[Texas by God]

Back in the 1970s and 80s the 30-30 in a rifle was short-range only Wonder. if you put it in a 10 inch barreled contender it became a 300-yard deer gun!

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[northmn]

Back in the 1970s and 80s the 30-30 in a rifle was short-range only Wonder. if you put it in a 10 inch barreled contender it became a 300-yard deer gun!

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Darn right. Then you had Jeff Cooper proving that a 44 mag revolver was far superior to the 94 at 100 yards. There was an article on the Marlin forum I believe talking about all the B.S. that has been perpetrated about the 30-30. One claim was that an individual that used or borrowed one held over the back of a deer at about 75 yards because he thought it would drop that much and was upset that he missed it.

My 38-55, according to the Lyman cast bullet catalog has a fairly point blank range at 150 yards. This is with a 1650 fps load and 100 yard sight in. At 200 that gets very tricky as the bullet really starts to drop after 150 yards. Take a 30-30 at about 2100 with a 170 grain bullet and that range will increase quite a bit. With flat points many considered that with a proper 100 yard sight in one had a point blank of about 175 yards. I would say that the 94's limitation is in the sights. Maybe with a scout scope or the use of a Marlin and normal scope one could do quite a bit better.

DEP

[EMC45]

The trash talk against the 30-30 has been pervasive for decades - I've never understood it either. What's not to like?....Relatively light weight, .30 caliber cartridge, good magazine capacity, light recoil, ammo availability, very effective on game, on gun racks in pawn and gunshops all over America....I just don't get it.

[Walks]

Outpost75,
That's some good info. I'd forgotten about the settings for the Win 94 peep sight.
I put a WILLIAMS FP & 3/32" bead on my TRAPPER when I bought back in 1982, last of the REAL WINCHESTER'S, A top eject.
Bottomed out that would put 170gr loads 2" high at 50yrds & dead on at 125yrds. It was also dead on with 150grs RN/SP at 50yrds.
Used to load one 150gr Spitzer in the tube & one chambered. Where I hunted with it there was a 1 percent chance for a 3rd shot.

[smkummer]

The factory open sights of pre-1964 Winchester Model 94s in .30-30 came zeroed to strike within a 3 inch circle drawn tangent at 6:00 inside a 6 inch black aiming bull at 50 yards. Normal sight picture with open sights is to take a "fine" bead in which the front sight is drawn all the way into the small rear notch, then using the bead to take a 6:00 hold on the bull, using factory loads, with the sight elevator set on its lowest notch.

Each step on the open rear sight elevator increases the zero range by approximately 50 yards or meters. Raising the open rear sight into its second elevator step with the correct height of front sight height should be zeroed at 100 yards, the third notch at 150 yards, and the 4th notch 200, using a "fine" bead, drawn down completely into the small notch, and taking a 6:00 hold.

When using semi-buckhorn factory open sights for quick combat range estimation, the shoulders of an FBI silhouette or Army "E" target approximately fill the width of the small lower notch at 100 yards or meters. If you can see daylight there around the shoulders of the silhouette, the target is farther than 100 meters and to make a quick shot at a fleeting target without stopping to adjust the sights, you would then alter your sight picture so that the bead "floats" above the fine notch.

When the bead is leveled with the first shoulder inside the semi-buckhorn, above the inner notch, point of impact approximately coincides with the center of the bead at 200 yards. Proper sight picture, being altered from the base 100-yard zero, then is to hold for center of mass of the Army “E” or “F” silhouette.

At longer ranges, the hasty combat sight correction is to raise the front sight relative to the rear notch so that the bead "floats" between the top ears of the semi-buckhorn open sight. The bead then subtends the height of the silhouette and provides correct elevation to approximately 300 yards or meters.

Receiver peep sights should be adjusted to a base zero which exploits the optimum trajectory of the .30-30 cartridge. Using factory 170-grain loads with a bead front sight and ghost ring aperture the rifle should be zeroed to strike 3 to 4 inches above the front sight at 100 yards, or 10 cm high at 100 metres on a metric range. This provides a point of aim = point of impact hold, covering the target with the bead at about 170 yards, hitting 3 inches below a center-of-mass hold at 200 yards and 10-1/2” below center-of-mass, into the lower half of Army E or F silhouette targets at 250 yards.

