Swiss 30-30

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Turf

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I'm not at all familiar with milsurp firearms having ever owned 1 jungle carbine. I tried a search but really couldn't find a definitive answer so I need some help from the experts on this.

The rifle in question belongs to my neighbour (I just met him)and about all we know is that it is Swiss and chambered in 30-30 WCF. So far I've been able to determine that it might be either a Schmidt Rubin 1889, a K11 or a K31. The rifle was given to him by a friend who has since passed away but he wasn't given a mag to go with it. Once we can determine the model we hope to be able to source a mag.

He gave me 3 pictures to post. Any help you guys can give would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

bob1.jpg

bob2.jpg

bob3.jpg
 
I believe that your rifle is a single shot, so don't worry too much about finding a mag for it, the 30.30 cartridge won't feed from it anyways. These rifles had the chamber reamed and the barrel relined to accept the new round, kind of an oddball conversion IMO...
 
I've seen one. I got on here (cgn) to find they ca be problematic with feed/extraction. I snoozed and, lost the one I was considering. Asking was 125$'s.

I've since seen a couple and, one of them was a supposed to be a"repeater"...dunno as, n'er tried. Quite a few 89s were converted but, not so popular now.

I like the idea of a "pointy" 30-30 round
 
Are there any markings on that rifle that denote it as 30-30 caliber?

My friend has one almost identical 1889 Schmidt Rubin with no magazine, and we had both assumed it was in the original 7.5x53.5mm cartridge....

Were the 30-30 conversion done by gunsmiths all over, or was it a brand conversion like a Parker Hale or an Eatons??? What markings could I look for?

Sorry for hijacking your thread... :redface:
 
Desert_Fox said:
Are there any markings on that rifle that denote it as 30-30 caliber?

My friend has one almost identical 1889 Schmidt Rubin with no magazine, and we had both assumed it was in the original 7.5x53.5mm cartridge....

Were the 30-30 conversion done by gunsmiths all over, or was it a brand conversion like a Parker Hale or an Eatons??? What markings could I look for?

Sorry for hijacking your thread... :redface:
Click to expand...

Not a hijck really. But yes, the right side of the barrel is stamped 30-30WFC.

From what I gather in my research a fair number were converted to 30-30 the way diopter and collector67 described. I also came across a thread entry on one of the US gun boards about mags.

This one fellow said he bought a converted 1889 and had to tweak the mag he got with it so it would feed the 30-30 round properly. Unfortunately he didn't go into a lot of detail about the modifications he had to make to the mag.

I found a mag on the Ellwood Epps website that says it's for a Schmidt Rubin model K91. I don't know if that refers to an 1889 made in 1891. It's the first reference I've seen to "K91". Epps wants $90.00 for it and I don't know if my neighbour wants to shell out that much for a mag that may or may not be made able to work.

Thanks for all your help guys, it's greatly appreciated.

diopter said:
http://theswissriflesdotcommessagebo...ubin-30-30-win
Click to expand...

That's the thread I saw diopter and now I see that the one on the swiss rifle forum may not even have been a 1889
 
A buddy gave me one once, along with a Mosin converted to 308 (????) and a BSA "sportered" US M17 Enfield he had been talked into accepting along with a rifle he really wanted.

I believe they were a Globeco conversion.

I salvaged the bolt and mag parts off the Mosin and threw the barrel in the ocean. The Swiss 30-30 had had the stock, trigger guard, and sights butchered and it was missing the mag so I kept the bolt and gave the barrel to a 'smith buddy in case he wanted it.

He retired and basically gave the barrel away along with a barrel of others he had laying around to a local gun parts shark. That barrel was pristine.

I recently traded the bolt for a box of 30-06 ammo to a fellow who posted on another site that he needed one.

There was a guy in the U.S. who called himself "Cruffler" or something who had a collection of oddball ex-military rifles who had one.
 
I have one of those critters myself. It was converted by having the barrel unscrewed, a chamber insert popped in and the barrel screwed up tight again.

And that makes sense. You cannot REAM something to a SMALLER SIZE, so forget any idea of reaming out the 7.5 chamber to handle the .30-30, which is much smaller in EVERY dimension.

Nice thing is that they handle ordinary .30-cal bullets, you can use pointy ones in these rifles.... and that 3-groove Swiss rifling just seems never to give up. They can be far more accurate than most people would even believe.

Not bad for a $39 rifle, back in 1959. A Model 70, in Canada, was well over $100 at that time and even a '94 was up about 50 bucks.

