Has anyone ever made 303savage out of 30-30

mike shickele

mike shickele

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The dimensions on these two cartridges look fairly close, other than the base diameter. The base diameter of the 30-30 is .422, and the base diameter of the 303savage is .439.
I've made 7X57R cases out of 303british cases, and this worked fairly well, but is there a potential issue that I'm not seeing with making 303savage out of 30-30?
Mike
 
mike shickele said:
The dimensions on these two cartridges look fairly close, other than the base diameter. The base diameter of the 30-30 is .422, and the base diameter of the 303savage is .439.
I've made 7X57R cases out of 303british cases, and this worked fairly well, but is there a potential issue that I'm not seeing with making 303savage out of 30-30?
Mike
Click to expand...

Yes, I have. You must first run the .30-30 case into a Sav. .303 neck sizing die and push back the shoulder a bit, trial and error. And if I remember correctly, I then used a .30 cal. case trimmer and trimmed to the .303 Sav case length.

When you load the cases try and find bullets 170 grains, made for .30-30 velociity and don't try for a hot load. The case will expand forward of the base and you can possibly reload it, but they very soon split.

A number of years ago, CIL Dominion were selling boxes of .303 Sav. which had the .30-30 head stamp.

My experience is limited as I only reloaded enough for a friend last fall for his Savage 99 and he usually gets his deer at 50 yards or less.
 
I did some cases some years ago with 1/8" long collars inserted all the way to extractor groove,FL size in 303 Sav die and fireformed.

Collars where cut out of 40S&W cases with mini pipe cutter to the same size and cleaned with files and sandpaper.

Whole process wasn't very hard to do but time consuming (especially making collars) and out of maybe 50 cases made 40 where useful.

All cases where tested with 19Gr of 5744 under Lyman 311413GC with excellent results.

One thing I learned from this experience was importance of annealing.Very useful lesson.
 
I have been doing that for a number of yrs.
Thru the 303 sizing die.
Standard 303 loads.
I throw the cases away after one firing.
30-30 cases are plentiful, & I feel thats the safest way due to slight diff in case base dia.
 
senior said:
I have been doing that for a number of yrs.
Thru the 303 sizing die.
Standard 303 loads.
I throw the cases away after one firing.
30-30 cases are plentiful, & I feel thats the safest way due to slight diff in case base dia.
Click to expand...

I think this is where I'm going. This is going to be done for a friend who isn't a handloader, and if the cases look funny after he shoots them it shouldn't matter. Given the price, and availability of factory loads, this is the option that is best.
Mike
 
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