357 in 24" MArlin CB

[crabo]

I am having some problems working up a good target load for Lever Action Pistol Cartridge Silhouette. I have a number of loads using Herco and Unique in the 6.4-7 grains, with a 160 grain boolit. The gun is shooting 3/4 to 1 1/2" groups at 50 yards, but falls apart to 3-5 inches at 100 yards. I am using CR lube.

I have a 3.5x10 Luepold on the gun and I put the front support in front of the reciever.

Any ideas?

[mike in co]

I am having some problems working up a good target load for Lever Action Pistol Cartridge Silhouette. I have a number of loads using Herco and Unique in the 6.4-7 grains, with a 160 grain boolit. The gun is shooting 3/4 to 1 1/2" groups at 50 yards, but falls apart to 3-5 inches at 100 yards. I am using CR lube.

I have a 3.5x10 Luepold on the gun and I put the front support in front of the reciever.

Any ideas?

more velocity

[1Shirt]

More vol, and or heavier blt!
1Shirt!:coffeecom

[gasboffer]

I had a Marlin .357. I slugged the bbl and got three tight spots, one where the front sighty dovetailed, one where the front band of the foreend touched the bbl, and one where the rear sight dovetail was. I could only get decent accuracy with relatively soft bullets that would upset as they passed the tight spots. Best accuracy was with Rem. semi-jacket hollow points. They have a real thin jacket.
Clyde

[Slow Elk 45/70]

different powder, more velocity, you might want to water drop those boolits and be sure they are the right size for your bbl., hard to say with the limited info you gave....but I bet you can get there!!

[centershot]

Crabo,
I found my 357 mag Marlin 1894 to be fussy about what it would shoot. Low velocity loads were OK at short range, as you have discovered, but don't work well at 100 meters. The above posts are steering you in the right direction, increase your velocity and bullet weight. I settled on a 180 gr PB TC bullet cast hard over 12 gr of #2400 powder. With aperture sights it shoots into 2" @ 100 meters. Hope that helps!:)

Patrick

[GabbyM]

Is this a plain based bullet you're using for one of those games that require that?

I have a custom gas checked 170gr bullet for marlin Lever guns here that when kicked with a load of H110 should get out their. It has for others. There's a photo of it in my album on here. I could send you some in the white pretty cheap. Putting on gas checks isn't something I do for fun. lol. I have a two gallon bucket full of Lyman #429215 sitting on my bench now. I should be working on . :coffee:

[crabo]

Here's my problem. I am using the plain based 160 grain boolit in the first picture. It is from a Mountain Mold that I had made. The two targets illustrate my problem.

The first target is at 50 yards. The second is at 100. The targets are a 180 grain GC boolit that came from a Mountain Mold I had made. Good at 50, bad at 100. I am working with the 160 grain pb boolit first. I have loaded up some different loads to try, but I ran out of daylight today.

I water drop my boolits, lube with CR. The 180 GC is also coated with LLA. I size to .359 I am using good bench technique because I can shoot good groups with my other rifles.
I have a Luepold 3.5X 10 on the rifle.

I do not want a barn burner load, just good accuracy at 100 yards. I hope this information helps. I have firelapped this gun.

[Three44s]

I had a Marlin .357. I slugged the bbl and got three tight spots, one where the front sighty dovetailed, one where the front band of the foreend touched the bbl, and one where the rear sight dovetail was. I could only get decent accuracy with relatively soft bullets that would upset as they passed the tight spots............................................. ......................
Clyde


I'd buy this book from Beartooth bullets:

http://www.beartoothbullets.com/bulletselect/index.htm


Three 44s

[GabbyM]

We may be back to post #2 where mike in co stated “more velocity”.

Sans some dark Gremlins what you have is probably no more than dispersion during the bullets transitioning to sub sonic velocity. Wide flat nose design may or may not aggravate that oscillation.

It looks to me you've plenty of room to increase velocity. I know you said no barn burner.

Being fast for rifle use. Herco and Unique, won't give you much more velocity than a 6” barrel pistol would . Your charge of 13.5gr of WW296 is what I see in the Hodgdon data book for a 180 grain bullet. Hodgdon uses the Nosler partition bullet for that 13.5gr charge. I'll assume that's a very long bullet using up powder capacity. Looking at the charge Lyman book list for Lyman 170gr #358429 is 14.4gr at 1638 fps starting then up to 15.0gr max for 1704 fps from 20” barrel. My NOE clone Lyman #358429 takes up .400” of case capacity as measured from top of crimp grove to base. That's only .020” or so shorter base than the Saeco 180gr gas checked bullet.

After all that the question with your plain based bullet is whether you'll be able to drive it fast enough accurately to stay super sonic at 100 yards. Odds are against you on that.

[Blammer]

I have a Win 94 with 24" brl, get some more velocity and you should be fine.

[EDK]

Try larger diameter boolits. Maybe tumble lube some unsized boolits since you aren't "looking for barn burner loads." My Cowboy rifles like the larger...and heavier boolits. I'm using the NOE 360 180 WFN, in GC and PB both, sized to .361...as cast diameter from a couple of my molds.

If you haven't read Glenn Fryxell's article on 1894 Marlins at lasc.us...go over to marlinowners.com also. There's a couple guys over there that are really intense about 357 Marlin rifles.

:cbpour::redneck::Fire:

[deadguy]

My .357 Marlin really likes the 125 grain semi-jacketed hollowpoints on top of a max charge of Win296. Wicked fast velocities from that load result in extremely entertaining total target annihilation when using water filled milk jugs. It pretty much vaporizes them.