Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Custom Rifles & Wildcats Granpa's 30 belted Newton custom, now mine :) aka 'lost in the 50's'

I will TRY to post some pctures later today but this weekend while visiting family in North Idaho I took up to my uncle some dies that I was able to locate for my now deceased granpa's old custom rifle in 30 belted newton caliber. Uncle David said that since neither he nor his sons will ever try to handload for this or any other rifle if I could just locate him a good .270 I could take grandpa's old 30 Belted Newton rifle home with me. Needles to say I drove over to grandma's house and got into the gun cabinet imediately and retreived the old rifle. To my great pleasure I also found about 100 rounds of loaded ammo which was loaded up 60 or so years ago by long time family friend Judd Monger who taught me how to reload ammo and from whose loading press came the ammo with which I shot my first deer as well as the next several during my early teens so now the rifle and ammo have DOUBLE memory connections to me.

In the old ammo box is one box from the SPEER company actually MARKED 30 Belted Newton cartridges but none of the brass has a Speer headstamp. Too bad. All of the ammo is MArked Remington 300 Magnum and two of the old Green boxes are marked 300 MAgnum. I cannot tell if these started out in life as 300 H&H brass that udd Monger cut and necked down or if Rem made this brass in its current form. The Midway cartridge identification page says that the 30 Belted Newton is the same thing as the 30/338 which is, of course, the same thing as a .308 Norma which I also bought dies for thinking they would work for Grandpa's old gun beofre I found the set marked 30 Belted Newton. Any one here know if Remmy ever made brass for the 30 Belted Newton or 30/338? The loaded ammo has a few rounds loaded with Remington Bronze points and others with ordinary looking pointed soft points so I will probablly just shoot this stuff up and relaod it with Barnes TSX's.

Enough about the ammo, here is a bit of info about the gun itsself.....

Granpa Tom LOVED really nice rifles and knew his stuff. When he was in his truck driving and hunting heyday he commisioned three custom rifle to be built by California gunsmith Ralph Allison. All were buitl on nicely worked over Mauser '98 actions with lots of polish and shine and had Beuhler low swing safeties mounted on the left side of the action and set up with Bausch and Lomb adjustable scope mounts. As I do not need adustable scope mounts I might replace these with Burris DD's but if I can find B&L rings that fit these I may use them as well. The rifles were in .257 Roberts, .270 (which he used most of the time) and this one in 30 Belted Newton which I do not think he EVER took hunting and I am not sure he even fired it much if at all. .257 roberts is with Aunt Carol and .270 is with cousin Tommy who still hunts with it, I think.

Rifle is done up,like the other three, in a Classic 1950's style with a real Ebony forend tip and grip cap, real ivory white line spacers, nice straight grained Walnut with a modest Monte Carlo raise and cheekpiece and a shadow line underneath of it. All nicely done without the 'rollover' cheekpiece or excessive curves etc. more common of customs done in the 60 and 70's. Pretty much a classic in style save for the modest Monte Carlo raise and cheekpiece. Very light trigger of unknow manufacture with a trigger shoe to make it feel lighter than it is. Barrel is pretty hefty and I have not measured it yet but looks to be 26 inches. I will measure when I get home and take photos.

I Already have a really nice Winchester Classic model 70 in 300 Ultra Mag as well as a custom in 340 Tyrannosaur and so did not need this rifle to fill in any gaps but I do paln to take it hunting this fall and other times in memory of Grandpa Tom. I just thought about calling cousin Tommy to see if we could maybe hunt together some time with him using Toms old .270 and me packing this 30 Belted Newton.

Grandpa tom always wanted to go to Alaska or Canada and hunt for a big bull Moose and never got to. I have a big bull moose on my want list so this rifle will probably go with me on a hunt soon for 'ol Bullwinkle. Other hunts as well.

Info on the 30 Belted Newton Cartridge would be much appreciated. So far my paln is to use data for .308 Norma / 30/338 and just add H4831SC powder until I get velocities in line with this cartridge then quit. Hopefully photos to come later Happy day for me and an old rifle that needs to finally, after 60 years in the cabinet, go hunting.

MARK

PS I still need a 'good' .270 for uncle David so if anyone here has one for sale let me know....

Mark,

Man, that sounds like a jewel. Time for a stupid question - Outside of the obvious, how was the Belted version different from the non-Belted Newtons? (I've always been interested in the 35 and 40 Newton.)

Sounds like a wonderful old rifle. I look forward to seeing the pictures.

sent you a PM on a 270

Considering the time frame, I'd be willing to bet the Remington brass as cut down .300 H&H brass. As I recall, the .300 H&H was the only real commercial .300 aroud with the Weatherby being more of a semi-wildcat.
I have a box of new unprimed Remington 7x57 Mauser brass that is just marked R-P 7MM. I think the 7x57 was probably the only commercial 7MM around at that time as well.
Sounds to me like you got a really cool old rifle.
Paul B.

