By versatile they mean that the .243has greater range (distance)than the 30-30 does and makes a great dual purpose varmint, coyote, deer cartridgeand there is a much wider selection of available ammunition. The 30-30 is essentially a 150 - 200 yard deer rifle and that's it.


Lever vs. bolt rifle............

The 30-30 is a rimmed cartridge that was invented in 1895. Rimmedmeaning that the bottom (rim)of the cartridge is wider than the body of the cartridge thus it does not feed or stack on top of each other verywell in a stacked magazine so it is relegated to tubular magazines and single shots which also limits it to round nosed or flat nosed bullets so you don't set off the primers of the cartridges in the magazine tube when the rifle recoils. These tubular rifles are also of a weaker design than a bolt action rifle so the chamber pressures in side of the barrel generated from the firing of the cartridge must be kept low enough to keep the firearm from breaking.

The .243 is a non rimmed bottle neck cartridge which means that the base of the cartridge is the same diameter as the cartridge body so it will feed properly over one another in a stacked magazine which is what bolt action rifles use. This also allows the use of pointed, stream lined bullets which retain velocity and energy over a longer distance which gives it a greater effective lethal range. And, unlike the lever action rifle the bolt action can safely handle chamber pressures that greatly exceed the what the lever action rifles can handle so the bullets are able to be driven to much higher initial velocities.


A cartridge that you might alsowant to consider is the 7mm-08. It utilizes the same casing as the .243 but is necked up to accept the larger diameter and heavier bullets of the 7mm (.284"). This is a wonderful and light recoiling cartridge that is perfect for deer sized animals. I think that most 12 year old boys could easily handle this cartridge with no problems.