BEST Lever Action Cartridge - .30-30 vs .45-70

what is the best lever action cartridge ever made what's the best one for you to own and use whether that's for fun or for hunting deer and Elk or maybe even Dangerous [Music] Game well folks there really are just two contenders for that title of best lever action cartridge ever we can simply go to popularity numbers to determine that you got the 3030 which was designed all in the late 1800s and uh became famous in Winchester's Model N 1894 lever action rifle that's a Sleek little cartridge right here right and then there's its bigger older brother the 4570 government which was adopted as the standard issue metallic cartridge for the US government if I'm not mistaken I'm no great historian but if I'm not mistaken it was the first ever metallic rifle cartridge that was widely put into use by the army so which of the two is better well one's older bigger and more powerful the other one is a little younger but still pretty old right we're talking well over a century and probably more popular in a a broad sense of the word the 3030 is used by deer hunters Across the Nation still although it's not as popular among serious Hunters here in the west just because it has limited range but there are still purists and guys that just love lever actions that still hunt with their 3030 for Mu deer or elk or black bear every year and in Big Woods Country out east and in the Deep South there are uh some areas where there're just not much better than a good old 3030 because you can't shoot much past 70 to 100 yards you can't see past that and the 3030 does all you'll ever need to do inside that distance so let's talk a little bit about each cartridge uh dig a little bit more into its history and then compare the two head-to-head to decide which is better for you okay so let's start with the 4570 because it's the oldest right again I think it was 1873 don't quote me on that but it was certainly in the 1870s that it was adopted in the Springfield trapdoor rifle for use by the US military carving models for uh cavalrymen were loaded with a a 405 grain bullet I believe could have been 420 with a little bit lighter charge because the rifle was much lighter the carbine I should say than the infantry rifle those infantry rifles were longer heavier and typically were loaded with a bullet uh 500 grains or a tad more full charge of black powder behind them they recoiled a little bit more but because of the extra weight of the rifle with its longer barrel and greater mass it was tolerable right and that rifle and cartridge combination fought through the Indian Wars post Civil War in America it was the standard issue rifling cartridge at the Battle of Little Big Horn when kuster and his uh men were all all killed by the uh the Native Americans there in that area and uh used somewhat also by Buffalo Hunters although they tended to prefer the longer versions from the 4590 up through the 45 110 the 45120 which is moderately popular today among black powder cartridge shooters that won a lot of horsepower was not actually invented at the time so the 45110 as pictured in the great movie quigly Down Under starring Tom celic and a model 1874 Sharps rifle emphasis on the sharps rifles starring role well he accurately used a 45110 pretty cool so the 4570 found its way into lever action rifles in the 1880s during the 1870s there was some effort to to build lever actions with heavier more powerful cartridges such as the 4565 and so forth but it didn't really find legs get a lot of popularity until the Winchester 1886 was designed so that's this Rifle right here this one is a currently available model from Winchester it's a really really nice rifle they're almost impossible to mount a scope on so just don't bother right that's this this is the purist lever action 4570 you can also get him in 4590 by the way and with a variety of barrel lengths and so forth Winchester tends to build different iterations every uh year or two or three these are just a beautifully smooth wonderfully balanced purist rifle as you can see nothing inside this one we just work the action a couple times to be sure comes to the shoulder beautifully runs fast and they tend to shoot pretty well especially these modern versions made for Winchester in Japan it's unfortunate that they're not made here in the United States but the the good thing about Japan is they make a great barrel and their rifles tend to shoot very well they're uh very focused on quality control and it shows through so that's where the 4570 really took hold in lever actions and it's stayed in um relatively good popularity ever since it was eventually added as well to the Marlin 1895 so this would be what about nine years after again we'll just show you the the action is empty on this rifle this is um more popular now among shus Hunters than the Winchester 1886 is for a few reasons when the action is closed it's pretty hard for any debris or whatnot to get in there you can take the bolt out actually if you know these rifles clean them from the rear but most importantly and probably the biggest reason for their popularity is that they have a solid top receiver rather than an open top like the Winchester and it's easy to mount Optics on them whether you put it straight above the action or a four Ro mounted scope scope on a scout rail like this one this is one of the new uh Marlins made under the Ruger umbrella it's the guide rifle model with an 18inch Barrel shoots wonderfully and is a really good all-around choice for anything from deer hunting in Big Woods Country elk hunting in close cover and even hunting for the big bears a lot of guides in Alaska like this model because it's uh got a lot of authority and uh holds a lot of ammo and is easy to run fast in dicey conditions that rifle also is available in um 30 33 with a little bit different profile Barrel lighter right the action is very very