Henry Steel Lever-Action .30-30 Rifle: Tasteful Performance

I’m happy to see the lever gun making a comeback and am delighted that new generations of shooters are discovering this most traditional American sporting rifle. Henry has helped. Henry Repeating Arms Company manufactures other firearms, but they are very much a lever-action company, making the greatest variety of lever guns, from classic tubular-magazine rimfires and centerfires to modern box-magazine rifles. The Henry motto is “Made in America, Or Not Made At All.”

Henry’s tubular-magazine centerfires include short-actions for handgun cartridges, and long-actions in .30-30, .360 Buckhammer, and .45-70, with a half-dozen receiver finishes. To each his or her own, but my preference is good old walnut and blued steel. That’s what I’ve spent the last few days shooting: Henry’s H009G, a classy side-eject, side loading gate lever-action, American walnut stock with straight grip, blued metal, 20-inch barrel, chambered to .30-30 Winchester.

The Eyeball Test

I’m no stranger to Henry rifles, but the first thing I did was examine it from butt to muzzle. Good, thick black rubber recoil pad. Not essential for the mild-kicking .30-30, but I like a rubber pad because the rifle won’t slip on your shoulder, which is a tendency when working a lever-action. Sling swivel studs on butt and forend cap. The stock is good, straight-grained walnut, both grip and forend nicely checkered. Bluing is even, more matte than shiny.

The side-loading gate and ejection port are on the right. There’s also a loading port on the bottom of the magazine tube, accessed by rotating the end of the inner magazine tube and withdrawing it until it clears the loading port. So, unusually, this Henry can be loaded through either side gate or tube loading port. Better, the magazine can be unloaded by pulling the tube, pointing the rifle down, and letting the cartridges slide out. Quicker and quieter than cycling them through the action, just make sure you cycle the action and make sure both chamber and magazine are clear.

Design and Function

The next thing likely to strike shooters familiar with other lever-actions: This rifle has neither crossbolt safety nor half-cock or safety position on the hammer. The hammer has just two positions: Fully cocked and fully forward (fired down resting). The safety is a transfer bar, allowing the rifle to fire only when fully cocked and the trigger is pulled. If your thumb slips and the hammer gets away from you while cocking the rifle will not fire; it is designed to be safely carried fully loaded with the hammer in the fired down resting position.

Naturally, while examining the rifle, I worked the action a number of times and tried the trigger. The action is smooth and positive, the trigger a pleasant surprise. Almost as a design feature, a hallmark of many lever-actions is a heavy trigger that’s often almost impossible to improve. On this Henry, no improvement was necessary. Right out of the box, the trigger was light and crisp, consistently breaking at about 3.5 pounds.

Sights

Sights are traditional lever-action: Semi-buckhorn rear, elevation adjusted by a notched wedge. The front sight is a gold bead. If windage adjustment is needed, it’s done by loosening the forward set screw on the rear sight and drifting the sight. In lever-actions, the advantage of side eject is scopes can be mounted low on top of the receiver. The Henry is drilled and tapped for scope bases or rail, with four screw holes in pairs. I ordered an Area419 Henry long-action rail strip from Midway USA, was delighted to see it had a linear groove in the center, allowing me to see and use the open sights with the rail attached.

Funny, I had just had cataract surgery and lens replacement. For the first time in years, I could clearly resolve both front and rear sight. So, before attaching a scope to the rail, I wanted to see how close the iron sights were to zero. Out of the box, the rear sight was all the way down. I started with a big target at 25 yards, wasn’t surprised that the first shot was low. The windage was perfect. I raised the rear sight a couple of notches and it was near-perfect at 50 yards. Which, even with new eyes, approaches my limit with open sights. I mounted a Vector Optics 1-6x24mm scope with straight objective. A scope with more magnification might have tightened my groups a bit, but that type of scope seems a good match for the .30-30’s capabilities. In addition, the height of comb was perfect for open sights, but the Leupold tactical mount I used required me to lift my head a bit to get a proper cheek weld. For shooting the best groups I was capable of, I added a strap-on cheekpiece to bring height of comb up a bit.

