30-30 to 219 zipper conversion.

yotenaylor

yotenaylor

New member
Ive got this old 1942 winchester 94 that I picked up at a yardsale for 30 bucks (no kidding) years ago. I have meticulously taken what rust pits I could out of the rifle, and rust blued the receiver. The barrel, however, will never be able to be returned to as good a shape as Id like. The bore is mint, but to refinish the barrel, the factory markings would be altered. Being that switching barrels on this thing looks to be pretty simple, Im thinkin of swithcing it to 219 zipper. Both use the same case, and loading data for the zipper @ the 30-30 saami pressures is easy to find.

Im wondering if anyone has played with this cartridge?

Seems like a barrel mounted long eye relief scope on this guy would make it a quick handling rifle. I just dont know too much to say whether its worth it or not.

What do you guys think?
 
I had a Marlin 336 in .219 Zipper I shot for years. Its decent cartridge. Makeing brass for the .219 from .30-30 brass takes quite a bit of work though which is one of the reasons I no longer own it. Alot of the loading data out there for .219 Zipper though is for bolt action guns. I did have some great loads for it though worked up using H380 powder and 50grn Hornady SXSP bullets. Are you going to replace the barrel or sleeve it? A barrel in .219 Zipper is going to cost you a pretty good $. I looked into it before.

Tim
 
My thinking on the data is, If I keep it around what the 30-30 pressures are, Ill be fine.

For the barrel, I was just gonna get a 224 blank, grind it to contour, thread it accordingly, ream the chamber, cut the extractor grooves, rust it and go from there.

Ive looked into take off barrels too. Your right, it is crazy what they get for them, but when you can turn a 250 dollar 30-30 into "collectors item" 25-35 or 32 win special with the turn of a barrel wrench, I can see why they ask what they do.
This one had set under under a bed on a wood floor for some twenty years, and the entire left side of the gun was rusted heavily and used as anger management therapy for the last several years. The collectors value on it was negligable to begin with, tinkerin wont devalue it that much more.
 
I dont have the numbers in front of me but .219 lever guns operated at pressures lower than a .30-30. Something to do with the difference in bore diameter and quicker rising pressure. Talk with the guys at Horanady they were VERY helpful in helpme work up load for mine. I originally used the 45grn "Bee" hp in the gun but they have the ballistics of a fat woman in a moomoo. I ended up going with the 50grn SXSP over 30.5 grns of H380. Since I was using a SP in the tube mag I was only loading two in the mag and one in the chambers. I had only been putting one in the tube but the guys at Hornady told since the rim dia. was so large and the bullet so narrow the tips and primers wouldn't touch when in the tube, combine that with the light weight of the shells compared to a .30-30 and chance of a shell going off in the tube where slim to SFA. With the bullets and load I used ballistically the gun shot like a .222 Rem. It was good for me out to 250-300yrds for Coyotes size critters. It had the accuracy to go there also. Off a bench on a good day I was able to print 3 shot groups in the .660"s. Not bad for a 50yr old lever action gun.

Good Huntin'
Tim
 
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