ruger 30 carbine

ok, so i broke down and picked one up. i found one on the local classifieds. i looked up the serial #, it's an older one from '74. hopefully i will be able to shoot her this weekend.
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Jepp2 - I was thinking about loading lead bullets for mine. Do you mind passing on your powder and grains/load? Also thought about searching for plated bullets, but I suppose there's not a great demand for those.

As for functioning, if I keep the gun I will write to Cylinder and Slide about getting the cylinder tweaked, unless anyone here has a cheaper and/or more efficient gunsmith to recommend for the work. It is a strange gun - much like a strange woman that you can't quite get out of your mind.
 
FLvet, yeah kinda weird. i wouldn't say it's a big city, maybe 120K in the whole county. but two-three weeks i ago i saw one at a gun show. it really interested me. i've been watching a couple on gunbroker. thought i'd check out the local classifieds and there was an ad for one. the ad was posted in the middle of September. maybe it was the law of attraction or something.
 
so i had a little time to go and shoot her today. first impressions, this thing is a blast. the ammo i picked up was some factory federal american eagle 110 gr fmj and magtech 110 gr fmj. i didn't have a lot of time, so only six cylinders worth. those of you that said the recoil was sharp, i think you meant the report. the recoil was minimal, very fun. the bang was a sharp crack, not much of a boom but loud. very cool. accuracy was something for me to aspire to for sure. not very often can i hit a can from 50 yrds. extraction however, you guys were right. the federal ammo, maybe 1 out of the cylinder came out easy, the rest required some serous effort. the magtech, 2 came out easy. once three came out easy. the magtech brass was way dirtier though, the federal looked like it hadn't even been fired. final thoughts, i'm glad i picked this up. i really want to shoot some lower velocity lead now, and call it a lead throwing revolver tokarev with a heavier bullet. thanks for the replies and thanks to Jepp2 for the great info. i know i'll be having fun with this thing.
 
A Ruger .30 Carbine thread that's been open for more than 6 days, and Sevens hasn't replied yet? :eek:
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:D Just found it.

I'm already too late to help the OP! :p
No worries, I like mine a lot. It's not something that everyone has. I've definitely got my complaints -- not enough to make me get rid of it, not even enough to keep me from enjoying it. Frankly-- not even enough to tell someone not to get one! But definitely enough to pass along some things I learned about it as a warning before someone else buys one.

Here are those things: If your .30 Carb B'Hawk doesn't take factory ammo and stick the empties, you are fortunate because most of them do. Mine does for darn sure. I've fed it only 112 rounds of factory fodder and that was enough for me to know. Bad enough that I pounded out the balance of my factory ammo for the components with a kinetic hammer-type puller. That's enormous work!

It loves my handloads, but I can't run them hot. The gun is built for it, for sure, it'll take WAY more than I will ever feed it, but you'll be pounding empties with a mallet just as was said above.

And handloading for it is an annoyance compared to most other rounds. Simply-- sizing the brass sucks as you've got to lube each case and the physical press lever effort is extreme for a small round. Also as was said by zxcvbob, you better have done your homework with case trimming. If it's stretched, the design of the face of the revolver is such that you'll wedge that thing in the chamber and you've to remove the cylinder to get it out--this is pure pain in the tuckus right here. Embarrassing, too. And if you trim it too short you simply won't hit the primer and the round will never fire for the rest of it's life, at least in a B'Hawk. That brass is now ruined and useless.

Also, bullet selection is slim for the .30 Carbine. As I don't hunt with it, I'm thrilled with the Berry's 110gr plated RN. Affordable slug, accurate as you could ask and I can buy them 1,000 at a time.

I like mine -- it's VERY accurate and for a gun that gives a tremendous blast and fireball, it's a pussycat in felt recoil. It's fun, very fun, and precious little else. But fun is really what I want out of most all of my handguns.

If someone is interested but does NOT yet own one...I'm recommending the .327 Federal Magnum Ruger Blackhawk instead. Basically -- it does the same thing, much easier to handload, better bullet selection (but at more $ for those slugs) and the brass is harder to get, but so much easier to work with at the load bench. And the .327 Federal is an 8-shot revolver with a more manageable barrel length.

The two rounds are very, very close outside of bullet construction.

