Remington 30 AR

[NHlever]

I was playing around with Quickload this morning, and noticed that the new Remington 30AR has exactly the same powder capacity as the good old 30-30 Winchester. I sure am wondering if that would make a really good cast boolit gun in a bolt action? It has the standard .473 bolt face, and might feed out of any .308 rifle though the case does have a larger body diameter....... same as .284 Win. Any thoughts?

[Larry Gibson]

It has a short neck and right now the brass is expensive. If using a .308W length action then why not just use the .308W. I might be able to see the conversion if the .30 AR case had the 30-30 length neck but it does not. If one did a conversion I would suggest a 14" twist or 12" twist as the fastes. Just my thoughts.

Larry Gibson

[NHlever]

Larry, after looking at things a little closer, I have to agree with you. I'm guessing that it will take as much pressure to seal the neck on that case as it does for the .308 too. I've been shooting cast in the 30-30, .308, and 30-06 quite a bit in the past few years, and I guess I will stick with them. There is a thin rumor that Ruger may chamber the No.1 in 30-30, and possibly .303 British soon, and that would be nice.

[Larry Gibson]

Yes a #1 in those cartridges would certainly be nice. Unfortuneately Ruger will probably go with 10" twist. That is too bad. I have a #3 in .22 Hornet that is just about shot out. I am going to have it rebored to .30 cal (.30x.308) with 4 equal width grooves and lands with a 14" twist and chambered in 30-30. It should be a great cast bullet shooter with cast bullets from 90 to 170 gr.

Larry Gibson

[dualsport]

I've been looking at that too, damn shame about the short neck. I got a funny feeling about this one, maybe a NATO change in the air? It's been a while.

[StarMetal]

I've been looking at that too, damn shame about the short neck. I got a funny feeling about this one, maybe a NATO change in the air? It's been a while.

Not making fun of you, but you funny feeling is just that. When the U.S. finally burns out the M16, which has been going on for like 45 years, they will abandon it totally. It will be a totally different platform and not sure they'll go to some new unforeseen cartridge and caliber. Remember the 6.8 Rem was an attempt at changing the M16 cartridge. Not going to happen. I've heard the U.S. actually looked into the 7.62x39.

We'll just have to wait see.

Joe

[NHlever]

Yes a #1 in those cartridges would certainly be nice. Unfortuneately Ruger will probably go with 10" twist. That is too bad. I have a #3 in .22 Hornet that is just about shot out. I am going to have it rebored to .30 cal (.30x.308) with 4 equal width grooves and lands with a 14" twist and chambered in 30-30. It should be a great cast bullet shooter with cast bullets from 90 to 170 gr.

Larry Gibson

There are a couple of 30-30 No.1's floating around out there now that were made for "special" folks. I think Ed Harris had one made when he worked there too. I dunno about the 1-10 twist thing. These days all the barrels are hammer forged, and the guy that heads that up is a real stickler for having the "right" twist, and rifling configuration. He did use different mandrels for the .308, and 30-06 at one time anyway. I expect that if SAMMI says 1-12 that is what you will see. I have had good luck with some Marlin barrels that were 1-10, but most of them sure arenn't the same I. D. end to end! I remember one that shot the 170 J word bullets like a house afire....... very close to minute of angle, and often less with selected loads. Imagine my surprise when I tried some 110's, and saw them keyhole at 25 yards, often giving complete profile holes when they actually hit the target. The snow was melting at the time, and a couple of days later I recovered some of those bullets. They miked .305, and didn't look like they had seen rifling hardly. Hmm, I decided to slug the bore. The slug tapped in nicely for about 5", and then just fell for another 10", or so before getting snug again. ( it was a 24" 336A barrel. ) Anyway, I figured out that the long bearing surface of the 170's kept them marginally engaged in the rifling, but the short bearing surface on the 110's would not so their rotation would slow, and they would be out of time with the rifling when they engaged it again near the muzzle. Marlin replaced the barrel though it was an old gun, and the new barrel was mediocre with everything.

Sorry to ramble.....

Your project sounds really interesting. What will you use for an action?

[Larry Gibson]

I'll leave the #3 as is and just have it bored out with those specs in the barrel. I might even go with a .299 bore. I'd like to push a 150 gr FN to 23-2400 fps with accuracy out of it. My experience with my 14" twist .308W says that is quite feasible. The #3 in .22 Hornet has for years been a dandy walk about rifle though a bit heavy with the 24" barrel that is also the same contour as was the 45-70 barrel. Made it a "light" varminter. Bored out to .30 cal should lighten it a bit but still be a good stiff barrel for accuracy. That's the plan anyway.

Larry Gibson

[Jack Stanley]

I had a number three chambered in .223 Remington once . It's accuracy was fine for what I intended it for however , the rifles habit of changing point of impact at least once a day was enough to sell it off . I had a chance to buy one chambered in the Hornet but the experience of the other number three was still fresh in my mind .

Even though I like the looks of the number One and the idea of the .303 British and the thirty-thirty chambered in a classy single shot . With the problems I've had from Ruger products in the past , I would have to test fire the product in question before buying it . There is a lot to like in the looks of the number one and I do rate them high in the "classy" department .

Jack