Federal’s HammerDown loads use nickel-plated cases for corrosion resistance and smooth loading in lever guns. A bonded bullet yields excellent terminal performance. (Photo courtesy of Federal Premium)
May 02, 2025
By Richard Mann
The .45-70 Govt. and .30-30 Win. are more than a century old, and neither excels at great distances. However, both perform well at ranges hunters usually shoot big-game animals. Many hunters have no idea what either cartridge is truly capable of, especially with modern loads.
Some see the .30-30 and .45-70 as outdated and hardly sufficient for deer. This is untrue. Shot placement is the key limiting factor with any cartridge, though trajectory and velocity affect this. At some point, bullet drop makes getting hits difficult, and eventually, velocity slows enough that bullet upset is questionable.
With a 100-yard zero, most modern .45-70 loads drop about 12 inches at 200 yards. Modern .30-30 loads offer another 25 to 50 yards of reach before the bullet drops a foot. The velocity needed for bullet upset will vary, but generally, .45-70 bullets work well when hitting at 1,200 fps or faster, and bullets for most .30-30 loads work best when impact velocities exceed 1,500 fps.
Within these limitations, the .30-30 is fine for most non-dangerous big game. In the mid-1920s, a young African professional hunter named Wally Johnson even successfully hunted lions with a lever-action .30-30. The .45-70 is suitable for any animal the .30-30 is capable of taking, and with modern loads, hunters have used it to take elephants. I took my first two Cape buffalo with a .45-70. The key to success in any case is using the right load.
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I’m not sure what load Wally Johnson whacked his lions with, but hunters have much better options today. The original .30-30 load was a 160-grain bullet at about 1,950 fps, and the original .45-70 load was a 405-grain bullet at 1,300 fps. Manufacturers have had more than 100 years to fine-tune .30-30 ammo to be flatter shooting and more terminally effective, and to devise more potent .45-70 loads.
BETTER .30-30 WIN. OFFERINGS Remington’s 150-grain Core-Lokt load is a great performance baseline for the .30-30 Win., and most ammo manufacturers offer something similar. It’s great on big game inside 200 yards. One of the first modern advancements in .30-30 ammunition came when Hornady introduced its LeveRevolution ammo more than a decade ago. By adding a soft and pointy polymer tip that was safe in tubular magazines, Hornady increased the bullet’s ballistic coefficient. The bullet retained more velocity, and effective range increased by about 50 yards. Hornady makes lead-free 140-grain and lead-core 160-grain LeveRevolution .30-30 loads.
For several years, Buffalo Bore has made what it calls a “Heavy” .30-30 load utilizing a 190-grain Hawk bullet. The load doesn’t shoot as flat as some others, but the bullet penetrates very deeply and retains more energy than any other .30-30 load. It’s a fantastic option for elk or moose. Federal and Barnes offer 150-grain mono-metal lead-free loads for the .30-30 that also penetrate deeply because both bullets retain all their weight. The Federal load uses the Trophy Copper bullet with a round polymer tip, and the Barnes load has the company’s popular TSX bullet. Both should work well on most big game out to around 225 yards.
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Federal’s .30-30 HammerDown load is another option. It uses a bonded 150-grain bullet that doubles in diameter on impact, shoots reasonably flat and can deliver great terminal performance as far as 250 yards. But the bullet isn’t the only innovation. These loads sport nickel-plated cases for corrosion resistance, and that, combined with the chamfer on the forward edge of the cartridge rim, makes them feed very smoothly in lever-action rifles.
FASTER .45-70 GOVT. OPTONS As with the .30-30 Win., the 405-grain Core-Lokt load for the .45-70 Govt. offers a great base line and performs best inside 200 yards. More modern .45-70 loads can stretch effective range another 50 yards. Hornady offers two LeveRevolution loads for the .45-70. The first is a lead-free 250-grain MonoFlex bullet that’s ideal for deer out to around 200 yards. The other is a 325-grain FTX lead-core bullet that carries nearly 1,200 foot-pounds of energy to 250 yards. Hornady caps both bullets with its soft polymer Flex Tip that makes them safe for use in lever guns’ tubular magazines.
Shutterstock photo Barnes and Buffalo Bore load the Barnes 300-grain TSX bullet for the .45-70, but the Buffalo Bore version is a +P load that’s about 400 fps faster. It’s one of the flattest-shooting .45-70 loads available, probably your best bet for a 250-yard load. Federal’s HammerDown .45-70 load isn’t lead-free but uses a 300-grain bonded bullet in the same nickel-plated cases with the chamfered cartridge rim as the company’s .30-30 load.
All these .45-70 loads work great for deer, and the harder-hitting options are suitable for elk, moose and even African plains game. I used the Barnes 300-grain Vor-Tx load to take a big mountain zebra. For even bigger and badder stuff, Buffalo Bore’s 430-grain hardcast lead load is the way to go. It carries a ton of energy out to as far as 150 yards. From deer to hippo, it’ll work on anything walking Earth.
SUBSONIC LOADS With the rising popularity of suppressors, many hunters want subsonic options. Hornady offers a 175-grain .30-30 load and a 410-grain .45-70 load. Both use Sub-X bullets built to upset at velocities slower than the speed of sound. These are short-range loads—inside 100 yards—but they’re effective for hunting and shoot with great precision at these distances.
With bullets having high velocities and high ballistic coefficients all the rage now, hunters often overlook cartridges like the .30-30 and .45-70. However, inside 250 yards, where most hunters shoot big-game animals, both are plenty deadly with modern loads.
This article was featured in the April 2025 issue of Game & Fish magazine. Click to subscribe .