similar but it's called the model 336 back to the 4570 so what can it do well they generally shoot the cartridge generally shoots bullets from about 300 grains up to about 500 grains and there are some outliers you can now get monometal bullets such as hornady's 250 grain monoflex that are lighter than that 300 grain traditional standard and you can go all the way up to a big heavy hitting bullet such as a 550 grain gas check bullet with a flat me plat that's that big nose the big flat nose on it those are terrific if you're doing Defense work against big Coastal brown bears and you need to be able to shoot all the way through one stem to stern breaking and destroying everything in its path those uh kick a lot folks we'll talk about some recoil numb here in just a minute but really as it stands your most versatile bullets are in that 3 to 400 grain range now I've got a little lineup here of bullets to to look at here is a 300 grain Flats very classic popular typical bullet those can be driven in about any rifle to about 1,800 feet per second and in strong actions a little faster and you can shoot a 4570 and something like a Ruger number one or even a b bolt action I think they call them a siese Mouser where you can run those up to higher pressure than a lever action can uh can contain safely on the note of pressure let's take just a moment to address that because of uh so many very early 4570 rifles that were built with relatively weak actions such as that trapdoor Springfield employed by the military many even most 4570 Factory loads have traditionally been held to very low pressure thresholds and even reloading manuals would generally have two different categories of load data for weak rifles and for strong rifles as typified by these good lever actions modern ammunition well thanks to Modern propellants a lot of the modern 45770 ammo is um suitable for use in weaker actions but still a achieves pretty impressive velocities and hand loaders can do that as well if you research and select the right propellants you can get pretty good performance at very low pressures but more and more owing to the popularity of rifles like these Marlin Guide guns and so forth manufacturers are pushing the pressure uh ceilings a little bit generally it'll be printed on the box for use in strong actions only or something like that you can get right up to what they kind of casually term or in sorry informally term uh 4570 heavy Magnum ammo by Buffalo boore and by some others where they're shooting some of these loads of very impressive velocities for example Buffalo produces a 500 grain bullet a 1650 feet per second that's a lot of authority folks let's go back now to the different bullets and talk about what they can do and what they're good for next to our 300 grain flatnose Lead Core bullets here is a 300 grain Barnes triple shock it's got a great big Hollow cavity in the nose It's a Wonderful all-around bullet I've seen those shot into calibrated ballistic gelatin during ballistic testing and they'll generally go 30 to 38 Ines deep that's wonderful penetration out of a big bullet very good uh for allaround use on elk for Broadside first shots on even brown bear certainly for almost any use on grizzly bears right interior bears that tend to be smaller than your brown bears and whatnot next to that is a bullet it's a 400 grain flat nose and there are a lot of different similar type bullets you can get on the market for loading your 4570 this one's a Barnes original bullet they're built fairly tough they're really really good if you want to shoot um a 400 Grand bullet that's not going to Pancake and get the size of a silver dollar on impact a lot of the 400 grain bullets designed for the 4570 are too soft too thin jacketed for modern loads they're designed to be shot at 11 or 1200 feet per second out of you know soft loads and they'll mushroom and do fine at those speeds but if you drive one at 1,700 feet per second it's probably going to Pancake and F to penetrate well these Barnes originals are are the better choice in that case then of course next to that is that 550 grain flatos gas check bullet you can cast these yourself if you have the equipment you can buy them online it's a great specialty bullet it's not a good all-around bullet that's what you want if you want ultimate penetration in your 4570 and then next to that there's uh a bullet here and a cutaway these are probably the most versatile and most advanced 4570 bullets on the market today there's a 325 grain Hornady Flex and these are built with a squishy is rubber tip so that they won't detonate the primer of the cartridge in front of it when then they're in a tubular magazine it's very important nobody likes accidental chain fires going off in the bottom of their lover action rifle and very dangerous and will destroy your rifle don't ever handload pointy bullets into uh tubular magazines unless they have that squishy tip that's designed for it it so this is of course as I mentioned the 325 grain Lead Core version it has better aerodynamics than any other 4570 bullet on the market Hornady Factory ammo drives it to pretty impressive velocities you're probably going to be getting oh I've got a box right here I'll just look and see what the advertised velocity on that is 2,000 feet per second with a 325 grain bullet and uh you get really good downrange performance with that next to it of course is that monometal version that we touched on lightly earlier it's a lot lighter it's 250 gra goes even faster but it doesn't hold that velocity very well great choice though for somebody that wants to shoot a non-led bullet so what about um the 3030 how does it compare I want to take a minute now to talk about recoil before we go into the various types of bullets and veloc ities that you'll get out of your uh 3030 let me consult my little notebook here I I jotted down some numbers before we got started