Stupid Question about .30 Remington Vs .30-30 Winchester

[Eli'sbook]

This is my first post on this site and I'll start out with what some may think is a very Stupid Question about .30 Remington Vs .30-30 Winchester. I recently came into being the proud new owner of a box of ammo that most of are calibers I'm not familiar with. In this box is a 20 Round box of .30 Remington 170 Gr Core-lokt PSP rounds. I did some reading on the net and see it was basically the same as a .30-30 Winchester load. My question is will my Marlin 336 in .30-30 safely chamber and fire these rounds? I don't even want to load them into the rifle until I get info to tell me if this is safe to do. Thanks and I apologize for being an old gray haired noob with a dumb question.

[DeanWinchester]

NO!
It's not a dumb question. It's only dumb to try it first and ask why things went bad, later.

Seriously, post the ammo in the classifieds and let someone who has the right rifle buy or trade for them.

[bullet maker 57]

Hello Eli'sbook and welcome to the forum. 30-30 is a rimmed case and 30 Remington is not. Do not load in your 30-30. No question is dumb if you do not know the answer. I would always err on the side of caution. Safety first. Good shooting.

Pete

[Eli'sbook]

Is the "NO" about my question not being dumb or a no, don't try them in my Marlin 336 in .30-30 ?

I thought I read in the rules that I have to be a member for 30 days before I can post "for sale" items ?

[Eli'sbook]

Great, I kind of thought that was the case but wanted to be sure with the price of ammo these days - Thank You !!


Hello Eli'sbook and welcome to the forum. 30-30 is a rimmed case and 30 Remington is not. Do not load in your 30-30. No question is dumb if you do not know the answer. I would always err on the side of caution. Safety first. Good shooting.

Pete

[Char-Gar]

Remington introduced a series of cartridges designed for their pump rifles that were ballistic twins of the Winchester's levergun cartridges, they are in a side by side comparison

25-34 Win. - 25 Remington
30-30 Win. - 30 Remington
32 Win. Spl. - 32 Remington

While of comparable ballistics and case capacities, they are not interchangeable in rifles, for the reasons mentioned above.

[onceabull]

Good advice already posted here, BUT,according to old gents I hunted with as a youth, it was a relatively common and accepted practice during the ammo situation caused by wwII,to use 30 Rem.ammuntion in their Winchester 30/30s whenever nothing else could be obtained..Single shot only ,of course,and either or rod or pocket knife nec.for extraction after loading/firing..I tried it for kicks/grins ,worked ok for me.. Don't know about trying in a Marlin ,as I was grown and far from home before I ever saw a Marlin rifle up close...the 30 Rem.was around there only because the Remington 14s,141s, 8s and 81s, were considered OK to own/use...

[felix]

That would be correct! Good chambers headspace somewhere on the sloping part of the neck for both cartridges. ... felix

[DeanWinchester]

....ole gents used to put radium in their drinking water too.

Bad idea. Even if it works, it's still a bad idea.

[texassako]

.30 Remington has a different shoulder angle than .30-30, ~23 deg. vs. ~15 deg, making the length to the shoulder longer. Pretty much a .30-30 equivalent other than that.

[Duckiller]

DO NOT SHOOT .30 REM IN A 30/30. You may try neck sizing a 30 Rem with 30/30 dies. You can use 30/30 loads in a 30 Rem. Boolits may be interchangeable. Just don't shoot in the same gun!!!

[dtknowles]

My brother would like that box of ammo, he has a Rem pump in 30 Rem and pays premium $$ for ammo. If the box is original some collector would also pay a good price. Since you said they had Core Loc bullets I guess it was made by Remington.

Tim

[Alan]

Above responses answered the question, but I will just throw in that the only dumb question is the one you ask AFTER emergency medical service is in transit.

[Combat Diver]

Eli'sbook,

I have nothing to add but would take the oppurtionity to welcome you to the site.


CD

[TXGunNut]

Welcome to the affliction! And no, that wasn't a dumb question. The 30 Rem is an obscure but interesting cartridge and some folks would jump at the chance for some factory ammo or cases. Sounds like an interesting box of ammo. Anything else in there?