Last mag I bought for one of these was attached to a Bubba'd '89. Guy wanted $40 for the magazine or $35 if I would take the whole rifle along with it. I saved money and ended up with a spare rifle with a WONDERFUL barrel, uncut. Now all I need are 3 stocks for an '89!

It's fun at times.

Nice rifle. Don't sell the old girl short. They aren't "worth" much.... but they WILL feed you through a bad Winter. That's something to appreciate, especially if you have ever gone hungry.

Nice old toy.
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smellie said:
I have one of those critters myself. It was converted by having the barrel unscrewed, a chamber insert popped in and the barrel screwed up tight again.

And that makes sense. You cannot REAM something to a SMALLER SIZE, so forget any idea of reaming out the 7.5 chamber to handle the .30-30, which is much smaller in EVERY dimension.

Nice thing is that they handle ordinary .30-cal bullets, you can use pointy ones in these rifles.... and that 3-groove Swiss rifling just seems never to give up. They can be far more accurate than most people would even believe.

Not bad for a $39 rifle, back in 1959. A Model 70, in Canada, was well over $100 at that time and even a '94 was up about 50 bucks.

Last mag I bought for one of these was attached to a Bubba'd '89. Guy wanted $40 for the magazine or $35 if I would take the whole rifle along with it. I saved money and ended up with a spare rifle with a WONDERFUL barrel, uncut. Now all I need are 3 stocks for an '89!

It's fun at times.

Nice rifle. Don't sell the old girl short. They aren't "worth" much.... but they WILL feed you through a bad Winter. That's something to appreciate, especially if you have ever gone hungry.

Nice old toy.
.
Click to expand...

Smellie, did you or do you have feeding problems with the mag? (I'm assuming yours is a 30-30 conversion)Fix?
 
I have one of those. A lot of people turn their noses up at them. I don't know why though. Mine shoots any commercial 30-30 ammo very well. I have tried some handloads with spitzer type bullets and it digests them with ease. I suspect the original 7.5 Swiss ammunition intended for them, had 200+ grain bullets loaded to around 735m/sec. The cartridges loaded for them, ran around 38,000psi. (CUP) The original round for these rifles fired a long, round nosed, paper patched lead bullet. They are unsafe with modern 7.5x54 ammunition and attendant pressures. Therefore they had their chambers sleeved for the 30-30. The chambers were reamed out by the way to accept a fairly substantial sleeve. Some were done so well that the sleeve was unnoticeable. There were even rumors of the sleeve popping out on some rifles. I can't see it happening though and have never seen one that has. I saw hundred of these rifles at Lever Arms. Lever make a deal with International and brought in a truckload.

The original rifle had a 12 round magazine. Mine has a 6 round mag the has been modified to feed the rimmed case.
 
Interesting thread guys!

The idea of a chamber insert in an easily available North American calibre is interesting, although since brass and dies in 7.5 x 55 are available, anyone who reloads can tailor loads for any of the Swiss S-R models, including the weaker early ones.

bearhunter said:
I have one of those. A lot of people turn their noses up at them. I don't know why though. Mine shoots any commercial 30-30 ammo very well. I have tried some handloads with spitzer type bullets and it digests them with ease. I suspect the original 7.5 Swiss ammunition intended for them, had 200+ grain bullets loaded to around 735m/sec. The cartridges loaded for them, ran around 38,000psi. (CUP) The original round for these rifles fired a long, round nosed, paper patched lead bullet. They are unsafe with modern 7.5x54 ammunition and attendant pressures. Therefore they had their chambers sleeved for the 30-30. The chambers were reamed out by the way to accept a fairly substantial sleeve. Some were done so well that the sleeve was unnoticeable. There were even rumors of the sleeve popping out on some rifles. I can't see it happening though and have never seen one that has. I saw hundred of these rifles at Lever Arms. Lever make a deal with International and brought in a truckload.

The original rifle had a 12 round magazine. Mine has a 6 round mag the has been modified to feed the rimmed case.
Click to expand...
 
now you can

cantom said:
Interesting thread guys!

The idea of a chamber insert in an easily available North American calibre is interesting, although since brass and dies in 7.5 x 55 are available, anyone who reloads can tailor loads for any of the Swiss S-R models, including the weaker early ones.
Click to expand...

I'm guessin', when these were released, you could buy 30-30 any where...

