I'm finally starting to feel more like myself after the stay in the hospital. I'm far from venturing down to the Reloading Room, but at least I can make some observations.
I bought a Marlin 336 in mid-2002, and started cooking up loads for it. I was only 2 years into reloading at this time, and I'd never shot a deer with anything but 30-06 and 12 GA slug. I detailed the story here:
Ode to a 30-30, Part 1I've been trying to piece together the trail that led me to the WIN PP 150 grain. Going back and covering the sources available to me at the time, I can say that my original focus was on the Hornady 170 grain and 150 grain FN's. I was going to be initially using this load as a Yute load for #2 son's first rifle hunt, so I picked the 150 grainers-- slightly less recoil. I then switched to 170 grainers when the results were less than ideal.
Mind you, all the bad results probably resulted from the kid closing his eyes and not telling me. I didn't find that out until years later. The icing on the cake occurred when I took the rifle out for a late morning sit in one of the stands and managed to put several rounds into the chest of a small doe at less than 20 yards. The rounds hit in the right spot, but the doe was unfazed. I was left with a surrealistic vision of this deer wandering off with an arterial spurter, finally keeling over about 40 yards later. I felt snakebit.
After a couple of seasons of mixed results, I finally got Mooseboy onto the M1 Garand, and all the problems he had been having evaporated. For myself, I ended up buying a Savage 99 in 308 WIN for the next year's hunt. This has been my go-to rifle ever since. When #3 son, Angus came online a few years later, he got the Marlin 336 and the Winchester 150 grain PP's. He nailed a nice doe with it, and broke the jinx.
I retired the Marlin 336 from active service as a deer rifle, but kept experimenting with loads. When LeverEvolution and the 160 grain FTX came out, I tried both in comparison with the WIN 150 grain PP as a benchmark. Out of that comparison, I found that the LVR powder was a sincere winner over my previous favorite of H4895. The 150 grain Win PP did better at ranges under 100 yards. The 160 grain FTX did better for ranges above 100 yards.
I've had the Savage 340 for a few years now. I had always wanted a 30-30 bolt, just for the heck of it. I figured it would be a good first deer rifle for #1 Granddaughter. If memory serves, I compared loads with the 170 grain Hornady FN and the 160 grain FTX against the 150 grain WIN PP's. Much like Ken Water's, Pet Loads, I found the 170 grain Hornady FN to be the most accurate in the Savage.