we're going to talk about a 7 pound 3030 because they tend to be built lighter than a 4570 right and we're going to talk about 8 pound 4570s which is a fairly reasonable average okay so in the 4570 with a 300 grain bullet going 1,800 F feet per second it's a pretty average achievable load right in hand loads or standard Factory ammunition that combination will generate 28 foot-pounds of recoil energy that impact your shoulder now just for reference so that we have something that all of us can kind of relate to a 30 out 6 in an 8pb rifle firing 180 grain bullet at 2700 feet per second will recoil 24.5 foot-pounds of kinetic energy into your shoulder so at 28 pounds it's three and a half pounds heavier than your average 30 out6 180 grain L right very tolerable most folks can learn to master that level of recoil how about that heavy stuff like that 550 grain bullet that you might handload pretty hot within safe limits of of course but with you know a pretty hefty charge for using one of these 4570 rifles for a backup guide rifle in brownberry country or something right so with the right propellants you can push that bullet or in I should say in specialized Factory ammunition like You' get from Buffalo boore or Garrett or some of those others that 500 grain bullet could be pushed around 1,600 feet per second in an 8B rifle listen to this folks it generates 48 foot pounds of recoil that is double what the 30 out6 does and it goes to show you how much increasing bullet weight can increase recoil pretty interesting stuff there so is it worth it well if it's a choice between that or getting your ankle chewed on by uh an iate brown bear yes 100% worth tolerating that level of recoil so how about that fine old 3030 it's kind of a sweetheart of a cartridge it's built in a lighter rifle that's easier to carry all day it's more responsive and quick handling and thick brush so what I did with that because folks go back and forth between 150 and 170 grain bullets for their 3030 I averaged it out went with 160 grain bullet which is kind of perfect because Hornady Flex tip bullet their lever Evolution bullet is 160 Grainer and I averaged the velocity to Crunch our our recoil numbers at 2300 feet per second just a good round number for 150 grain bullet out of a 24in barrel is 2400 feet per second the 170s will generally do about 2200 feet per second so we'll just split the difference and call it 2300 with 160 grain bullet all right what's our reest look like in that 7lb rifle it's just 13.4 foot- PBS of kinetic energy that you have to absorb with your shoulder so that's a fantastic um benefit to the 3030 if you're not shooting big dangerous stuff and you just really want to enjoy shooting your lever action 3030 is real hard to beat while we're on it and while I've got my notes handy let's talk about the energy that the animal absorbs too because there's there's energy that goes into your shoulder and there's energy that goes down range right in terms of kinetic energy which is kind of a flawed metric it's really strongly biased toward velocity rather than bullet weight but it's popular so we'll use it for the sake of this discussion that 3030 generates 1880 foot-pounds of kinetic energy going into your animal downrange right and this is right at the muzzle that obviously drops off the further you go downrange and the where your bullet slows down that 300 grain relatively moderate 4570 load at 1,800 feet per second generates 2150 foot-pounds of muzzle energy now that doesn't sound quite right does it it seems like it should have a lot more on impact Authority than that 330 and folks it does it absolutely plays out in real world use so that's why I say using kinetic energy numbers are kind of a flawed metric but it's popular it's what we have so let's carry on and let's look at that real heavy 500 grain load at600 feet per second this is of course only safe and very strong rifles right this is the one that generates 48 footp pounds of recoil energy it sends at the muzzle it's sending 2,850 foot- PBS of kinetic energy downrange that's getting more impressive right but it still doesn't honestly represent what that bullet can do on a big Dangerous Game animal U for reference sake and again just to kind of showcase how kinetic energy can be manipulated let's go back to our 30 out 6 180 grain bullet 2700 ft per second which is kind of the industry standard for that weight bullet in a 30 out6 it generates 2914 foot- pounds of energy at the muzzle that's what it's sending down range right so if you look at this you say well 24 foot-pounds of recoil versus 48 foot-pounds of recoil it's got half The Recoil the 30 out6 does as that real authoritative 4570 bullet and it's actually got like 65 foot pounds of energy more on impact well folks again kinetic energy can be manipulated by velocity and that 30 out6 load is going 1100 fet per second faster than the 4570 bullet even though that 500 grain bullet is what 320 grains more than the 180 grain 30 out6 bullet and certainly has a lot more practical real world Authority on impact well the energy numbers suggest otherwise so just kind of a fun little side note to keep in mind when you're studying energy numbers okay let's go now to 3030 performance uh different bullet weights and what they can do so here in front of me I got a 150 grain flatnose bullet that's a super popular weight range for deer hunters they exit the muzzle at about 2400 feet per second and do a pretty good job but I actually prefer the 170 grainers in traditional bullet right next to it here you can see there's a Nosler 170 grain partition and it's got a blunt round nose on it still safe in a tubular magazine that's my favorite 3030 bullet folks it works real well because it's got that controlled expansion partition design it'll penetrate well on an elk yeah it comes out of the muzzle a little slower about 2200 ft per second and it's a little more