ADD-ON

I don't mean "anywhere you can get ammo" I mean, any hardware store, small town store, gas stations...anywhere
 
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40 years ago, when those rifles first hit the markets, you couldn't get 7.5x55 or 7.62x54. There just wasn't any available. To show how bad it was, many SVT38s and 40s were converted to 303Brit. Because of the odd rim size of the 7.5x55, it wasn't easily made up either. These were some of the first Swiss rifles I can remember seeing on the market. Suitable surplus ammunition just wasn't available. Same goes for the 7.62x51. Lets not forget the 6.5x55 either. If it weren't for all of the Dominion ammunition still on the shelves, it was non existent other than some extremely expensive Norma offerings. Of course things have changed now, these cartridges may not be available in local hardware stores or WalMart but with a bit of digging almost anything that needs to be loaded, can be found.

The idea of chamber inserts isn't new by a long shot. The russians used to make their T33 pistols with 22rf barrels but cut the chambers to fit the 7.62x25. They made up chamber inserts to fit, with 22rf chambers. I never tried one but I heard that they fed and extracted reliably. Another old time favorite was to make up inserts for the Martinis' so that you can fire 45 LC cartridges or the myriad of 11mm cartridges so they can shoot the 44mag or 44special. I've even seen a set made up for the 45-70 to shoot 45acp.

The main difference here is that the original chambers were opened up and then the inserts were added. On my rifle, it looks like it was sweated in. As we all know, this method is almost as strong as a solid block of steel.

I find most handloaders are far more sophisticated than now than they were 40 years ago. I don't know how many guys I talked to that were convinced the 8x57 round was interchangeable with the 30-06, because it fit in the chamber. I know a fellow that bought several thousand rounds of surplus 8x57 to shoot through his "personally customised" P17 enfield. He shot them all off with nary a hitch.

Personally, I think International Firearms, made a wise move by adapting the old 1889-1911 rifles to the 30-30 cartridge. At least it was safe. Some of them shot extremely well, some were dogs. One thing that can be said about them is that they were all built on carbine (for the time) length barrels and proved to be very handy rifles for knocking about in the truck or in the bush.
 
camster, you are EXACTLY right. Country general stores, every hardware, gas stations, you name it. They ALL had .30-30 and .303 and darned little else except maybe a couple boxes of 43 Mauser, and that was all we knew about metric because it said on the box that it was the same as 11mm. So Trudeau converted us so we could be like "China or Russia or Cuba" or another of thos nice, progressive countries. Thirty-ought-six was regarded as something pretty exotic and .270 was something for specialists who really knew their onions. But a GOOD hardware store (we had 2 here) would have .25-35, .32-40, .38-55, .30 Remington, .32 Special, .22 Winchester Automatic, 25 Stevens, .25 RF, .32 RF Short AND Long, .22 WRF, .351WSL, .43 Mauser, .44-40, .38-40, .32-20 and other usful calibres, plus perhaps a box of .45-70, although it was usually special-order, as with the .577 Snider and .577/.450 MH. But NO 7.5 Swiss..... or 7.5 French...... or 6.5 ANYTHING apart from a few boxes of REALLY old 6.5x55 and the odd box of 6.5MS.

At the time these rifles were converted, there was a VERY small amount of 7.5x55 ammo available in Canada and it was expensive. It featured rebulleted 1924 military cases and Gawd-only-knows-what for powder; I still have a couple of rounds.

The gun magazines TALKED about NORMA ammo, but it was impossible to obtain if you lived outside one of the biggest cities. Handloading was something VERY exotic. I was fortunate in that there was ONE person in this town who handloaded, and I learned a lot from him. I started handloading because 8mm Mauser was $5.25 a box of 20 rounds...... and I was making 70 cents an hour, starting at 5 AM and going until 2 PM in a bakery: 7-1/2 hours at work for one box of shells PLUS TAX. Eight-hour day for 1 box of shells which I could reload for a quarter of that, even with jacketed slugs.

But ask yourself: if .270 is almost unknown and .30-06 regarded as exotic.... what hope was there at all for 7.5x55....... or 8x56R....... or 8x50R........ or 8mm Lebel.

Thutty-thutty was IT, especially as the '89 just could not handle the super-spiffy brand-new .308W: 'way too much pressure.

So people ended up with (pardon the pun!) "Schmitty" .30-30s which cost a lot less than a lever gun....... and shot the same ammo every bit as well.

And there are still some of them around and they are still bringing home the venison and they are STILL a darned decent rifle.
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