Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 30-30 and 190 grain bullets?

I have some Hawk 190 grain FPs for my wife's 30-30 but am having a tough time finding any data for them. I have on hand IMR 3031, H4895, RL15, BL-C2, and IMR 4320. Locally powder availability is sketchy so I need to find some loads with one of these. I haven't been able to come up with much of any data for either the 30-30 or the 303 Savage for 190 grain bullets. I did find a load with H335 and one with IMR 4064, neither of which I have on hand. Any thoughts or advice would be appreciated.

Mart

Call or e-mail the the powder manufacturers of the powder you do have, same for Hawk bullets.

Lee Reload manual would have data... or just use the 303 Savage data it has,

The 303 Savage data isn't good for 30-30, the 303 Savage loads are predicated on lighter powder loads with .311 diameter bullets - which matches the SAAMI specs. I suppose they might work well if you wanted to shoot .311 bullets out of a 30-30 for some reason..

The reverse seems to work well though, 30-30 loads with .308 bullets out of a 303 Savage shoot great.

What is the jacket thickness on the hawk 190 grn? I bet it is a thick one, and wouldn't perform as welll at typical 30-30 velocities, let alone the slower velocities you will get from a 190 grn. I am guessing, but I would bet that bullet is for 300 win mag velocities.

They're intended for the .303 Savage which has a little more umph than the .30-30. The .303 Savage was originally loaded with the 190 and a lot of guys who have them want that weight.

They are .308 diameter as is the .303 Savage.

That 190 out of a 30-30 would have a trajectory similar to a toddler throwing a Medicine Ball .

Gunwriter Sam Fadala used to write about pulling 190-grain bullets from .303 Savage cartridges and loading them in his .30-30.

You might try to find some of his articles on how he did it. I don't remember what he used for powder charges.

I load 190's in both .30/30 and .303 Savage- it's my go to hunting bullet. But, they are cast bullets. I load them with 28 grains of 3031 and enjoy no pressure signs and long case life. You're on your own there due to the differences between soft lead bullets vs. hard jacketed ones. Start low and work up looking for pressure signs along the way.

If stuck with just 170gr. jacketed bullets I wouldn't fret, either. The 190's give a little more 'thump', but in the real world there's really not much difference. I shoot 190's because I can, and I want to, and I like the thought of duplicating the extinct factory .303 Savage loads.

I can vaguely remember 32 years ago when I was an impressionable lad of 14, reading in an older book (no idea which one or who the author was) from the library about someone loading an oddball heavyweight bullet that he pulled from something else. I think it was the 190 grain from a .303, and he used Dupont 3031 under it in his 30-30, which using this combination, supposedly it gave the 30-30 some "real" power. If I recall correctly, he used it to flatten a grizzly at close range.

At that age I knew enough to know that you couldn't load a cartridge beyond what was "safe". However, I was also led to believe that the "books" were too conservative and somehow or another, I believed that many wildcatters/ gunwriters had somehow found "magic" loads which allowed you to get an extra 1-200 fps over anything else, while either shooting "softer" than a "magnum" or much "flatter" than other conventional loads and as a bonus, were more accurate in every gun than any other load.

3031, TAC, 748, '15, and others in that burn range should get you 2000 fps from a 20" bbl, at 40-42K psi.


I'd get with Hawk for their load data, to be sure.

Ill-informed comments about the low speed of the 303 Savage are so droll.

Hawk didn't have any data for that bullet in the 30-30. I have been provided some data from an older Lyman manual and it pretty well lines up with what I expected for loads. They list 3031, 4895 and 4320 as the powders for the loads. I have all those on hand. Now to the bench to load some test loads.

Mart

Is the .30-30 twisted fast enough to stabilize the 190's?

I've never tried it. I have had good accuracy with 180 grain round nose bullets loaded in the .30-30 and I also learned 220 grain bullets keyhole when shot from a .30-30 so I'd guess 190 would be the upper limits.

It's probably 1-12" twist, which will stabilize a 190 fine. I have even had good luck with 210 grain cast bullets in them.

I loaded up some subsonic Hdy 220gr RN at 1050 fps in a 1/12 barrel. They were wobbling into the target at 100 yards, about 2 moa accuracy for 10 shots.

I would think the 190 would be very stable in a 1/10, and even a 1/12 should do fine, especially at potential 30-30 velocities.

Actually, the 303 Savage always used .308 diameter bullets, not .311 as one would expect from the caliber designation.

Ted

Goes against what we know.

As far as we can tell, the Savage 1895's and 1899's always had a .308" bore, but at least some of the early cartridges were .311". Prevailing thought is that Arthur Savage went for slightly oversized bullets in order to generate a bit more pressure and velocity.

Here, maybe you'll believe Townsend Whelen.

Townsend Whelen : The American Rifle (1918)