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Say a fellow had 100 once fired Federal .30-30 cases with no purpose in life other than taking up shelf space, what might be a good recommended load to use to fireform them to .38-55 cases using a cream of wheat filler? Or at least a decent starting point so as not to waste time and powder starting too low. I have Unique which worked well to make .250 Savage AI cases from .22-250, but also have Win 231 and Ramshot Zip on hand. Being as the .38-55 is a straight (slightly tapered) case, sharp shoulders are not an issue here... whistle

Rifle is a modern reproduction Winchester 1885 so it's pretty strong.


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One of the problems with COW fireforming is nobody yet has published a book of suitable handloads for every possible combination of cartridge, powder and purpose. So unless somebody else out there has felt a desire to blow out .30-30's to .38-55's, you're on your own.


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Ken Howell's book on Custom Cartridges has the best discussion I've ever seen on COW method.


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Jim-
I'm in the middle of a COW project myself, and had the same question as yourself.

Easy answer: Make a series of cases with increasing powder charges, one or two cases with each charge. Start the series with a low charge (e.g. 3 grains) and increase a grain in succession. Start firing with the low charge. At some point the case will form adequately. Then it's easy to go back to the lower pressure cases and finish forming them with the adequate charge. The cost of the experimental series will be a few primers, a bit of powder and some COW. Some time will be required to break down the overloads in the series and reload them properly.

It's possible to overload the cases with powder. I used 3-grain intervals, and the cases went from not sufficiently formed to flattened primers in one step.

I've used Red Dot, Bullseye, and 700-X powders. Unique should be fine.

I don't bother placing any sort of barricade between the powder and the COW. The COW gets funneled into the case on top of the powder, and the case is handled gently through packing and sealing.

I lightly pack the COW into the filled case with a rod that fits the neck pretty well. Usually I just squish it down to the base of the neck, and then add a bit more COW almost to the case mouth., and squish the added bit down enough to allow the seal to be flush with the case mouth.

I seal the end of the case with dairy wax. I tried using tissue paper in the case mouth, but it was a bother to get just the right amount. It also fell out when I dropped a case. I found that paraffin and candle waxes don't adhere well to the brass, and it was tedious getting the melted stuff into the case mouth without dribbling it onto the case exterior. Some white glues were not completely blown out by the COW when fired.
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Dairy wax peels off the encased product in a flat sheet. It's pretty sticky and malleable at room temperatures. Just press the wax sheet onto the case mouth like an upside down cookie-cutter, and the case is nicely sealed. The red or black wax looks pretty professional too.
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Take this for what it is worth as I have not done 30-30 to 38-55 but first I would just try graduated neck expanders with ones I have on hand or one of the universal stepped expanders. I would go slow and possibly candle anneal half way through if I split any case necks. The 30-30 cases tend to be thin and PO Ackley wrote that some batches they lost a lot of cases when forming the 25-35 AI. But I bet going to 32-40, 35, then .375 would not ruin too many cases.

With the COW method 13 grains of Red Dot has been a good starting point for 30-06 size cases so in 30-30 maybe 3/5ths of this?. I take inventory of all the faster powders I have on hand and then cross reference lead bullet loads from one of the Lyman manuals. If I have a match I start at the starting load and use tissue as an over wad if I will be transporting the loads very much. If the lower loads don't fully expand they can be recharged and fired over again. I use the Lee dippers to measure powder and COW if I am using it as it is not critical and they are fast. Especially if I am using 13 grains of powder and 13 of Cream of Wheat. Get the regular as the instant has more salt in it.

Another method is to cast a bullet with 30 caliber base and .375 diameter on the ogive. More trouble but works well and fun plinking loads.


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Originally Posted by Mule Deer
...you're on your own.

Hmmm, that’s how I learned about sex… wink


Trying to approach this scientifically, the only COW fireforming I’ve done was .22-250 brass to .250 Savage AI, mistakenly using a powder charge of Unique which MD used to make 6.5 Creedmoor cases from .22-250 brass.

Coincidentally, the case capacity of a .22-250 is almost identical to a .30-30 case, right about 43-45 grains of water according to three on-line sources.

I used 18 grains of Unique in my .22-250 cases which John informed me was probably 1-2 grains too much, so based on case capacity alone the load for the .30-30 cases should be around 16 grains. However, with the .22-250 you need to push the shoulders hard against the chamber to form them, I just need to blow them out straight, so probably don’t need as much pressure, so that would indicate a drop of another 2-3 grains. However, the prior experience was going from a .22 caliber bottle neck to a .25 caliber neck, whereas here I’m starting with a .30 caliber hole in a sloping case and going to a .375 caliber hole, which should generate less pressure which indicates a couple more grains of powder to raise the pressure back up, countering the earlier decrease.

Running the numbers through my Fantastic Fudge Factor Findabulator (pat. pending), 18-2-3+2 would indicate a load of 15 grains of Unique as a good place to be. Since the Findabulator is still in beta testing I’ll lower that to 13 grains and see what happens. If the case mouth comes out wide enough to get a .375 expander plug into then I’ll grease’em up good and let the expander do the rest of the work. Otherwise I'll add another grain and repeat as needed.



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The "best beef" thread is all over the place as to which COWs are best, with some sort of cross-breed seeming to be favored.


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Have you considered Trailboss? I've used it to fire form. I didn't have to worry about using pistol powders and fillers.

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I used 5cc (4.7 grs.) of Bullseye, then fill the case to the neck shoulder junction with cornmeal, then stuff some paper towel in to hold it all in the case..
To fire form point the rifle vertical so as to give you a more uniform blow out..
After fire forming trim to equal length as sometimes the case mouth might be slightly longer on one side than the other..
You may or may not have to neck turn depending on your chamber size and the size of bullet that you use..

