Having been sold on the virtues of .30-30, .30-30 Ackley Improved, .32 Winchester Special, and .35 Remington, I thought I would explore a little deeper into the world of mid-bore cartridges. A friend had sent me an article about the .360 Buckhammer, and the thrust of the article was that it might lead to a revival of the .35 Remington.

"Revival?" says I, "...I didn't even know it had coded."

Consideration of these cartridges led to a brief read on the .350 Legend (truly the answer to a question nobody asked), which I subsequently compared to what .357 Maximum in a levergun must be capable of... now there's something I wouldn't say no to.

But lever .35s, well, there's more than one way to skin that cat. One could get a Savage 99 in .358 Winchester, for example... or there's that vintage wildcat, the .35/.30-30 Winchester. So I went to googling on the .35/30-30 (which is no more than a .30-30 or .32 Winchester Special necked up to take a .358 caliber bullet). Any bullet suitable for .35 Remington can be loaded in .35/.30-30, and the wildcat caliber is well-regarded as a cast-bullet gun, more so than the short-necked, short-throated Remington round.

So then I go back to Google looking for more info on the .35/.30-30 Winchester, and because I can be lazy I typed in ".35 Winchester" thinking that would pull up the .30-30 wildcat.

Oh my. Of COURSE .35 Winchester is its own thing, and was an original chambering in the '95 Winchester. Of course it has 3/10ths more case length than the .30-30 case. Of course it's a beautiful cast-bullet cartridge in its own right.

I give up! I'm about to go find a Remington Rolling Block in .35 Krag and have done with it.

-AaronB (nursing an unhealthy obsession)

John K. has been playing with a .35 Krag in a Krag for a little while now. I like what he reports very much. I search, off and on, for a '95 Winchester in .35WCF because, after all, I have dies but don't feel much like parting with the entry fee. I do like the 35 caliber for sure. I think there are 8 different chamberings in that bore here but I'd have to count them again up to be sure.

Now, if you want 'off the beaten path', one of my projects (in my head at least) is a .35 Epps which I don't believe old Elwood did much, if anything, with---at least I have been unable to find much more than a mention of it in any of my searches. I have a sporterized P-14 with a "Mannlicher" stock and Redfield peep which would serve as the base.

This 30-40 sporter Krag belonged to Terry M. Obtained it after his passing. I already had a nice 30-40 sporter, but this one was Terry's - he always wanted to shoot my Krag at the Holiday, so I could not resist.

Unfortunately, the bore was too far gone on his. I could've rebarreled, but wanting to keep it as Terry owned it, I turned to JES to rebore it to 35 Krag, which had always held my interest.

It is quite nice. After the barrel came back, everything was rust blued and the stock refinished. Dialed in a Lee 30-40 size die in the lathe and opened the neck to to suit. Works fine.

Still working on loads, but it shoots a 280gr PP pretty well and gives just under 2000fps. Also likes the 200gr Remington PSP Corelokt. Killed one deer with it, using a 310gr lead slug that Jared sent me to try. I think he intended that bullet for a 35 Whelan.

Y'all ought to leave all those weird cartridges alone - just buy yerself '06 and be happy.

(And then tell me where to find the oddballs...)

John K.

Would the .35 Epps be a wildcatted .303 British cartridge shooting a .35-caliber bullet?

-AaronB

Yes Hoot, please tell more about the 35 Epps.

John That`s a Great looking Krag.

Yes, I did in fact mention .35 Krag, and danged if the one in your photo isn't a pretty thing.

I have owned exactly one Springfield Krag in my life, a nice carbine, and foolishly I sold it down the river in pursuit of some other toy I just had to have. It was a shooter, too, so I would not likely have futzed with it... but an action can be had if one has the scratch.

https://www.gunbroker.com/item/1065330735

Remember that Remington Roller I mentioned in the OP? I think the seed was put in my mind by the existence of the Carl Gustafs Remington RB that was built for the Swedish military back in the day. Those were chambered in 8x58R Krag, though, not .30-40 (although RBs can be had in .30-40 also).

https://www.chuckhawks.com/swedish_rolling_block_rifle.htm

A brief comparison of the .30-40 vs. the 8x58R cases revealed that aside from length, the 8x58R cartridge is larger at all points of comparison... meaning that the conversion of an 8x58R Krag rifle would not create a .35 Krag, but rather would create something new... call it 9x58R Krag.

