Shooters Forum banner

Anyone here shoot a .303 Savage??

9K views 19 replies 7 participants last post by  Jack 
#1 ·
Here is my 1907 vintage Savage 1899B in .303 Savage. It was just gifted to me by my Uncle. It was my Great Grandfather's and used to harvest game for the families meat supply back in the day. It has a 26" Octagon barrel. I have since put Williams firesights on it as i want to use it this fall. It also came with 5 boxes of factory 190 grain cartridges and 30 once fired brass. I managed to pick up a brand new set of .303 Savage dies as well so i am very excited to dial in some handloads and harvest my meat with it this fall in honour of my Uncle and Great Grandfather.

 
See less See more
1
#2 · (Edited)
I don't have one, but it surprised me how heavy the bullets were in your commercial loads? Probably helps burn the powder.

I tried out several bullets in QuickLOAD. Because the pressure is rated at under 40,000 psi, it is difficult to get something to burn efficiently in it without going a powder faster than will give you best velocity.

Note: The following information was not correct in the original post due to my error. It is corrected here. For bullets like the BTB 160 grain FN or others in the 150 to 190 grain range, IMR 3031 is near the top of QuickLOAD's list for performance every time, and is probably a good choice for it. With about 30 grains of powder you should be able to get the BTB bullet up to 2200 fps, but in a lever gun, YMMV. 3031 looks like a good performer with jacketed bullets in that weight range, like the 170 grain FP Hornady or Speer, though the starting load drops to more like 27 grains with those longer shapes.
 
#5 · (Edited)
I don't have one, but it surprised me how heavy the bullets were in your commercial loads? Probably helps burn the powder.

I tried out several bullets in QuickLOAD. Because the pressure is rated at under 40,000 psi, it is difficult to get something to burn efficiently in it without going a powder faster than will give you best velocity.

In general, velocities were all under 2000 fps. That tells me this gun is probably an excellent candidate for a flat nose hard cast bullet like BTB's 160 grain FN. In the 150 to 190 grain range, IMR 3031 is near the top of QuickLOAD's list for performance every time, and is probably a good choice for it. With about 33 grains of powder you should be able to get the BTB bullet up over 1700 fps.


33 grains of IMR 3031 would be straining this old girl a little too much for my liking. 33 grains of powder out of that 26" barrel will probably be closer to 2200fps with a 160 grainer.
 
#4 ·
This one, if you can see it in the pic, was made in 1912 and still has the original stock. I did put a Williams receiver sight on it to help me with the deer hunting some. IMR 3031 powder and 170 grain .30-30 bullets work fine...loaded to .30-30 velocities. Drops a deer just fine. I guess the deer don't know the .303 savage is an obsolete cartridge!

 
#10 · (Edited)
I would have the head space checked , for some of the older savage guns had a problem with this . Then some barrels were also generous and would better shoot 311 bullets .

Most guns that I know are shot with 30/30 loads in 303 Savage brass.
I would to if i did not know that my Uncle has shot the rifle as recently as last year with no hiccups. I was given some boxes of factory loads as well and they all miked to .311 my understanding and the reasoning for this after quite a bit of research, is that factory loads were made with .311 bullets to spike the pressures somewhat and increase velocities. I won't be shooting the factory loads as they are collectors items nowadays and very very pricey to the tune of 75.00 - 100.00 per box. I will work with the once fired brass i was given. 28-30 grains of IMR 3031 with some 170 grain speers due to there excellent BC should do me well.
 
#11 ·
My curiosity is piqued. What to these bores slug to?
 
#14 ·
. . . My uncle always shot .308 bullets out of it with no probs. . .
Often you can shoot jacketed bullets successfully in an oversize bore, but will have a terrible time with cast bullets. As Harry suggests, going oversize with the cast bullets will fix that. A lot of lever guns, like the Marlins, seem to do best with cast bullets about two thousandths over groove diameter.
 
#13 ·
I had a friend that had a older savage that did not group. We found the barrel to be overbore and would shoot 311 cast bullets with ease. We never had a chance to slug another savage , but suspect barrel tolerance could be generous in some barrels like some models of levers to day that are over bore as with the 44 Mag and 45/70 levers .
The older savage 99 did not have the metal of the latter so head spacing did some times become a problem . The 99 post war I think was by far a better gun.
Too bad they became too expensive to make , as I would rather a 99 over a Marlin and winchester .
 
