POTD: The Winchester G30M – Beating the Garand, Almost

Welcome to today’s Photo of the Day! Here we have Winchester’s attempt to build a better Garand. It failed, and in failing it handed us the M1 Carbine, so I would call that a fair trade.

Winchester bought Ed Browning’s self-loading patents before he died in 1939. By 1938 the company had talked itself into believing the newly adopted M1 Garand had real problems, and it wanted a house design sitting ready in case Ordnance came shopping again. Right after Browning’s death they hired David Marshall Williams to take the design over. The big change was the operating system. Williams threw out Browning’s annular gas piston and put in his own short stroke gas tappet, a stubby little piston under the barrel that smacks the operating rod rearward and then stops. That tappet is the whole reason anybody remembers this program.

What came out is the G30M. Chambered in 30-06, tilting bolt, a modified BAR style detachable box holding twenty, a stripper clip guide milled into the receiver and a bayonet lug cut for the M1905. In December of 1940 Winchester sent a handful to Marine Corps trials in San Diego to run against Melvin Johnson’s rifle, the 1903 and the Garand. The Marines picked the Garand.

Very few got built and most of the survivors live behind museum glass, so getting to look at one out in the open is not something that happens often.

Most of our POTDs utilize images from our friends at Rock Island Auction Company, the premier firearms auction in the United States. Take some time to browse their current auctions – who knows, maybe you’ll find a piece of history to take home!

“Rare Experimental Prototype Winchester G30M Semi-Automatic Rifle.” Rock Island Auction, www.rockislandauction.com/detail/4097/1265/rare-experimental-prototype-winchester-g30m-semiautomatic-rifle. Accessed 31 Aug. 2026.

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