[hightime]

Yeah, I'd like them.

Owen

[tawastom]

You could always pull the bullets and sell the cases to someone who has a 6.8 SPC, dont try and shoot them from your 30-30

[Four Fingers of Death]

We used to have a sign at the prison which said "Dumb questions, better than dumb mistakes." Welcome to the site.

[Harter66]

Presuming I have the correct picture . This is 32 Rem w/ 32 Win side by side.

66318

[Harter66]

This is a look at the whole family 6.8 to the right (actually 7RWH 6.8 necked up to 7mm) 32 Win to the left.

66363

[Eli'sbook]

I know this is a very old thread but I failed to respond back when I joined you guys. I just wanted to say "Thanks" for the advice, I will do my best to locate the boxes of vintage ammo that I think are buried in my home/office somewhere and see if I can give you folks a list of what is available. Who knows, I may be able to sell some or all of it.

My wife of 39 years was struck with stage IIIc cancer. She is doing well (all things considered) and I forgot that I had even joined this site until tonight while wasting time on the net. Life is strange and sure can throw some curve balls at ya !!

Anyway, my job came to an end and my bride got sick plus a mongrel used my identity to help bleed my retirement account to almost zero and the bank says they can't help me get it back. But we have trudged through so far, so I can't give up now. Hope to get back here soon with some goodies that will help pay the utilities, etc. Thanks again for your help with my question and I feel fortunate that I did not try the ammo and harm the firearm or myself !!

[starmac]

Hate to hear of your troubles, but the 30 rem is marketable easy enough. I would be interested if there was a feasible way to ship loaded ammo here. There is quite a bit of demand for just the brass, if nothing else, in fact it comes up in the want to buy pretty often, enough that we have one member starting to build it.

If you look at the two cartridges side by side, you can easily see why you wouldn't want to shoot one in a 30/30.

[MtGun44]

I think that .30 Rem ammo is hard to get. If this is correct, somebody REALLY
wants that ammo - don't waste it and risk your gun and your self.

Bill

[Salmoneye]

Please do not shoot those in your trente trente (.30-30)...

People pay big bucks (as in more than $2/round) for modern factory ammo...

http://www.ammo-one.com/30Remington.html

[GRUMPA]

Visual aid for those to look at.

First the 25Rem along side the 30-30 parent case.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=95240&d=1391279126

Second this is the 30Rem along side the 30-30 parent case.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=100673&d=1395962201

Last is the 32Rem along side the 30-30 parent case.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=100674&d=1395962424

These have all been Hydroformed so there's no need to fire form the cases. With Hydroforming it gets around a 90% fill out.

[Four Fingers of Death]

Can they be made from 30/30s by turning down the rim and cutting the extractor groove?

[GRUMPA]

That's what I'm doing....

[Tom Myers]

Can they be made from 30/30s by turning down the rim and cutting the extractor groove?

Looks like it should work ok. Might be just a tad short.
(Click on the images to show to scale)

30 Rem from CIP Standard specs

101144

30-30 Win from SAAMI specs

101141

30 Rem / 30-30 Win Overlay

101139

[GRUMPA]

Talk about a thread drift.

When you Hydroform the cases the case grows a bit, the factory trim length for the 30Rem and the 32Rem is 2.050 -.020 and the ones I've done are trimmed to 2.035

[hightime]

I just buy my 30 Rems from Buffalo Arms. No problem. I love my Model 8. I don't have a need for much more that a couple boxes and I probably won't reload. I use a few to sight-in and the others will be for one deer per bullet.

Owen

[Four Fingers of Death]

I have always fancied a Marlin 336 in 35 Remington and passed one over recently (the only one I have ever heard of in Australia) as a phone call to pretty much every decent sized gun shop in Australia resulted in a bag of 50 cases, for a ridiculous price. Knowing what I do now, I will transform some 30-30 cases, I have a bucket or two of them.

[GRUMPA]

35Rem is not the same critter as the pictures above. I'm in the process of converting 35Rem from 308 LC cases. Not done with that conversion yet but so far so good.