#16 ·
I helped a friend get a 1920's era 99 Savage takedown in 303 Savage back into use. He had several boxes of pre WW2 factory ammo for it.
I am not a Savage 99 or 303 Savage expert, but here is what I ran into.
First, the bore of the one I worked on slugged to a .308, not a .311. (Can't recall the exact numbers).
The big problem with using a 303 Savage these days is finding cases. Winchester was the last major manufacturer to make loaded ammo that I'm aware of, and they discontinued it in the late 1990's. Their load was a 190 grain Silvertip. I did find some Winchester loads and chronographed them out of the 20" barrel 99. Muzzle velocity ran about 1750 FPS.
The pre WW2 factory ammo was exhibiting neck cracks, so, I pulled all the bullets and annealed the case necks. That cured the cracking problem in the cases that hadn't already cracked.
BTW, I weighed the bullets I pulled from that batch (mixed headstamps) of pre WW2 ammo: some were 170's and some were 190's- and the variation in weight between batches was quite high. 170's varied from 165 to 175, and the batch of 190's varied from 185 to 195. I did not re use the old bullets- bullet manufacturing has improved quite a bit over the years- modern bullets are better. Since the cartridge is about the same performance as a 30-30 (but NOT interchangeable!), I used bullets meant for the 30-30, i.e, 170 Hornady flat points. Loaded to about 1900 FPS with 3031 powder, the old Savage is now back in the deer woods and killing deer quite nicely.
Maybe I can save you a little time and effort here: since you are not using a tube magazine, flat point bullets are not mandatory. So, I thought I'd put together some pointed bullet loads for use in the Savage. Uh uh. There's a problem with doing that. The 303 Savage has a rather long neck. When you seat a pointed bullet deep enough to work through the magazine, the bullet is seated very deeply. Deeply enough that the ogive of a pointed bullet is down below the case mouth. The end result is a weird looking load, and the unsupported case mouth will hang up during feeding. Another problem is that you have to seat the pointed bullets so deeply, you lose case capacity for powder, possibly raising pressures if you don't make adjustments.
I tried 130 and 150 pointed bullets- neither was worth the trouble. Given the velocity levels you'll be at with the 303, 30-30 bullets perform better in the field, anyway.
Good luck with your project.
 
#18 ·
I tried 130 and 150 pointed bullets- neither was worth the trouble. Given the velocity levels you'll be at with the 303, 30-30 bullets perform better in the field, anyway.
Good luck with your project.

.................just wanted to add that i have not come across a spitzer bullet that would perform or expand properly at .30-.30 velocities. These velocities are where a flat nosed 165 to 170 grain bullet shine.
 
#19 ·
Jack,

Good post. I'll add in a couple of tidbits that my recent re-reading of Hatcher's Notebook suggests may be relevant. The reason military cases have the neck annealing stain is that it was once not standard practice to anneal a case neck after forming the case. This leads to what Hatcher refers to as "season cracking", or the spontaneous cracking of case necks in unfired cartridges with age. Once the military found neck annealing post-forming would prevent that, they began to specify it be done to all military cases. The stain is present partly so ammunition with annealed necks may be distinguished from those without. But also, Hatcher found that unpolished cases that have the oxide layers intact will resist corrosion better than polished ones when exposed to the elements.

Annealing may not have been done to all civilian ammunition between the wars, however. You can usually tell if you hold the case in the light just right. Despite polishing, an annealed area will be colored a slightly lighter yellow.

Another thing to mention is non-corrosive primers. My assumption had long been that mercuric priming had stopped just after the first world war, with chlorate primers replacing them. Not so. Again referencing Hatcher, it turns out that chlorate priming mixes were in use from the nineteenth century. Because purly mercuric primers contaminated brass with mercury, such cases would crack easily and not be reusable. The chlorate formulations were created because they did not damage the brass, keeping it available for reloading. This was something Americans, in particular, liked, as they were likely to reload. Europeans were apparently less likely to reload back then. However, in the early 20th century it was discovered the potassium chloride left by chlorate primers, in the absence of the heavy residue left by black powder to dilute it, was responsible for bore corrosion in smokeless powder guns. Thus, the non-corrosive primer was developed. This was accomplished by going back to the use of fulminate of mercury. So, if you have smokeless commercial ammo from between the world wars, the brass may not be trustworthy if fired with the original primer, assuming it still works.

Fulminate of mercury was done away with as soon as lead styphnate became available because it ages and breaks down fairly rapidly. Some mercuric primers would only keep working for a year or so, which is why the military favored chlorate primers until the early 50's.
 
#20 ·
UncleNick, good point about the primers. I didn't mention it earlier, as the post was getting a bit long, but, I didn't fire any old primers - I was thinking the primers could have been mercuric. After pulling the bullets and dumping the powder, I decapped the cases, killed the primers, and discarded them.
On the old factory ammo, about 10% of them were already showing a crack the length of the neck. I don't recall seeing any sign of annealing, but, it's been several years now....
Actually, I can't be absolutely certain that the old ammo I was given to work with was factory, but, it all appeared so, and the people who had possessed the rifle have never reloaded anything, so I believe it was factory ammo.
The key to getting a 303 Savage working is cases. If you can get your hands on some Winchester cases, you should have no real problems getting the rifle working.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top