.30-30 powder recommendation

h4895

3031 has worked for me for 20+ years and many, many boxes of .30-30 ammo.

IMR 4895 for the win!

I use TAC for the 160gr Hornady FTX. Works great...

Varget.

I have used lots of 3031.
Lately, Win 748 is my favorite.

Be safe and have fun !
-steve

Alliant's RL-15, 35 gr behind a 150 Remington bullet. Under max, have not seen a gun that would not do very well with it.

Great cold weather powder.

I prefer w748, TAC and LeveRevolution with the 150gr Jacketed bullets (mostly Sierra). The Lever powder does push them along quite fast, easily exceeding factory loads and still a full gr under max out of my 336.

I also load a lot of Sierra 125's JHP, mainly with TAC. Pushes along at over 2500fps with a max charge. I've always been really happy with TAC, meters great, and still uses Standard primers vs. Magnums for 748.

Assuming that you are loading for a levergun, I have great accuracy with Hornady 160 Grain FTX bullets and 37.0 grains of Hornady Leverevolution. I also have good luck with a 165 Grain Lead round nose flat point and 20.0 grains of H-4895. Others have used BLC-2 with success. Happy loading!

IMR 3031 or Reloder7

I reload my Grandson's with Ramshot Big Game

I have used a big container of 3031 and have been so happy with the results that I never bothered to try anything else. That said there are some other choices as noted above that work well as does Trail Boss when using lead bullets for soft shooting practice rounds. Your rifle will tell you what propellant/bullets it likes. I have a couple Winchesters, 3 Marlins, and a couple savages--one bolt and one model 24 OU and they all shoot extremely well with Rem CoreLocts and various charge amounts.

Lever powder is really good with cast and of coarse, the FTX. My groups @100 shrank 50%.

IMR/H-4895, W748, IMR-4064, BL-C(2), W760, and IMR-4350 all work well with my cast hunting loads. I honestly don't have a favorite right now. I did a few months ago, but I got a new Ranch Dog mould and so far all of those powders seem to be pretty equal.

IMR3031 was developed for use in the 30-30 and it works well. That said there are new powders available that will do just as good or better. I gave Hodgdon Leverevolution a try and I really like the results. IMR or H4895 will also give you good results as will W748. Pick a powder and run with it...

Old Krow, to answer your question.

I use TAC for the 160gr Hornady FTX. Works great...


I don't shoot cast from my 30-30. It is a stock pre-64 Model 94. The cases need to be trimmed and COL 2.525 per the Hornady web site. I have had some feeding problems in my win 94 if I didn't keep them at that COL. They have the load data http://www.hornady.com/assets/files/ftx_load_data/30-30_win_ftx.pdf

30-30 load

I started loading for my pump .06 and .44 mag about 30 years ago.

When I thought about doing so for my 30-30, I looked in the Speer manual and saw you could use IMR 4350 which was within about 40 fps of any other powder so rather than buy other powder, I just used what I had for the .06.

I found the deer don't mind.

For the pump gun, I found that by reducing the load by a grain and a half, the groups dropped from 2 to 2 1/2" to about 1 1/4" for Nosler ballistic tips. I get about the same accuracy for the 30-30 with 34.5 grains of 4350.

32 grains of W-748 under a Speer 170 grain FNSP in Winchester or Remington cases with WLR primers.

Fired from a 63 year old Winchester 94. 2100 +/-50 fps. Three shot group at 100 yards...1 5/8".

IMR 4064. 30 grains and a 173 beartooth bullet works great for me. 3031 is ok.