Using correct sight picture, with a correct base zero, a game warden or state trooper qualified as Sharpshooter or better should average 80% hits or better on the Army "E" silhouette at 200 yards, 70% or better at 250 yards and 60% hits or better at 300 yards. The correctly zeroed and managed .30-30 lever action provides hit probability fully equal to the Soviet SKS and is more accurate than typical AK platforms at ranges exceeding 100 yards or meters.

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Thank you so much for this info. That took a lot of your time and is very appreciated.

[Outpost75]

Thank you so much for this info. That took a lot of your time and is very appreciated.

Didn't take much time. The lesson was already "in the can" and that is how I was taught to shoot the '94 Winchester by LTC Ellis Lea, (USA) Ret. when he still worked for the Office of Public Safety for USAID in the early 1970s.

[beagle]

In my younger days, I was down at Ft Bragg, NC visiting a friend who ran one of the Army's Trainfire ranges. We were talking guns and loafing and decided to see how well my M94 would do on 200 yard silly wets. It surprised us both and took down about every one we aimed at after the first couple of shots.
Then, we switched to my M1911A1, an old Remington, and GI Ball ammo. After about a magazine of trial and error, we were able to take down silhouettes quite regularly.
Surprised both of us on the effectiveness of these two old standbys.
Bought my first M94 in the early 60s and since that time, there's been a .30/30 in the house ever since....and a.30/06 as well./beagle

[MT Gianni]

I laugh about the article in an old gun magazine how a 14" contender in 30-30 was superior to a 94 because it could take a pointed bullet. The 94 would also, you just load 1 in the chamber and one in the tube.

[northmn]

I laugh about the article in an old gun magazine how a 14" contender in 30-30 was superior to a 94 because it could take a pointed bullet. The 94 would also, you just load 1 in the chamber and one in the tube.

Now we have the LE's, but the 14 inch barrel also gave enough less velocity such that the pointed bullet would have lost any advantage. What some don't mention is that the bullets for a 30-30 are more or less unique to the cartridge. After the 120 years its been around they have them down pretty good. When I got my daughter her 300 Savage bolt I loaded it down a bit but used 150 grain Cor Loks made for the 30-30. Those caliber dedicated bullets have made the 30-30 more effective than paper suggests.

That trick is so old it has hair on it but they really work well on reduced loads. Many of the spitzers are made to function in everything from the Savage to the 30-06. Now Hornady is making a bullet just for the 300 Savage. While I have used a 300 as well as my daughter, softer bullets would not hurt anything.

DEP

[Texas by God]

That old trick works well at full .308 velocity as well. I noticed well hit runoffs stopped when I switched to 30-30 specific bullets instead of pointed btsp in my Sako .308 back when.

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[LAH]

I've shot mine out to 300 plinking rocks with a 190 cast at 1600. That for sure is stretching the load but it can be done if you know your rifle. Like most here I think it's a very good all round rifle for most things you normally do. They are handy & inexpensive. By the way mine is the unless post 64 model made the first year after the pre 64s went away. And everyone knows they are no good.

[indian joe]

I've shot mine out to 300 plinking rocks with a 190 cast at 1600. That for sure is stretching the load but it can be done if you know your rifle. Like most here I think it's a very good all round rifle for most things you normally do. They are handy & inexpensive. By the way mine is the unless post 64 model made the first year after the pre 64s went away. And everyone knows they are no good.

And everyone knows they are no good ---- interesting comment - I have a post 64 model 70 in 22/250 - also regarded as no good - the pre 64 mauser type with its controlled feed /claw extractor is so much better ? Funny thing - I have had around 4000 through mine, throat is burnt some, and accuracy started to decline but NEVER had an extraction problem - not one time! Would not swap for a pre 64 even if you added a large sum of cash to the deal.

[LAH]

Guess I could have done without saying that Joe but thought I'd say it before someone else did.

[Char-Gar]

My first centerfire rifle was an old octagon barrel Win. 94 rifle. This was about 1956. On the way to Boca Beach down here, there are some mud flats with a hill behind them that was used by the Army for a rifle range, when Fort Brown was still active. I picked up rifle brass and even a few loaded rounds from before 1910.

At any rate some of the old boards were still there and bleached white by the sun. I took a seating position from 600 yards and went to work on a 3 foot by 5 foot board. I could see the bullet strikes on the dry flats and when I got the elevator set, I proceded to put five rounds in the the board. That convinced me that the 30-30 was more than a 100 hard rifle.

[modified5]

But I thought you needed to shoot a 338 Lapua to get past 100 yards much less kill the new generation of armor plated deer!
Love my 30-30’s!

[snoopy]

Thank you