Okay, now I'm just being silly.

But a roller in good old .35 Krag is a definite possibility.

-AaronB

.303 Epps which was an "Ackley Improved" .303 Brit. He, I am told, was not seeking performance gains but was looking to improve case life. Indeed, sources warn to use standard .303 loads with the Enfield rifles. He did succeed in this pursuit coupled with setting headspace to both the shoulder and the rim.

Not sure what involvement Epps had with any wildcatting of his cartridge but there is a little bit of press on the base case being necked up and down. The thought of a 35-303 "Improved" tickles my fancy. It won't do a danged thing that my other 35's won't do but that doesn't matter much. In the strong P-14 action, it should be all of a .358 Win or better--maybe. Hoping I can reload it with what dies are on hand already....we'll see.

FWIW, Epps Sporting Goods is still up and running in Canada...Ontario, I think. They don't have any answers regarding the 35 cartridge but they were very kind in telling me so.

the base case for 8x58R is the .45-70. There is much written about the "ambitious" data in COTW and other sources. Norma did a study but I cannot lay my hands on their recommendations just now...

My, .35 Epps sounds like a spiffing round for one of the newer production High Wall actions.

If we can start throwing terms like 'practical' around, it really wouldn't be anything more than John's .35 Krag---which in no way is a bad thing. About its' best quality would be in the collection of blank stares one would get when some goober asks, "Whatcha got there?"

Honestly I didn't know that the 8x58R Krag was based off the .45-70. I would not have thought a Danish cartridge would be built around a US milspec case as its starting point.

-AaronB

It's tempting to noodle out a design for a wildcat that has absolutely no earthly use, that 9x58R Krag I mentioned... just a necked-up 8x58R Krag. It would shoot a .358-caliber bullet at essentially .35 Krag velocities, although maybe plus a little due to extra case volume. Pressures could be kept reasonable and the applicability to break actions and vintage single shot designs would be considerable. One could spec out a 1-10" twist or so in order to handle bullets that are heavy for caliber, which would be this cartridge's wheelhouse.

Because it would represent nothing that anybody really needs, I would label it the ".358 Dauntless."

Because of course it's undaunted by common sense.

-AaronB

***

.45-70...sorry. I meant one can make the brass from .45-70. As to the origins...I don't really know. There was much going on at the time. I find cartridges and arms from that era to be fascinating.

https://www.jbmballistics.com/ballistics/calculators/calculators.shtml

https://www.ballisticstudies.com/Knowledgebase/.35+Whelen.html

I tend to believe a 12 or 14 twist is fine for 35cal rifles. The 16t that Remington used is a bit slow for the bullet weights (length) we like. So far, I have no issue stabilizing 280s @ 1900fps with a 14t, though I could see a 10t if 300+gr subsonics were planned.

Most of my experience over the last 35yrs has been with 225/250gr bullets in the 35WAI and they shoot quite well, even the old discontinued 250gr XBT. The also discontinued 225gr Nosler BT shoots well and is excellent deer medicine. Notice a trend? The 35cal bullets just don't sell as well as 30 and 338cals and the manufacturers drop them for the latest internet hotness. As usual, my ubiquitous statement of "if you find something that works, stock up" applies.

Will throw in a link to Hawk bullets; they are priceless to those wanting to shoot jacketed in various obsolete cartridges - and you can even spec jacket thickness to suit your velocity.

https://hawkbullets.com

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100yds, Redfield receiver sight, five shots.

The load was a 280gr paper patch bullet, 16bhn, over 40grs of IMR4895, 1930fps average MV. As usual, there was one anti-social so-n-so that landed up north away from its friends.

I peeked at their site but it isn't mentioned...or I missed it.

measuring .348" bore, .359" grooves, grooves & lands measuring about .182" each. This is what I have in the 35 Krag.

Last I knew, he can provide 4 & 5 groove and other twists.

The provenance is meaningful to me.

That's a pretty group for irons at 100.

It speaks well for the cartridge (not to mention the rifle and the shooter).

-AaronB