.35 Winchester (WCF) in a bolt action

Don't know exactly where to post this, in military rifles, in my favorite caliber, in case forming or reforming or here in in the Cast Boolits general forum. I finally made it to the range to try out a multiyear Covid project, a hybrid P14/M1917 Enfield bolt action in .35 Winchester. Catching the 35 WCF bug years before Covid after re-barreling a M1895 in that practical caliber, it became tiresome reading esteemed gun writers repeat each other in both praising the caliber's effectiveness but lamenting it being not as good as the .348 or .358 Winchesters, particularly with turn of the last century's lever gun pressure limitations. With nil chances of obtaining an affordable Remington-Lee or Ross in 35WCF, and not wanting to scavenge a good .45-70 Siamese Mauser, P14 and M1917 parts were acquired. A gun show $25 sporterized M1917 receiver and magazine were mated with a P14 barrel, bolt and (modified) follower. JES did an excellent job in reboring and rechambering to 35WCF. I completed the rest, cutting and crowning the former military barrel to 24", installing modified 98 Mauser front and Redfield Series 70 rear sights, cock on opening kit, Timney trigger and the stock whittling. Bubba does passable work sometimes.

The proof in in the pudding (or how does it shoot?). As normal, I spent half the day getting ready and driving to a spot where I don't alarm the neighbors, so I felt rushed when I got there, but...I think this rifle wants to shoot! The results posted are with multiple loads first with 2 completely different cast boolit "Christening" loads and then with full power Hornady 250RN. I didn't adjust the sights after boresighting (by looking through the barrel and through the sights with the rifle on sandbags). At 45 yards, everything shot had the same impact point, 180gr cast, 202 gr cast and 250gr Hornady jacketed. I took 3 shots at 100, but my excuse for a 4" vertically strung group is that my soup can stenciled spray painted bull was too indistinct for my 63yo eyes to draw a finer bead.

Cases varied from reformed Hornady .405s, fireformed Grafs (PPU) .30-40 Krag and a few Jamison "real" .35 WCFs.

In the attached pics, I shot everything without any sight adjustments, and although at only 45 yards, they hit in the same place on the targets.

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Wow! Great work!
What kind of velocity does that cartridge generate? I am familiar with the 35 Remington, but not it's Winchester cousin.

Nice looking rifle. Am surprised you have to worry about alarming neighbors up in AK.

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Originally Posted by Daekar

Wow! Great work!
What kind of velocity does that cartridge generate? I am familiar with the 35 Remington, but not it's Winchester cousin.

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I didn't use the chronograph, but estimated the cast loads to produce between 1600-1800. Jacked bullet velocity should be about the same as in a 24" M1895 lever gun previously measured at about 2200 with a 250 grain jacketed bullet. In this strong bolt, I think it can be pushed harder and can almost equal the .35 Whelen.

Well done muskeg13! Reminds me of an 1989 hunting trip when we stopped in a gun shop in Alamosa and I slobbered all over an old Remington bolt action in .35 Winchester. I sure wanted that rifle but, didn't have the necessary jack in my jeans at the time. That rifle should keep you in meat whenever you need.

Nice work and rifle.

All of the 35s are easy to like, and the WCF is one that deserves far more interest.

Sweet project!

A $25 action is hard to pass on.
I have a Winchester M1917 action that went through a fire. I need to get it heat treated and do something with it.
Looks like your rifle turned out great.

I've always liked 35cals and the 35Win is a great one. Have two - an 1895 Winchester and a Holland & Holland falling block.
This is a great project - you should be justifiably proud of the result.

Had a very good range session yesterday with a few very promising 35 Winchester (WCF) loads. I first verified zero at 45 yards with 3 remaining RCBS 180-SIL/14gr Unique loads (reformed Hornady .405 brass). This resulted in a one-hole group. Off to a good start! Not bad with iron sights.

Next was the Ideal 358318 (243gr) with 36.0 gr IMR-4064 in reformed PPU 9.3x74R cases. This resulted in a 2.75” group @100.

Then came the shocker. Using the Lyman/Ideal 358318 243 gr RN gas checked, LoadData notes show poor accuracy with 31 gr RL7 producing 1939 fps. I backed off to 27.0 gr and got a 7-shot group of about 2” @ 100, with no filler!

I followed up with two 5-shot full power 250gr Hornady shot strings using 47 gr of Varget @100 yds. The results were acceptable at just over 2” (2.16”).

I believe these loads and this rifle are capable of even better accuracy, better than I can provide as a rifleman. I apologize for no chronograph data, but I ran off forgetting to pack a few key components. I strived to achieve about 1700 (estimated) with the cast boolit loads and about 2200 with the jacketed load. Again, I give thanks to JES Reboring for turning a mediocre .303 barrel into something useful.

