Lee 309-113 in a 30-30?

Jeff H

NW Ohio
We have not shot a 30-30 in near 30 years. All ours were rebored and actually no regrets as we have numerous other caliber 30 rifles. Especially a nice 300 Savage.
But we may have a 30-30 barrel Contender barrel. Plus I think we may yet have a Marlin 336 barrel...... Next time north gonna have to look.
If my 30/30 were a bolt-action, there'd be no excuse for it to be a 30/30. A 308 - the boring ol', do-anything 308 - would make more sense.

The Contender is such a great platform for the 30/30 and makes for a very short. light and handy 'round-the-homestead vermin/varmint buster, as well as a small game getter. Where it REALLY shines, and where I get 99% of MY use from it is simply goofing off. It's basically a 32-20 that I could load up for deer if I took a mind to.
 

Missionary

Well-Known Member
We have a couple bolt 308's which added to the "why have the 30-30's" when those levers could be 35's, 38's and 41's.
 
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JWFilips

Well-Known Member
Ok , Spent a good part of the day going thru my Savage 340 archives of targets...I see I never shot them after starting to powder coat...so that will be new!
My best targets shot back then 2017 with the Lee Soup Can; Show 8.3 grains "American select shooting" 4 into a 3/8 " group at 50 yards wit one flier. BLL coated and gas checked
Also I had a pretty tight group with 6.4 Gr Red Dot ( that would be close the the above "Clays" loadings)
So I powder coated and size a bunch of 113's this week to .311" sans gas checks! Will start there and try to go downward to get to sub sonic!
One thing I noticed that my COL changed with the PC coating: I nee to sent the bullet deeper because of the thickness of the pc coating.
(I always start my loads on the lands)
Going to be very hot and humid tomorrow, so I will be in the basement loading!
 

Bret4207

At the casting bench in the sky. RIP Bret.
Not sure if you're asking @Fiddler or in general, but it brings up an interesting point on the three LEE C309113s I've used - one 6C, belonging to a friend, and two 2Cs of my own.

All three of these "309s" cast .313" bullets, making it very versatile. I've cast for the a few different 30/30s with it, sized to .310" and it shoots great. I was also able to shoot them as-cast/unsized in a CZ527 7.62x39 Carbine with similar accuracy and the same powder charge.

I cast up and PC'd a bag of these (my plain-base version) for that same friend to try in his various 32 Mag and 327 Mag revolvers, but have not heard any range reports. Hes one of those guys with more irons in the fire than day in the year, so who knows when...

If I had to rely on my 30/30 alone, I could get by with this bullet and the last version of the RDO 31016RF (also shown in the above pic) and have all bases coverd. If I had to get by with just the 7.62x39 (which I wouldn't), I'd use this bullet and the RDO 313165RF.

The little LEE C309113RF covers a lot of ground and would be an interesting one to HP as well. I bought two of these from Michael at the same time, but after an embarrassing attempt to HP one of them on my own, with my crude tools/cruder skills, I am left with one. The HP attempt was an affordable faux pas, as I only gave $20 each for them, but the one I have left is in "protected" status and neither will I, nor anyone else mess with that one. This bullet makes me look like i know what I'm doing - as a caster, hand-loader and marksman.
I was asking Jim.
 

Bret4207

At the casting bench in the sky. RIP Bret.
Ok , Spent a good part of the day going thru my Savage 340 archives of targets...I see I never shot them after starting to powder coat...so that will be new!
My best targets shot back then 2017 with the Lee Soup Can; Show 8.3 grains "American select shooting" 4 into a 3/8 " group at 50 yards wit one flier. BLL coated and gas checked
Also I had a pretty tight group with 6.4 Gr Red Dot ( that would be close the the above "Clays" loadings)
So I powder coated and size a bunch of 113's this week to .311" sans gas checks! Will start there and try to go downward to get to sub sonic!
One thing I noticed that my COL changed with the PC coating: I nee to sent the bullet deeper because of the thickness of the pc coating.
(I always start my loads on the lands)
Going to be very hot and humid tomorrow, so I will be in the basement loading!
If they were .310 and .311 (or .312!) works better then there you have it. I know there are limits to things, but I honestly have had good luck shooting as cast stuff in 30-30/308 that drop in the .311/.312 area. If it chambers, it's worth a try. On little short bullets I kinda wonder if the cartridge is concentric and if maybe there's some run out in the loaded bullet, not a lot of body there to steer things. I've had honkin' big long bullets get sideways and cattawumpus, should be even easier to do with a short one.
 

fiver

Well-Known Member
looks like it didn't muss him up too much.
i'm hoping JW figures this out.
i've been kicking around using my stevens 325 with the LEE and maybe a pistol primer for some of my grouse hunting this fall.
i've got like 9 jillion powders to choose from, but titegroup or titewad have both been on my mind.
 

