This year I plan on hunting with my Marlins in 35 Remington as well as a Marlin in 30-30 and a M94 Winchester in 30-30.
Should be able to kill a least a dozen critters with each cartridge,will report back on how the two cartridges actually pan out.
So far in my admittedly limited experience,I have never had a deer or hog run off with the 35. I have killed one 8 point buck with the 30-30 that went about 100 yards despite hitting the onside shoulder and destroying both lungs. No exit,no blood trail from the 150 grain flat point. The buck was about 75 yards away when shot. He was not easy in find in thick cover with no blood trail.
Never seen anything like that in a dozen kills with the 35, always dead right there,generally exits. This year,I want to take turns using 35 and 30-30 and see how they compare.,
One load that has shown great promise in the 30-30 is the Hornady 140 ftx bullet. These actually chronograph around 2500 fps in my 30-30 rifles. I have killed one big sow at about 125 yards,dead right there with a big exit wound. She probably weighed 180 pounds. Have also killed several hogs at close range in traps with the 140 ftx,all instant kills with exits.
Maybe my bad experience with the 30-30 was a fluke,maybe the fast Hornady loads with the 140 ftx are a game changer for the 30-30.
This year I'm going to try and find out.
Use 170 grain bullets in your .30-30. They will penetrate both shoulders and exit even on big deer IME. The Federal blue box 170's are good killers and very accurate in my rifles. They consistently group under 1" at 100 yards out of my Marlin. I recently chrono'd them at 2,204 fps out of my 336C's 20" barrel. I never had a deer drop instantly with my .35 unless spine/high shoulder shot. All lung shot went 30-60 yards before they fell using 200 gr. factory loads. Exactly the same results I get from my .30-30's. Regarding penetration there is a youtube video out there you might find intersting. It's .30-30 vs 308 vs 30-06 vs 300 win mag. on gallon milk jugs full of water. The .30-30 loaded with 170 core lokts and the .308, .30-06 and .300 loaded with 180 grain power points. Long story short the .30-30 wins by a considerable margin. The 170 core lokt being recovered, nicely mushroomed from jug # 7 while none of the others make it past jug # 4.