Now, I need help in solving a mystery. I loaded 10 rounds each with the Ideal 358318/RL7 and the Hornady 250/Varget jacketed, all in new Quality Cartridge .35WCF brass. I had difficulty seating primers when loading and had to run several of the Lee Hand Tool primed cases also through the Lee Bench Press to force the primers deeper to at least seat flush. I had no problems shooting with the Hornady jacketed/Varget loads, but every single one of the 10 358318/RL7 loads required 2 primer strikes to ignite. Strange.

I appreciate Quality Cartridge making occasional runs of obscure obsolete cartridge cases. In fact, I picked up 100 additional cases in today’s mail on the way home from the range. These are generally good cases, and while a bit pricey, are much easier to use in getting “strange” caliber rifles shooting than trying to reform brass. I did notice that I need to (absolutely had to) do more case preparation with these Quality cases than any other ready formed cases in the past. Primer pocket deburring and case length trimming after initial full length sizing was a must. I now believe that I should have also used a primer pocket uniformer before the first loadings. OK, but that doesn’t explain why I had no problems igniting the 10 Hornady/Varget loads, but had to re-cock to fire all 10 of the cast boolit loads. Strange.

If everything worked perfectly, it would soon get boring, and I’d be tempted to take up another pastime, like maybe golf.

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muskeg, it's speculation on my part but I suspect the first time the firing pin hit the primer, it finished a last, smidgen of seating it. The second srike detonated the primer.

Did you by chance examine any of the primers after the first strike? I believe that would confirm or deny my suspicion.

Funny how things work out!
This thread/project really caught my attention and interest. A rifle-builder buddy texted me Sunday PM that a mutual friend gunsmith had sent home with him a nearly forgotten collection of parts of mine.
These parts include a Remington Model 30 receiver with attached .30 truck axle barrel, a P14 bolt and an really old school benchrest type stock inletted for the Enfiels action. The plan for all this was and I guess still is a .30-40 lead bullet shooter! This thread kinda mKes me wish the barrel was .35 cal but such is life. We have a tentative date for sometime next month to discuss.

The Rem 30 receiver was given to me with 2/3 of it's original .30-06 barrel still mounted. The 30 receiver is sweet as it comes already "sporterized".

Some of your vertical stringing may be related to the problem with primer detonation. Could be getting velocity variation - if so, you will see that on the chronograph in future sessions.

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Originally Posted by sharps4590

muskeg, it's speculation on my part but I suspect the first time the firing pin hit the primer, it finished a last, smidgen of seating it. The second srike detonated the primer.

Did you by chance examine any of the primers after the first strike? I believe that would confirm or deny my suspicion.

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I'm pretty sure this is the case. All the first strikes produced light impressions, but I find it strange that this occurred with all 10 of the cast boolit loads and in none of the 10 jacketed loads. A coincidence?

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Originally Posted by DonHowe

Funny how things work out!
This thread/project really caught my attention and interest. A rifle-builder buddy texted me Sunday PM that a mutual friend gunsmith had sent home with him a nearly forgotten collection of parts of mine.
These parts include a Remington Model 30 receiver with attached .30 truck axle barrel, a P14 bolt and an really old school benchrest type stock inletted for the Enfiels action. The plan for all this was and I guess still is a .30-40 lead bullet shooter! This thread kinda mKes me wish the barrel was .35 cal but such is life. We have a tentative date for sometime next month to discuss.

The Rem 30 receiver was given to me with 2/3 of it's original .30-06 barrel still mounted. The 30 receiver is sweet as it comes already "sporterized".

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Your Model 30 receiver will make for a prettier rifle. If you're going to use a P14 bolt, you'll need to mate it with a barrel having a flat (Mauser style) breech face. The M1917 had a coned breech. How is your Model 30 with the existing barrel stub set up? I'm pretty sure you could go with either flat or coned using the Model 30 receiver as long as the bolt and barrel breech faces match. If you intend to build a .30-40, you probably won't need to do any (or very little) bolt face modification using a P14 bolt as the .303, .30-40, .35 WCF and .405 all share very similar rim dimensions. You'll need to consider what magazine and follower to use. For the .35 WCF, I had to go with a M1917 magazine because a .303 length P14 magazine is too short for most .35 WCF loads, but you'll probably need to go with a P14 follower to assist in reliably feeding a rimmed cartridge. The P14 follower is a bit short in a M1917 magazine box, but a short extension can be brazed on. If you can locate an old P14 barrel that's not too far gone, and have about $250 or so, you too can have JES fix you up with a .35!

You're right, the factory .30-06 barrel has a coned breech. The new barrel is fitted to the receiver (w/ P14 bolt) and flat breech face forrimmed cartridge. My planning has not gone as far as magazine and follower as life got in the way. I will have to hash all that out with my good buddy.
I sure appreciate your comments about thefollower and mag box.
With a big fat barrel I starting to see this thing wearing my Super Targetspot scope. Might as well stay old school (like me)!