SM, thanks for the PM, found a rifle earlier and bought it. Trade complete

PJ, I would have to concur, excepting that the .308 Norma was a sort of factory round about this same time and the Speer box is marked '30 Belted Newton' I just found some markings on the ammo box and it seems old friend Judd Monger put 73 grs of mil surp 4831 powder in each case and lit it with a CCI magnum primer all behind a Speer 180gr Mag Tip bullet. Velocity is written down as 2900fps, but I am sure this is an estimate from the loading manuals of the time as pretty much no one had a chronograph at the time of the writing. I will Chrono these and see how close he came in his estimates. I might even use these 180gr mag tips on a whitetail deer hunt I have planned for this October. A 30 Belted with any kind of 180gr bullet is overkill for any deer but it ought to work great if I get onto a big buck.

PINTOGUY....

The 30 Newton was a proprietary case of unique dimensions and when the Western Cartridge company quit making the ammo and brass in about the 30's if I recall correctly brass supplies dried up and many Newton rifles were re-chambered for cartridges that ammo could be had for. The 30 belted Newton is simply one of MANY 'short' or 30/06 length 30 caliber magnum wildcats prevalent in the days before the .308 Norma Magnum became somewhat standard and before the 300 Winchester Magnum came along and made the other short belted 30's pretty much obsolete. Most look a lot like the 30/338 with only very minor, if any at all, differences. I still do not know if there is any difference between a 30 Belted Newton and a 30/338 aka 308 Norma. Probably not much and maybe none at all. I will report back what I find if anyone here is interested in such.

You are indeed a very lucky man. May you carry your Grand Father and his rifle in your woods for many years. Bear

Ackley says that the .30 Belted Newton and the .30-.338 are the same cartridge. I used to shoot a .30-.338 at 1,000 yards, and it would have been cooler to call it a Belted Newton!

I know Charles Newton's .30 Newton, but I don't know who originally came up with the .30 Belted Newton. In any case it is a way cool rifle and it will be fun to shoot and hunt.

jim

"Outside of the obvious, how was the Belted version different from the non-Belted Newtons? (I've always been interested in the 35 and 40 Newton.)"

According to my "Cartridges of the World" The .30 and .35 Newton used a beltless rimless care larger in diameter than the .30-06.

Base dia.-.523
Rim dia.-.525
Case Length-2.52

The belted type H & H cases are:
Base dia.-.513
Rim dia.-.530
Length of .308 Norma-2.56

It appears that the .30 Newton was a rimless case slightly larger in diameter than the base dia. of the H & H type cases, but smaller than the belt. They might have slightly more capacity than an identical length H & H case due to the .523 diameter for the Newton.

It appears to be a case along the same lines as the WSM and RUM before there was such a thing, although the Newton case is smaller in diameter.

According to COTW, a limited supply of cases was manufactured by Richard Speer right after WW 2.

Surprisingly, the .30 Belted Newton is not mentioned in my issue (3rd) of COTW. I have heard of the .30-.338 being referred to as the .30 Belted Newton, but I can't remember where. I can continue looking, if anyone is interested. I have a lot of books dating back to the 60s and earlier.

It would seem logical that the .30 Belted Newton might have been developed so that the original .30 Newton rifles could be rechambered, but with the rimless case being larger at the base, a H & H sized reamer would not clean up the chamber.

Due to the difference in size of the two cases, I don't know what the .30 Newton could be rechambered to.

The barrel could possibly be set back so that the chamber would clean up.

Or, and I guess this is feasable, the original rifles could have been rechambered and the owner lived with the swelled bases resulting from the Belted cases being used.

I am curious about this. I think I will keep looking.

Mark, sounds like you have a real treasure. Now for the admonishment- keep it!!! I look forward to seeing it. Once spring bear season is over I will come check it out. Brian.

Exactly. I'm reading P.O. Ackley's words about the .30 Belted Newton as I type. He says it's a 338 case necked down to .30 caliber, and came out shorty after the introduction of the 338.

Don

Well, it seems that the 30/338 dies I had bought for this rifle would have been sufficient, but when I found a set marked 30 Belted Newton I bought them to be sure and now I should have no problem getting the rifle fed and running pretty easily.

Rufous, as you are well aware I trade off rifles more often than you change your underwear.... but this is in my keep forever pile. A family hierloom that does not have much real cash value on the market. We will have to go and blast some stuff with it soon.

I am having the clutch re done right now on 'our' Rokon, time soon to go and play with it as well.

Mark;

Dude.....

PICS!

Might have to e-mail them to you to post. Would you mind? GOT to learn how to DO this.... ARRRGGGGHHHHH!

Send 'm to my gmail account.......

I have some work to do via that account later anyway; they should be up tonight.

so where are these pics that everyone is waiting for?

Ain't been received yet.

Trust me, I'm waitin' too.....

I will get 'em done here in a minute or three.... MARK

I have the regular, beltless 30 Newton. I use 75grs of H4350sc and a 180gr Rn bullet, with cci 250 primers. Gets 3200fps, per my Oheler Chronograph. A charge of 75grs of 4831 and the 180rn, and cci 250 gives 2929 fps. I can make cases by running a 7mmRM case into the Newton sizing die, which pushes the shoulder back a bit (the original newton shorter than the 338/7mmRM case). I just leave the belt on, as the case will expand as far back as it can, and stop. I have found brass for it here and there (Winchester), but it's too valuable as collector stuff, to load.

The 30 belted Newton, just another name for the 30/338, which is an excellent round in it's own right.