Just as a side note I use Bullseye for all my other fire forming tasks such as 30-06 to 9.3X62 or fire forming AI cases..

Just start low and work up until you get the desired effect..

Last edited by Nrut; 02/19/18.

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Shouldn't be a need on a rimmed case but on bottle neck cases shooting oily cases or ones with one shot lube on them resulted in more uniform cases. Still I would try the necking up route first.

Last edited by Tejano; 02/19/18.

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I know it's not the Loony way, but I'd sell (or keep) the .30/30s and just do this:

https://www.starlinebrass.com/brass-cases/38-55-Long-Brass-2125/

Powder, primers, and COW ain't free, and time is valuable too.

Just a thought....


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start low and work your way up...

We had Holstein cows about 50 of them. That was a lot of work, but never used them to try to make 38-55 cases out of 30-30's. confused


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Got 100 of the Starline cases on order. This question was just due to having five boxes of once fired Federal factory .30-30 ammo on hand and no .30-30 to load them for. (I know, get a 30-30!) Right now they're just sitting on a shelf so I was exploring how to possibly repurpose them.

I have an 8x57 FL die but that's the biggest expander on hand, except when the .38-55 dies come in when I'l have a.375 expander. Expanding necks form .30 to .32 is easy enough but not sure if the cases would make the jump from .32 to .375 in one step even with the inside slicked up with Imperial Sizing wax. I might try one just to see, though, since it would be easier than running out to the boonies to try a fireforming load that may or may not work, then coming back, adding more powder, etc. But I do have all of the ingredients on hand - Unique, thousands of large pistol primers and even Cream of Wheat.

Looney questions, mostly. "I wonder how this would work...?" wink


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smile

Hmm, maybe Jerseys or perhaps even a beef breed might work?


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I learned about the COW method here.


I was thinking that the brass used should be new brass?


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[quote]I have an 8x57 FL die but that's the biggest expander on hand, except when the .38-55 dies come in when I'l have a.375 expander. Expanding necks form .30 to .32 is easy enough but not sure if the cases would make the jump from .32 to .375 in one step even with the inside slicked up with Imperial Sizing wax.[quote]

I went from .270 to .308 using a Lee decapping/expander rod from a .308 die in my Lee universal decapper and never lost a case. Lee's rod has a lot of taper to it. miles


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Should have added that it was 80-90 new Winchester cases. miles


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I was just looking around the reloading stuff to see what might work. The neck expander from a .357 Magnum die might at least open the mouth enough to get a .375 expander ball started. The .357 expander will just start to fit inside an 8x57 case mouth, although it's not long enough to fully expand a .30-30 neck all the way down. I also have a Lee Universal expander, it comes with two straight tapered expander plugs and the larger one goes up to .45 caliber so it would certainly open a case mouth enough to get a .375 expander started, but it's a steep taper so it doesn't give a normal .375 expander ball much lead in.

The problem as I see it is supporting the somewhat thin .30-30 case during all of this so the shoulder doesn't collapse. Anyway, it's worth a try just to learn if it will work.

The idea of expense got my mind working so I calculated just what it would cost to fire form 100 cases. The cases were bought and paid for when the factory ammo was bought so they are a wash, the money has been spent and is just sitting wasted on a shelf for now. My pound of Unique was purchased several years ago so cost was about $27/7000 grains. Primers were also purchased several years ago for around $27/1000. Premium brand Cream of Wheat is about $2.54 for 28 ounces or around .02 cents/grain. Figuring 1300 grains of Unique, 100 primers and 2600 grains of COW (a fudge figure at 20 grains/case, it would probably be less), it would cost me $7.48 to fire form the cases. Gas to the range is a wash since I'd combine the fire forming with a normal range trip. But that makes $7.48 to get 100 usable cases vs. $58.14 for 100 new ones from Graf's (cost plus shipping); I'm seeing an advantage to fire forming. Based on previous experience fire forming new brass with COW and blowing out shoulders on new .250 Savage and 2X .243 brass (without annealing) to make AI cases the case loss should be 0.

Of course, if I can get the necks expanded with tools on hand that's free, but risk of case loss is greater. Like a certain form of sex, lube is the key...


This is why I like handloading, my left brained engineering mind is having fun with this. wink


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Here is one expander button for Redding. http://www.gunstop.com/products/rel...ed-exapnder-button-375-caliber-30-to-375

Here is a thread on the topic there were several others. http://www.marlinowners.com/forum/3...eforming-30-30-brass-375-win-case-2.html Didn't read all of them but the gist is you want to have three or four steps up. Different posters used 8mm, 338, and 35 for the increments. I liked the stepped type expanders but they are less universal. A polished and well lubed tapered expander might do it in two passes especially if annealed.

This one is on sale Lyman: https://www.midwayusa.com/product/1011246697/lyman-neck-expander-m-die Most if not all die makers offer some type of tapered expander. Worth a Google as several threads came up on this as well as a couple different expanders.


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Thanks, that's great info. Some folks in those posts are using one pass to go from .30 to .375 but they are modifying expander plugs, buying new ones etc. I'll give it a go with what I have. This is just a one time and done deal so buying new stuff just for these 100 cases is sort of counter productive. The other good info is that those who do fire form are using 5-6 grains of Unique, not 13, and reporting perfectly formed cases. Hmm, I'd better go back and tweak the Fudge Factor Findabulator quite a bit...


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