.30-30 Reverence

The great old .30-30 doesn’t get much love these days. Certainly not as much as it deserves. Neither fast nor flashy against so many modern cartridges, it’s still a wonderful cartridge for deer and hogs that gets the job done. True, it’s not a long-range cartridge, but not everybody needs range. On our Kansas farms, neighbor Chuck Herbel and I have about two dozen deer stands. Only one offers a likely shot beyond sensible .30-30 range. I’ve taken several of my Kansas bucks with .30-30s and often use them for Texas hogs. The .30-30 doesn’t kick much, and on deer-sized game it hits hard and penetrates well.

While this rifle had the advantage of an exceptional trigger, most lever-actions have several things going against them that make tack-driving accuracy unusual. Two-piece stocks are usually not conducive to maximum accuracy. Neither are rear-locking actions, which applies to Marlin, Savage, most Winchester and Henry lever-actions. Tubular-magazine lever-actions also have the tube, making contact with the barrel at the forend cap and muzzle, which can interfere with harmonics. Doesn’t bother me because most lever-action cartridges are short to medium-range affairs, and that’s how I use them. The Henry manual suggests “…best at up to 125 yards.” I agree with that, but with a magnifying riflescope most lever-actions and the .30-30 cartridge can easily stretch another 75 yards or so.

Great Reliability

That’s what I expected from this Henry, and it delivered. I had odds and ends of a lot of .30-30 ammo on hand, but for zeroing, chronographing, and grouping I settled on Federal Premium’s 150-grain Hammer Down; Hornady’s 150-grain American Whitetail load with 150-grain Interlock; and Winchester’s 170-grain Power Point, an old load that has served me well on feral hogs.

Between shooting for groups, shooting at steel, and messing around, I suppose I put almost 200 rounds through the Henry, cleaning every 25 rounds. Never a single jam or misfeed, just consistently smooth and trouble-free operation…and a whole lot of fun. This won’t matter to most of you, but I’m a lefty. I suppose that’s partly why I have a special affinity for lever-actions, ambidextrous in operation. Although the Henry ejects to the right side, it throws the empties forward and away.

Consistent Accuracy

As the chart shows, accuracy among the three loads shown was amazingly consistent, and all three loads were well within normal factory load variance as far as Extreme Spread (ES) and Standard Deviation (SD) go. What the chart does not show: Every series had multiple five-shot groups under 1.5 MOA, and all averages were skewed by at least one group that wandered outside the norm. I shot Hornady’s American Whitetail load last. This target was looking especially good. Then the fifth and final group spread to almost three inches, upping the average.

In terms of ES and Standard Deviation in this rifle, Federal’s Hammer Down was the most consistent. The Hammer Down series is designed for smooth functioning in tubular magazines and to cycle through the lever-action’s unique feeding cycle. Its average group size was slightly the largest, also skewed by one poor group. The problem with this stuff: A bad shot that messes up a group can be shooter error. I’ve done enough bench shooting that I can usually feel a “flier,” but it’s impossible to be certain. On any given day, you might do better or worse. And on any given day, I might do better or worse.

The Bottom Line

It's not important, because this rifle produced very good accuracy for any tubular magazine lever-action. I’ve seen some rifles do better, others not as good. This walnut and blued steel Henry proved itself plenty accurate enough to take down any deer or hog within the .30-30’s capability. Henry’s H009 series is characterized by straight grip and smaller lever loop. With 20-inch barrel, it’s short and handy, comes up well, and functions perfectly. I like it, hope to shoot some hogs with it soon. You might prefer the H010 series, almost identical, but with a curved pistol grip and oversized lever loop. Like all Henry firearms, they come with a lifetime warranty. Maybe it’s time for you to join the new shooting club that’s loving the sweet-handling, fast-shooting all-American lever-action.

Henry H009g Specs

• Type: Lever-Action
• Caliber: .30-30
• Capacity: 5
• Barrel: Round Blued Steel, 20 in., 1:12 Twist
• Overall Length: 39 in.
• Weight: 7 lbs.
• Stock: American Walnut
• MSRP: $1,088
• Manufacturer: Henry Repeating Arms, henryusa.com