Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Savage Collectors 30 30 Win in a 303 Savage

I was just reading on another forum where a guy was looking for 303 Sav. ammo and he said a few individuals had hold him to fire form 30 30 rounds in his rifle. Apparently he did it and got away with it. More balls than brains I would think. Has anybody seen this before,and what is the possible downside?

Looking at the dimensional drawings for the two cases, I don't believe you could close the bolt on a 30-30 round in a 303 chamber. Has anyone tried to do this? It looks like the neck would bottom out before you could close the bolt. However, if the 303 chamber is oversized it might work.

Well according to him, he fired 3 rounds of Federal 150 grain factory 30 30 in his 1899 then neck sized and reloaded and fired them again without a hitch.

Bad idea. Use 303 brass or 303 ammo for 303 rifles.

I wondered the same thing once upon a time. I brazenly stuck a .30-30 round in a .303 chamber and it wouldn't discharge. I don't know why, and didn't investigate further. I felt nervous about doing it and figured it was kismet that it didn't work.

No, No, No.
303 savage for 303 Savage,

You Can reform 30-30 Brass into 303 Savage, But Not Form Fire It.

1) The 30-30 brass is narrower at the base, which means it's going to expand by .02" when you fire it risking case failure.
2) The 30-30 brass is .02" longer, meaning that if it even chambers it very likely will be up against the rifling and could crimp the bullet in raising pressures.

Even if resized, the .02" difference at the base would keep me from EVER using 30-30 brass in a 303 Savage rifle. It's just not worth the chance of serious case failures.

30-30:




303 Savage:

Thank You Rory, That makes it very clear...bad idea switching 30-30 for 303

I've had several different opportunities to buy a 99 in .303 Sav., but passed on them since I am a shooter not a collector. Having shot .303 Brit for several years, I would love to shoot .303 Sav., but I know I could never get any amount of ammunition to enjoy one at the range. Too bad there is no relatively easy way to make up that cartridge.

RORY
TNX FOR POSTING, I Have Seen 30-30 REFORMED into 303,, Plenty guys did in the past, and I shot Some, worked o.k. when i st got started, but,,, there plenty of brass and ammo out there to be f'in around
I Know Les did from 307 Winchester a few years back and Also heard guys do it from 30-40?
STEVE

I've got 20 pieces of 30-40 Krag reworked to fit the 303 Savage, from back when it was next to impossible to find any. The 30-40 is actually oversized, and so can be worked down to fit the 303 Savage. Now that 303 Savage brass/ammo is so much easier to find, I wouldn't recommend that route either. Way too much work to trim the necessary brass off just right to make it work when you can find Norma or PRVI brass.

30-40 Krag:

Over the years I've tried all the above except crunching down the .307 cases. I do think the .307 is the best donor for a resize effort but with brass getting more available I didn't bother.

I resized some .30-30 cases for the .303 and about a third of them showed small splits on the first firing. I knew a guy in Texas that just used straight up .30-30 rounds and forced them into the chamber. He died of cancer so that didn't get him but not something I'd dream of doing.

Handloading is the only way to go if you really like to shoot more than once a year.

You can pound on live hand grenades with a hammer too.

They usually don't go off....

30-30 win will not make good brass for the 303sav it can be hazardous to fire one in a 303 even if it chambered.
the base of the case will split.. the 30-40 krag will work if turned down on a lathe. I've also used 220 swift. head spacing with the swift case can be a problem as the rim is thinner.
hoard ur 303 brass. I do

plab

I shoot 30-30 ammunition in a 30-30 chambered rifle, but what do I know?

If you've ever fired a cartridge with too long a neck, (ie. forgot to check case length and trim after 4 or 5 sizings) you'd know that you would not EVER want to do that again. I damn near blew a .308 apart because the neck was a few 1/1000's to long. Crimped the bullet and case neck in the throat and as a result blew the case to pieces in the chamber. That was a Remington 700 action. If it was an 1899, I'm bettin' I'd a lost a chunk of flesh or an eye ball.

Not so. Brass is pretty much constantly available these days and once you've got brass, given that it uses .308 bullets, its a done deal.

Just did a quick check for .303 Savage brass. It ain't cheap, but it is available. Makes the 30-30 thing a non-issue.

http://www.grafs.com/retail/catalog/product/productId/12638

.303 brass and ammo is to available to risk it imo.

Sounds like a good reason to buy another 99 in .30-30 to me.

I should quantify my experiment by saying I ran the .30-30 case into a .303 die before trying this. It didn't go off, and I'm still puzzled why. I still have the round laying in my range bag if someone else wants to try it. I guess I ought to deep six it.