Firing forming 30-30 from 32-40

[Marlin Junky]

I need a longer 30-30 case and was wondering what a good load would be to fire-form 32-40 Winchester brand cases to 30-30. I wouldn't need to anneal the brass, would I?

MJ

[bdoyle]

How much longer? Current production 38-55 is 2.08 I think. Starline is now advertising 2.130s finally. I could try a 2.08 to see what it winds up at.

Brian

[Marlin Junky]

2.08" would be long enough but I've already tried 38-55 brass and it'll fold in the neck area if taken down to 30-30 in one step.

MJ

[bdoyle]

Well I had to try it. First I weasled the die down a few turns at a time and got many small folds around the neck. Then I did two more (still weasling) but I was wiping the excess lube of the brass. Perfect. 2.105-2.110 30-30 from a 2.080 38-55. Guess it amounts to the old time over money thing.

Brian

[w30wcf]

MJ,

About 10 years ago or so, I converted a box of John Wayne .32-40's to .30-30's to get the longer neck that you mentioned.

After pulling the bullets and dumping the powder, I ran them into my .30-30 sizing die and then trimmed the 2.130" long cases back to 2.100", the length of my 336A's chamber. The cases ended up at 2.090" after fireforming.

As I recall, I used a mid range load of 15 grs. of 4227 under a 160 gr. cast bullet and that did a nice job. I did not anneal the nickeled brass cases and did not lose any.

I fired them a few times over with full powered loads but did not see any difference in accuracy between the standard .30-30 cases (2.03") and the 2.09" converted .32-40's.

One thing to note is that with the longer neck the o.a.l. of the finished cartridge will increase which means that they might not feed from the magazine unless the bullets are seated deeper.

Have fuunnn!
w30wcf

[Jon K]

MJ,

Been there, done that................The easiest way I found was to anneal the 38-55 brass first then w/lube pad & RCBS lube - wipe excess- then one pass and it's done.

Jon
:castmine:

[Marlin Junky]

I ordered some Winchester brand .32-40 brass tonight from Buffalo Arms. The reason I'm doing this is because RCBS-30-180FN touches the rifling at a COL of 2.57" but when seated to this length the mouth of a typical 30-30 case does not reach the top of 30-180FN's crimp groove.

w30wcf...
What is the date code on your 336A?

MJ

[w30wcf]

MJ,

It was made in 1977. I bought it used about 20 years ago. One of the nicest levers I own.:-D

It has a .308" groove diameter and a .301" dia. bore and shoots cast just great.:-D

w30wcf

[Marlin Junky]

MJ,

It was made in 1977. I bought it used about 20 years ago. One of the nicest levers I own.:-D

It has a .308" groove diameter and a .301" dia. bore and shoots cast just great.:-D

w30wcf

John,

So it's a 20 incher with the dreaded MicroGroove rifling. I don't know how long my 55 year old chamber is but it will chamber a 2.07" case for sure.

Do you have any problem shooting ACWW metal (BHN 13 to 14) at top speeds with your shallow rifling?

MJ

[w30wcf]

MJ,
Actually it has a 24" barrel with 12 groove micro-groove rifling.

A little micro-groove history. Original 1955 .30-30 micro-groove barrels had 16 grooves. The number of grooves were later increased to 22 and then changed to12 in 1968. The earlier 16 and 22 grooved barrels had shallower rifling (.0015 to .002" deep) whereas the 12 groove barrels had deeper rifling (.0035 to .004").

In reality, the 12 groove barrels are capable of maintaining accuracy at a higher velocity with softer bullets than the traditional 6 groove .30 caliber barrel. At least mine does. Why? Because it grips twice the area of the bullet that a traditional 6 groove barrel does which also has a typical rifling depth of .0035" -.004".

Several years ago, I ran a test using soft lead/tin bullets. The rifles were my Rem. 788 .30-30 (6 groove 10" twist) and my 336A (12 groove 10" twist). I found that as the velocity increased, the 336A kept grouping while the 788's accuracy diminished.

No problem shooting the softer alloys in my 336A.:-D

w30wcf

[Marlin Junky]

Thanks John,

Sure enough, it's right there in Brophy. August 20, 1968: 12 grooves for both the .30-30 and the .35!

The thing I don't understand is the 10 or 11 year gap in the first and second issue 336A's. According to Brophy, the first issue 336A ran from 1948 to 1962 and the second issue from '73 to '80. Both issues wore 24" barrel but what happened between '62 and '73?

BTW... I shot a few 32-40's loaded with 30-180FN at about 194 grains bare with 17 grains of WC-820 and I was impressed enough with the performance that I'm going to use this load for the chickens, pigs and maybe even the turkeys next month. There is definitely no need to blow 'em out first and then load 'em up for the match; to do so would be a flagrant waste of precious lead and powder. The cases look pretty good too. The head and rim diameter of the 32-40 W-W brand cases are a little smaller than Winchester brand 30-30 cases but it's a small price to pay (I hope) for a cartridge case that reaches the crimp groove on 30-180FN when rounds are loaded to 2.575". I also shot a few 32-40 cases in the 336A today loaded with 16 grains of 4759 and SAECO 316. The 820 won hands down with respect to consistency over the chronograph. I didn't burn enough 4759 to get a feel for accuracy potential vs. the WC-820. Cases fire-formed with the 820 did not loose any length vs. the cases shot with 4759 which lost less than .015" on the average. I attribute this to the 820 load being the hotter of the two shot today.

MJ

[w30wcf]

MJ,


Both issues wore 24" barrel but what happened between '62 and '73? Probably weren't selling enough to justify making it past 1962, then marketing decided to try reintroducing it in '73 with, eventually, the same result.

Thank you for the load data using WC-820. I'll have to give some of that a try.
Do you position the powder to the back of the case?

4759 has always been a good performer for me. Interesting that WC-820 did better in your initial tests.

Currently, my .30-30 NRA Cowboy Silhouette load for the Chickens, Pigs, & Turkeys is 311291 over 16 grs. of Hercules "Lightning". It's like stepping back in time......the 311291 was the first gas checked bullet (1906) specifically made for the .30-30. In their 1905 catalog, Marlin recommended a mid range load of 16 grs. DuPont No 1 bulk smokeless for the .30-30. "Lightning" and 4198 have pretty much the same burning rate as DuPont No. 1 and I am fortunate enough to have a few pounds of "Lightning" and decided to use it for this purpose.

Velocity runs about 1,450 f.p.s.

Have fun.
w30wcf

[Marlin Junky]

MJ,

Do you position the powder to the back of the case?

w30wcf

John,

I make no effort to position the powder. All testing from the bench is done by loading from the ammo box (ammo is stored boolit up) to the bench rested rifle which remains horizontal though the 15 to 20 round string. I consider WC-820 to be a great find in the 336A with 200 grain boolits and I've spent a lot of powder and lead looking for a good 1700 fps load. I've tried at least a half dozen powders behind 30-180FN (at BHN 13.5 to 15) with and without fillers and for my time and money I can't beat 16 to 17 grains of WC-820. With the 16 grain load I use the same elevation for the chickens and pigs and crank the Williams FP up one turn for the turkeys. 16 grains yields about 1650 fps from a 24" barrel.

MJ

P.S. Thanks for the input on the 336A.

[w30wcf]

MJ,

Thank you for the update. I'll have to give your load of WC820 a try.

w30wcf