rwj,
the powder column length VS inside case diameter and taper and resultant case length is the reason.
It's a shame you do not have access to Precision Shooting Magazines from the 1970's era.
Ferris Pindell and Dr Palmisano were inveterate tinkers, and short range BR shooters. All of their experiments were detailed there. The PPC is based on the 220 russian case.
The last viable experiment/attempt to beat the PPC was by Seeley Masker and Dave Tooley in the early 1990's, iirc. Masker did not like shooters using a russian assault cartridge to shoot BR. He took Lapua (again, iirc) 30-30 brass and basically replicated the 219 Donaldson Wasp except in 6mm. He also turned the rims down to .308 case head diameter. It was competitive in the NE area. There's a Gun Digest from that era and an article by then PS editor Dave Brennan called "The Assault on Palmisano (again, iirc) which detailed the efforts of Masker, Tooley, and a few others using the SMW.
Back then Federal made match grade 222 and 6x47 (necked up 222 magnum). High quality, to be sure. They were able to convince Federal to make a run of what was termed "30 American" brass. 30-30, small primer pocket, 308 case head diameter and match grade in all specs. At that time Lapua was not making the high quality PPC brass they are today. Many shooters would prep their PPC brass, fire form on the warm up match, shoot the five 5-shot matches for aggregate, and generally just throw the brass in the trash barrel. Primer Pockets would loosen bad. The 6mm Seeley Masker Wasp got popular. It woke Lapua up, and that killed the Wasp. They began to produce better/stronger cases. Shooters would rather just turn the case necks, trim to length, and go shoot the PPC than mess with shortening the 30-30 case to SMW.
It is a shame you younger people (under 50) have not heard the pre-PPC history. Early on, a match with 50 shooters would have 30 or more different wildcats there. A lot of them were gunsmiths. They would invent a variant of the Wasp, win two or three straight matches, and customers would flock to them to get a new barrel or set their current one back if it still looked good down the bore.
My favorite pre-222 Remington was the Marciante Blue Streak. He was a gun smith, and one evening before a big match he formed the basic case out of one of the 30-30 family. The Wasp case shortened the 30-30 about 1/10th of an inch and maximized case capacity with decreased taper and a sharp should.
Most gun smiths made their own single flute reamers. Marciante left the case full length, and cut a reamer to match. He won the next day, and the Blue Streak was a contender. Unfortunately, the 222 came out shortly thereafter, and it and the rest of the 30-30 based cartridges died.
Rich
PS: gentlemen who know more are welcome to correct me here.
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