expensive to shoot because it's a premium bullet but just a terrific all-around choice for your 3030 now next to it right here I've got a cutaway of a Hornady 160 grain FTX bullet and this is U actually I stand corrected as I look at it this one is the All Copper version that's 140 grain Hornady FTX copper is a much less dense material than lead is so it's about the same size as the lead core6 Grand version would is but being copper it weighs less it's a 140 I actually used that bullet that copper version to take two big black bears in Alberta over a decade ago and it worked very well gave great penetration inside 100 yards is terrific uh terrific bullet it'll go faster 2500 2600 ft per second the 160 grain version with a Lead Core yeah right in there between 23 and 2400 ft per second depending on what kind of modern propellants Hornet is's using in his Factory ammel and you're using in your handloads and yes all these bullets are actually available as component bullets for hand loaders so in Practical terms which one's going to serve you better in the field it depends entirely on what you do with it my friends if you're hunting deer and deer only in you know the eastern half of the United States maybe some wild hogs thrown in there the 3030 will do everything you ever need it to do it actually has a little better aerodynamics none of these none of these bullets are hibc bullets they just aren't even in the same galaxy as modern High BC Bullets for 7 mm and 6.5 millimeter modern cartridges but you can still say all right let's let's draw some examples if those highly aerodynamic modern bullets could be compared to an arrow in flight right there's just not much drag well a 4570 bullet is about like a pumpkin in Flight lots of drag rainbow trajectory slows down real fast but makes a big Splat when it hits right and the 3030 is kind of somewhere in between it's maybe more like a football in Flight as long as you put a good spiral on it it'll fly pretty well but you're still going to have a lot of parabolic curve in its flight and um well that's my fun little analogy just to try and give a mental or uh you know a mentally visual picture of uh the ballistic characteristics of these cartridges compared to modern ones so what about if you live in let's say the Carolinas or maybe in Wisconsin and you hunt deer primarily but every once in a while you might get a chance at an honest to goodness Thumper of a black bear we're talking 400 lbs plus right in that case I would definitely go with something like that 170 grain Noz or partition Bullet in Your 3030 just to ensure that you get through the heavy layers of fat maybe a shoulder bone and all the way into the vitals and through the vitals inside the thoracic cavity because some of those other bullets in a 3030 don't penetrate quite well enough for a 400 plus pound animal that's where you may want to start considering a 45 7 because it's just a lot more cartridge and if you load it with something like that 300 grain Barnes triple shock bullet Big Hollow cavity up front but it'll hold retain all of its weight on impact can be driven pretty fast it's fantastic for the biggest black bears it's good enough for interior grizzly bears it's wonderful on elk in close cover right good enough for moose it's it's just great it's it's a good bullet for about anything you want to do with it except maybe stopping Coastal brown bears and then of course you have more choices so to me the way I look at it is as you move into either big bar country even big blackbear country or west into elk country if you like to hunt elk and especially if you like to hunt elk in Grizzly country you know Western Wyoming Western Montana nor northern Idaho of course British Columbia Alaska some of those areas if you like to hunt Moose or elk or Caribou or whatever in grizzly bear country with a lever action I would certainly go with 4570 over the 3030 just to All Around better choice and what you may have kind of deduced on your own folks just by looking at the little display of the couple cartridges and then all the bullets lined up here in front of me I think the 4570 is so popular these days that there are more options available both in projectile types and in Factory ammunition a a more versatile Spectrum so you've got everything from a 350 grain A-frame loaded by Swift wonderful load to the Barnes 300 grain triple shock in the Pioneer ammunition and a heavy Lead Core 400 grain Barnes original you got the outstanding Hornady lover avolution ammunition loaded with the flex tip bullet that's got more distance capability than any any other and of course the monom metal version of that the light fast 250 grain monolux you got great loads from Nosler and from Winchester and Remington all the big companies build it and then of course there's this serious Dangerous Game ammo as loaded by Garrett cartridges and buffalo boore like we talked about the 4570 is a very versatile cartridge that's being well supported in ammunition and in component bullets on our market today so in the end which is better folks the 4570 government or the 330 Winchester you know it's entirely up to you what you intend to do with it should help you decide which is the better cartridge I'm Joseph Von benedict with the backcountry hunting podcast Ron sper allows me to occasionally guest host here on ronp outdoors and I just love it as he would say folks honest and shoot straight I'll see you in the back country [Music]

Channel: Ron Spomer Outdoors

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Keywords: outdoors, ron spomer outdoors, ron spomer, hunting, firearms, guns, shooting sports, rifles, big game hunting, hunting gear, hunting gear review, rifle review, gun review, BEST Lever Action Cartridge - .30-30 vs .45-70, BEST Lever Action Cartridge, .30-30 vs .45-70, .30-30, .45-70

Id: mv5y67pwk4A

Length: 29min 17sec (1757 seconds)

Published: Sat May 18 2024