Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Savage Collectors States with cartridge restrictions and the Savage lever action

I think the new Remington .360 Buckhammer round covers nearly all requirements for states with restrictions on things like OAL of cartridges, straight wall only requirements, ft lbs of energy at distance requirements, and even caliber size requirements. Plus the added bonus of being available in a lever actions for states with those kinds of requirements or restrictions on other platforms.

My question is can the 1899/99 be adapted to use this round? What barrel styles/caliber/models would be candidates? What's the cost of conversion?

The Buckhammer is a rimmed equivalent of the 350 Legend if I understand it correctly. I would suspect it might be a tad too small in diameter for a Savage 99???

Neighbor kid has a 350 Legend in a Savage Axis and we handload for it, and I can tell you it's been a royal PITA. After two years of dicking with it he called Savage yesterday and they recommend he rebuild the bolt with new springs, washer, and firing pin. It misfires constantly. The most unreliable rifle I have ever seen. The two-spring firing pin assembly absolutely sucks. Since it headspaces off the case mouth, we assumed at first it was short brass, but that was quickly ruled out, as it does it with new factory ammo as well.

When it fires it's fun as heck to shoot. He settled on some mono bullets that work by disrupting flesh with fins on the front of the bullet spinning rather than expansion. I forget their name. If the buckhammer solves the problems of the Legend I'd say, "Yay!", but I personally don't need one in a Savage 99.

It's a 30-30 based case, so I imagine a 30-30, 32-40, or 38-55 would be all be pretty easy conversions. There are a couple guys on here already messing with them in other platforms. Dinny built a single shot that he's been experimenting with for quite some time now, and there's some load data starting to trickle out online.

38-55 and 32-40 would probably just be a barrel swap, but you'd be taking down a 32-40 or 38-55 to do it 😬 You could probably just get a rebore done for the 32-40 or 30-30, as well.

Added***

Saami dimensions PDF link

https://saami.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Public-Introduction-360-Buckhammer-2023-01-30.pdf

If it's a 30-30 based case it must be a shortened case with taper, or it'd be a 375 Winchester.

*That's almost as confusing as 36 caliber round balls being .375 diameter.

I just bought a box of ammo so will start tinkering soon. One of my first quests will be how far back Savage chambered loads of 50,000 psi. Don't want to modify anything much older than that. Whatever I learn, I will share.

Sam

It is. It looks very similar to a slightly shorter 32-40 or 375W... mild tapered straight wall down to .358

It looks like pressure for factory round might be a concern.

I'm not interested in building one but I would think that there are hunters in states with restrictions that might be interested in giving new life to a 99 shooter with a rough barrel.

More interested in the details of why or why not this might work and exactly what 1899/99's would be candidates. I can see pressure might be a problem using factory rounds.

The 250 and 300 chambered rifles were heat treated from the start. We have documented info that states that the rimmed chamberings were heat treated starting 266000.

The 300 Savage pressure is.. 48,000 psi? 47,000?

So just 6%-7% lower than the 360.

I solved the problem by going with a .357 Maximum (no real difference from a Buckhammer, with the advantage of using commonly available .357 diameter bullets of which there is a heckuva lot of selection, as opposed to the .355" diameter bullets needed for a Buckhammer). Only I did it with a Martini Cadet single shot, a 26" barrel to squeeze out higher velocity, contained in a short rifle (the action is way shorter than a 99) that weighs six pounds all up. Accurate as the devil, and really how often does one need a second or third Hail Mary shot anyway. 200 grain bullet at the same velocity levels as the .35 Remington is nothing to sneeze at. Common .38 Special/.357 Magnum bullets for lower velocity practice.

To make the Buckhammer work in a 99 would be a lot of work, IMO. Is it really worth it? Doesn't the .38-55 and .375 Winchester fill the bill in most states?

"...as opposed to the .355" diameter bullets needed for a Buckhammer."

It uses the .358 bullet.

"Doesn't the .38-55 and .375 Winchester fill the bill in most states?"

Not in states that have a max 1.8" case length.

"To make the Buckhammer work in a 99 would be a lot of work, IMO"

That was my question. What are the details of why or why not?

I hadn't thought about the higher pressure. 375 Win rifles as a best donor possibly, with the later steels?

Only way to really see about feeding would be throw in some dummies and try it, but with the similar case profiles, I still imagine 38-55, 32-40, 375 rifles would probably be the best bets to try.

I'm not sure they changed the steel significantly at any time after 1920's.

But vast majority of 99's after that are rimless, so conversion issues there?

I believe we decided the bolt faces and extractors are all the same, rimmed or rimless.

I'd guess that would be a bit tougher road because of the differences in the carriers and cutoffs for the rimless rounds.

I doinked around with quite a few different cartridge feeding experiments (seeing what would/wouldn't feed from the magazine) with that 300 I rebarreled, and it was not very receptive to feeding stuff with big shoulder/neck position changes. It feeds 250 ok, but it still gets a little hiccuppy sometimes. Going bigger bore led to worse feeding issues for me than going smaller.

Ahh, yes. I was thinking of the .350 Legend. Sorry.

I have converted rimmed to rimless and vice versa, and found no difference in bolt or extractor. Carrier modification to rimmed involves material removal to clear rim, and it can be touchy. Carrier modification to rimless usually depends on case taper. but the availability of rimless carriers usually obviates the need for modification. Proper cartridge guide is crucial and frequently esoteric. Cutoff is something I never know in advance, but can be very important, especially in preventing empty case dropouts during slow extraction. Recently while working with candidates for a 224 Valkyrie conversion, I discovered significant differences in the size of the magazine cavity just behind the spindle head bore between a 22 HP and a 250 of similar vintage. That caught me off guard.

As far as the Buckhammer is concerned, I think there are advantages in the short (pre 900K) action, and with a long history of 300s at a pressure around 47,000 psi, any post 266K receiver should be strong enough. Confining the search to rimmed still gives a range of from 266,000 to 399,000 or thereabouts, 1926-1940, but I am not sure the advantages outweigh the restrictions. We shall se as the work progresses.

Gary, I am ducking your question on wouldn't something else be just as good, because if we felt that way, there would be only 10 cartridges in the world, 9 based on modifications to the 30-06 plus the 22 rimfire

Thanks Sam. I'm sure that others will be asking about this conversion given the changes in some state hunting cartridge allowances. I think knowing what can and can't be done in adapting the 99 to the .360 BH is wise so as to prevent unsafe advice be given. If it can be safely done, then maybe a few here that are in the business or just have the interest might benefit.

As a note, Henery Rifle is chambering the round and the beginning price is a little under $800.

I recently converted a 308 to 375, and I think this should be similar. I won't blow the whistle till it is done, however.

That would be similar to converting a .300 Sav to .360 BH. Onward.

And .360 BH ammo is readily available at about $28/bx.