30-30 Marlin 336 lever closing difficulty?

[NLS1]

Hey Folks!

After a very fun time out on Thursday shooting 10gr Unique loads in the old 30-30 I have a question.

First the background. 1949 Marlin 336, great bore, well used, a bit ugly-but tough- kinda like me, shoots better than me, and I love it.

It was my first time reloading for 30-30. I used some of my recently cast NOE 165gc from 50/50 with a pinch of lino, 173gr with homemade lube and aluminum gc from 338 Ultramag. Sized .311. Brass trimmed to 2.025. Boolits seated to cannelure. Wolf LR primers. RCBS FL dies.

Well I am no expert iron sight rifle shooter, but this thing was so much fun, I may never want to shoot anything else for rifle hunting. 8" plates from 25-100, standing, with irons no problem every time! Plus you could shoot it all day with those loads, and ZERO leading!

I had 45 rounds loaded up, and probably about 15 of them were pretty tough to close the lever on. Some of the ones that were difficult to close were engraving the rifling on the boolit, and some were not.

What have I done wrong? Did I not size the case right? Or is the boolit just fatter at the front than what the throat is made for? Or was the gas check or boolit too fat and making the brass too tight in the chamber? Did I not crimp enough? I didn't see any marking on the brass. Should I trim the brass shorter to keep the cannelure in the right spot and account for a narrow throat? All of them extracted easily with no signs of pressure and they were all accurate enough to hit the 8" plate easily while standing with iron sights. I didn't shoot for groups, just Minute-of-Deer-Vitals!

Thanks for the help!!!

Dan

[YunGun]

Mine do the same thing with that boolit - It's because that last 1/4"on the lever is engraving the nose into the lands. If you carefully eject one after chambering, you will likely see the marks on the nose & ogive where it engraved. Shouldn't really be a problem unless you use a little too much lino in which case the resulting CBs are pretty hard & very difficult to chamber.

[338RemUltraMag]

Dan,

You may want to look at trimming your cases, it would seem if you are crimping to the crimp groove and your cases are needing trimmed this would cause harder engraving.

[popper]

Check empty cases, check dummy cases. Too long, shoulder too far out, forget to remove all the bell, Boolit nose too big or not seated deep enough. Boolits seated to cannelure doesn't always work.

[NLS1]

Thanks everyone, I appreciate the feedback.

I did trim all the cases to 2.025" which is actually a bit shorter than trim length in the manuals.

I bet I must have messed up the crimp. Only a few had rifling marks on the nose when they got difficult, I bet the bell was hanging up and preventing some from getting in.

Suppose it could be the shoulder being out a little far, but I didn't have really any more I could have gone.

I was not impressed with this particular set of dies, it is the full length RCBS 2 die set, it did not bell or crimp very nicely in my opinion, maybe operator error.

Maybe I will try Lee or hornady, I have several of each of those for other cartridges and they seem a little better at belling and crimping.

Do you guys that have this same issue have to trim back the cases even further? Or could I set the boolits in further and crimp past the crimp groove a little without issue?

Dan

[.429]

when u FL sized, did the shell holder kiss the bottom of the die WITH the brass installed? it's a pretty common mistake to set that die to kiss the shell holder without the brass installed, but then with the brass in there, all the travel is taken up because of the extra pressure and the no longer touch, therefore the shoulder didn't get set back properly

[mroliver77]

Check you nose size too. Sometimes they are a bit too large or if you get lax you can not close the mold tightly. My Marlin does not allow much of the .311 part of the boolit stick out of the case. I don't crimp my 30-30 rounds unless using heavy boolits with max loads and a tube full of cartridges for hunting.

Uh, rifle dies do not bell the case. I use an Lyman M die or a pair of needle nose pliers if I don't have the proper M die spud.
J

[NLS1]

when u FL sized, did the shell holder kiss the bottom of the die WITH the brass installed? it's a pretty common mistake to set that die to kiss the shell holder without the brass installed, but then with the brass in there, all the travel is taken up because of the extra pressure and the no longer touch, therefore the shoulder didn't get set back properly

I will be sure to adjust it with a case in it, no I did not adjust with the case present this last time. Good tip.


Check you nose size too. Sometimes they are a bit too large or if you get lax you can not close the mold tightly. My Marlin does not allow much of the .311 part of the boolit stick out of the case. I don't crimp my 30-30 rounds unless using heavy boolits with max loads and a tube full of cartridges for hunting.

Uh, rifle dies do not bell the case. I use an Lyman M die or a pair of needle nose pliers if I don't have the proper M die spud.
J

That is what I figured with these dies, although I didn't realize that all rifle dies do not bell! Funny. Ah yes, not a lot of bottle neck reloading experience yet! Mostly straight wall case reloading so far. More that it was suggested above that the bell was hanging up, but I suppose the correct way to put it is that there wasn't enough crimp. I don't want to crimp any more than necessary for case life.

Next go round I will be sure to adjust the size die with a case present. And I will be sure to trim all the cases again, and I will give it a tiny bit more crimp, and see how that goes. If that isn't enough, then I will move the boolit in past the crimp groove a little bit.

Thanks everyone!

Dan

[popper]

The RCBS sizer & seater are fine. I do believe they roll crimp, which I don't do. I use a Lee universal decapper, Lee FL sizer with the stem removed & universal expander but it only bells the case. I use the 31R M die and the Lee FCD which allows me to crimp anywhere. Don't seat & crimp in the same step.

[woody1]

My money is on your crimp. Too much of it is a common problem. With a roll crimp you can get a bulge in the neck just behind the crimp. Just crimp enough to remove the flare and not much more. IMO do not over size your cases. Take your fired cases and see if they will chamber easily. With your load, I'll bet they will, thus not much need to do a lot of resizing except to seat the boolit properly. If they will chamber before loading and not after check the crimp. Sometimes you can smooth out the crimp by gently running the loaded round into the FL die. Usually only takes a thou. or two to fix the problem (or create it). Regards, WOody

[popper]

FL sizing a loaded rnd works but I would only single load. Your neck tension will be gone. I've used the FL die to pull the boolit. I just pull and resize & reload.

[RickinTN]

You probably didn't do anything wrong. That bullet doesn't fit the Marlin 336 throat very well, at least not on the 6 or more I've tried it in. It has too much full diameter in front of the crimp groove. Marlin 30-30's usually have a very abrupt throat. My '49 model does happen to have the longest throat of any of Marlin 30-30's.
Rick