There is a 7-30 Waters for sale on Auction Arms. It has a 24 inch barrel. If the gun were Achley Improved, it would shoot a 120 grain bullet around 3,000 ft/sec. For antelope and open areas, it could be a good long distance hunting gun.

There is a 7-30 Waters for sale on Auction Arms. It has a 24 inch barrel. If the gun were Achley Improved, it would shoot a 120 grain bullet around 3,000 ft/sec. For antelope and open areas, it could be a good long distance hunting gun.

The 7-30 Waters can be a very accurate medium-long range antelope cartridge in platforms like the T/C Contender pistol, carbine and rifle but, can the same be said of the Winchester 94? And then there is the difference in bullets. A nosler ballsitic tip has a much higher ballistic coefficient than the flat nose bullets that are required in the M94.

If you are into handgun hunting, here is a load that will group 1 MOA from a T/C Contender with a 10" bull barrel. Muzzle velocity is 2260 fps.

Federal nickel plated cases.
37.0 grains of W748.
120 grain Nosler Ballistic Tip bullet.
WLR primer.

When zeroed at 190 yards, the 3" point blank range is 225 yards. This means that the bullet path will not be more than 3" high or 3" low between zero and 225 yards and you can hold dead on at any range up to 225 yards and strike a 6" vital zone, assuming good marksmanship.

I have no experience with the 7-30 Waters in a Winchester 94. Maybe one of our fellow members can shed some light on this subject.

I had a win mod.94 7-30 waters 24'bbl. With the 139 grn Hornadys I got a little over 2500 fps using rel.15 powder. I sold the rifle as I tend to like the carbines better. Last fall I bought another Win 7-30 carbine. It's as accurate as the rifle I had and handier in my opionion, though I'm sure I'll lose velocity. I have yet to chronograph this one as I bought it in the fall and the weather still isn't very nice around here. A bullet I'm trying now is the 130 grn Speer fp. This bullet wasn't available when I had the first rifle. This bullet would probably be the one to use for longer ranges in the rifle. Nosler made a 120 grn fp but I don't know if it is still available. Sierra makes the bullet that federal uses in their factory load(120 grn fp) but is not available as a component.