I am not at all surprised you were able to find a .30 Carbine Blackhawk. Do most people realize that Ruger produced these guns before they ever built and sold a .45 Colt Blackhawk?! :eek: They've made them on & off since the late 60's, IIRC. They aren't wildly popular, but there's plenty of them out there. If you are patient, you can typically snag a decent used one for as low as $400. I've never seen one cheaper than that, though anything is possible.

I would love the idea of what I could do with a scope on mine -- but it will never happen. I'll admit, aesthetics mean a lot to me, and my stomach turns at the look of that. I couldn't do that to my revolver. But I've shot rested groups at 100 yards with it -- the gun & the round are highly capable, and a scope would make that so much easier.

Fun, loud gun. Different! But with it's own specialized set of warts.
 
Sevens - thanks for the reloading tips.

My .30 Carbine Ruger is like a woman or two I knew before I got hitched, except I can lock it in a safe and it is happy staying there until I want to see it again. Even way better than a dog in that respect.
 
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Question: Would it be practical/feasible to get a second .30Carbine cylinder and have it reamed for the 7.62x25Tok round for more affordable ammo?
 
I can check tonight and see if the cylinder is long enough -- I think it is. (I have a .30 Blackhawk and I have some 7.62x25 ammo) And it certainly should be meaty enough. But have you priced Tokarev ammo lately? It's not cheap anymore, and it completely disappeared for a while last year.

You also may have problems with the shoulder bumping forward when it's fired, then the case heads will stand out a little and jam the cylinder from rotating.
 
I'd be interested in hearing where the heck you are going to find a Blackhawk .30 Carbine cylinder...without a revolver attached around it.
 
Ruger .30 M-1 BHK

I have one and shoot it often. I use a Lyman 120 RNF (311008) cast bullet sized to .309" and load with 4.5 of Red Dot or 6.0 og Unique. Very accurate. I scoped it and when using a rest could pop a 4" wide plate at 75 to 100 yards--this is with a 2 x scope. On one occassion I had a large field to shoot into--it was dry sand that was just disced. Set up a 16 ounce soup can at 250 yards---using a sandbag rest and no scope, I manged to pop it farirly often...I could only see it becase the can was glinting in the sun and the sand was dark...(good contrast). I knew I hit it when the glint "moved"...I did retrieve the can and it had been hit multiple times. When I missed I could easily see the strikes ..plumes in the dusty sand.

I then tried my hand with a .357/.41/.44 magnum---let's just say that they didn't do very well by comparison and all sported 8" barrels! Also, there was a stiff crosswind..the .30 shot far flatter than any of the magnums. The load was 6.0 grains of Unique with a Lyman 130 RN (311410) bullet.
 
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Sevens, thanks for the input. I've been on the fence about picking one up for a long time. To be honest, nothing you've said really discouraged me. Even though I've sold off a few guns now that I've relocated to the south I must admit I'm keeping one on my list. After all,you only live once.
 
That's good -- as I said, I don't even suggest people interested skip them, I just like to pass along the things that are worth knowing ahead of time.

Even still, I'd suggest the .327 Federal Blackhawk as a better purchase idea than the .30 Carbine Blackhawk, for a revolver and cartridge that is so much more similar than it is different.

I really doubt that most folks have any idea how similar the two cartridges are.
 
I misplaced my reloading notes for 30 carbine in a move long ago. But I could only get a couple reloads without trimming. They were also very sensitive to primer protrusion but that was due to bad brass. I loaded reduced amounts of 296. I do not remember the warnings about not shooting reduced loads of 296, but they are there now so I will not mention the loads.

The 30 carbine Blackhawk is an attention getter at the range, nice and loud. Like "OH MY G....WHAT WAS THAT?!?!?!" at an indoor range :cool:
 
It is certainly a fun round. I was given two cases of ammo from a friend and bought a gun to use it with. Everyone at the indoor range loves it! Slow enough that we are allowed to shoot it indoors (we are not allowed to shoot magnums indoors).

We chronoed some rounds outdoor one day. Went from 1400 fps down to 1000 fps, including some that didn't fire at all. We also had a squib. Had to push the bullet back into the brass, it was stuck between the cylinder and the forcing cone. We opened that cartridge up and found the powder was caked. Looked like it got wet at some point.

I have found that a lot of the brass splits so I don't keep any of it. I have two different brands of ammo. The foreign stuff seems perfect. The olf Hornaday stuff seems to be all over the place. Again, I bet it got wet.
 
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