[catskinner]

To add to the 30 Remington Rimless confusion Remington did stamp some early Model 8's 30-30 Rem and Stevens lever actions were also stamped 30-30 Rem. Both were actually chambered for the Rimless cartridge. Don't know the reasoning behind that but it has been confusing people ever since.

[geargnasher]

Grumpa, this won't help your production operation much, but I just FL resize .308s in a .358 Winchester die (with expander mandrel installed), then relube with lanolin/castor oil and whang 'em through a .35 Remington die. This is AFTER discovering that turning the rims down and base-sizing in first a .457" and then a .454" Lee push though boolit sizing die was a waste of time in my particular Marlin whose bolt face and chamber will accept un-turned .308 rims and the case head just being resized to normal and then put through a .35 Rem die is plenty small enough to drop right in. Not SAAMI spec, but it fits my rifle just dandy. Had to turn the necks a bit to thin them near the base, and of course trim to length.

Gear

[Four Fingers of Death]

Now that's right clever Geargnasher! I'll put that in the bank.

[LeftyDon]

30 Remington ammo and brass is on back order just about everywhere. Ditto with 25 & 32 Rem which is often just reformed 30 Rem brass. So finding a home for your 30 rem ammo shouldn't be much of a problem. I recently picked up 60 rounds of 170 gr 32 Rem ammo at a LGS for a fellow that wanted them only to have to eat the purchase since he ran into cash problems. I figure somebody else will need them one of these days.

[starmac]

I have three old boxes of 30 rim winchester silvertips that came with my Model 14. I just couldn't make myself shoot them, so will probably keep them for ever. One full box and one missing 3 and one missing 2 iirc. Apparently the old gent that owned the rifle bought a new box every deer season. lol

[Scharfschuetze]

When I bought my Model 141 in 30 Remington, the gentleman threw in 14 unopened boxes of ammo, RCBS dies as well as several hundred unfired cases. While I've refrained from shooting the factory ammo, 100 of the cases have been loaded many times. While not the most accurate rifle in my vault (2 to 2 1/2 MOA), it is one of the funnest rifles that I have and one of the easiest to reload cast boolits for. While many might consider it blasphemy here in the levergun forum, it is as fast to mount and faster for repeating shots than my Model 94 and 64 Winchesters.

[Four Fingers of Death]

That Model 141 Remington is one interesting looking rifle, I would love one of those!

[LeftyDon]

That Model 141 Remington is one interesting looking rifle, I would love one of those!

The model 14 or 141 is about the slickest cycling guns you'll ever shoot. Peterson designed it for Remington and it is as smooth as anything I've ever cycled.

[jonp]

....ole gents used to put radium in their drinking water too.

Bad idea. Even if it works, it's still a bad idea.

If they were "ole gents" must not have been that bad

[gemihur]

... and today you might add the .224 Valkyrie to that family tree!

[earlmck]

Interesting question, and certainly not a dumb question. I own both so I just went out to the shop and pulled out a Marlin 30/30 and Winchester 30/30 and tried chambering a 30 Remington. Nope, not going to go -- the 30 Rem shoulder hits the 30/30 chamber shoulder area just early enough you cant force the bolt closed. The Marlin extractor does pull her out of there but not with a firm enough hold to eject. The Winchester extractor doesn't get a pull. The Marlin feeds 30 Rems from the magazine just fine. The Winchester jams because the cartridge stop uses the rim to keep the cartridge ahead from getting on the feed ramp with the cartridge ready to feed.

Other than the shoulder keeping you from chambering it there would be no danger in firing a 30 Rem in a 30/30 -- same bullet, same powder charge, same base diameter. Well, maybe the case would be a scosh too long also in a factory round. I Use the Lee zip trim for brass trimming and so my 30 Rem brass has all been trimmed to the 30/30 length, but looking at drawings it looks like 30 Rem is 2.050 long vs. 2.040 for 30/30.

[Ramjet-SS]

Model 8 adapted by law enforcment early 1900s. Same ballistics as the 30-30 but rimless so it would feed in the Remington Model 8