CWLONGSHOT

Well-Known Member
I have been shooting them with trail boss in the 300 blackout bolt and my buddies Contender (300 whisper) Quiet fun and accurate. Cant say I remember paper targets but tin cans and steel never gets away to 65yards on his back yard range standing or sitting at the picnic table.

CW
 

JWFilips

Well-Known Member
Ok Picked my 2 best loads from 2017:
But with the buulets noe being PC coated ..took into account the shorter COL and the base of the bullet displacing more case volume !
Just for Sh...ts and Giggles... Weighed the bullets and the cases!
Did An American Select load and a Red Dot Load ( which were my best)..... Still not" low node" but more like "Mid Node"
Looking forward to trying these this upcoming week!
soup can test with PC.jpg
 

Barra

Member
3.4 bullseye and the Lee soupcan goes about 815 fps in my 30-30 single shot.
quite accurate at 100 yards . Easy on the ears and shoulder and above all frugal on lead and powder.
Used as cast in unsized cases and finger or dip lubed in 50/50 beeswax and vasalene.
Finger seated out a tad long and allowing closing of action to seat to depth.

2.8 grns in the 7.62x33r but with sized to 0.310" are a bit faster but accurate as well.
It’s my big 22lr loads.
Ha
 
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JWFilips

Well-Known Member
Had a chance to try out those loads above today......However I have corneal erosion in my right eye...and every few weeks the crap sluff off and my right eye can't focus! Of course this happened this morning on the way to the range! I noticed it driving ...right eye was blurry! When I sat down at the rifle on the bench It looked like the scope was out of focus! I was a bit aggravated however after bringing my targets home I was surprised that I did so well! I was able to extract good data from the shoot. As I imagined, the 6 grain Red Dot load was impressive enough ...most likely matching the posters 7 grain "Clays" loading!
However.... This is still velocities in the "Mid Node" range! So I still want to find the "Low Node" range ( Sub sonic) my next quest!
Came home ....Neck Sized my brass & Weighed out 100 cases....splitting them up in to groups and color coding them!
Primed the cases & tomorrow will expand the necks and work on the super light loads!
 

Dimner

Named Man
Powder coat them if they're too small.

I use the 100-grain 2R plain base and the 31116 sans check, powder coated and sized .310" in my .30-30s with a pinch of Titegroup for 1K fps and they are a delight to shoot suppressed (yes, I have two .30-30 leverguns with threaded muzzles). Accuracy isn't stellar but they're minute of soda can at 100 yards and minute of racoon brain at 0.2 yards which is all I need them to do.
straight up Teddy Roosevelt vibes there... suppressed lever guns.
 

Ian

Notorious member
Yep, Maxim had a good thing going and TR was a big fan. I really liked the offset version that worked with standard-height sights on the 1895 Winchester. Looks like I didn't hit the "c" enough times when I typed "raccoon".
 

JWFilips

Well-Known Member
Today I loaded down from my Red Dot loads I shot the other day! They shot well in "Mid Node" but want to get them sub sonic & I know Red Dot has always been my winner in super light rifle loads ( I have a great 8 mm load for my WW1 29 1/2 inch barreled Mauser. 3 .0 grains red dot with the NOE 130 grain FN...Sounds like a cap gun)
So Today, I very carefully loaded ...Powder to the exact measure for 4.0 gr, 3.0 gr & 2.0 gr of Red Dot and Plain base Lee soup cans Weight to .1 grain weight!
Would like to test these Monday Morning but they are calling for windy conditions
 
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JWFilips

Well-Known Member
OK one final test today of the plain base soup cans I think I found to lowest velocity sweet spot at approximately 1174 FPS!
with 5 gains of Red Dot! I tried to make it subsonic @ 1118 FPS with 4.4 gr Red Dot, but you see what happened below!
It is a fickle bullet to try subsonic! BTW the weight of the plain base version is 118 grains!
There is one mistake in my target notation: I sized the .311" ( not .3105)

Final Soup Can test.jpg
 
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fiver

Well-Known Member
your on the cusp of 1200 now and it's pulling together nicely.
i'd try .2 up and .2 down and bracket that 5.0, if you don't see much then i'd call 5 good and move on.
 
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Bret4207

At the casting bench in the sky. RIP Bret.
Looks good Jim. So what was the problem before? It looks like you're sizing to the same, so where did you fix the problem? Or was it just a matter of playing around with them more?