Marlin Help

[Michael J. Spangler]

So I recently picked up a 1894 in 44 Special (barrel has been set back and re cut) from 1977.
The previous owner told me it double fed and that he never played with it and decided to sell it off.
Upon arrival I noticed that it was missing an ejector.
I took and old ejector from an original 1894 and bushed the button end with a piece of brass to center it and keep it in place. It seems to work well.

However I have an issue from time to time where upon firing the spent case being extracted get back to the point of almost ejection when things tend to bind up. If I tilt the barrel down and do a little jiggling I can close the bolt and try to cycle the gun again and sometime it will eject flawlessly and sometime it will hold up at that some spot. It's not the typical Marlin jam because I can push a the lever a little more and it gets past the bind up and ejects the spent case from the action. The typical Marlin jam would keep binding up tighter.

During this process the cartridge on the carrier seem to be free and not hung up in any way or interfering with the process.
This doesn't happen all the time, just from time to time.

I'm wondering if my issue is something with the carrier or if it's just an issue with having the improper ejector not tossing the spent brass out of the way as early as it should?

I'm going to take the rifle apart and remove the ejector to see if the issue is related. I also have a buddy with what I believe is also a 1977 vintage with the original wire spring ejector. I was going to try out his ejector to see if it solves the problem or not. Also probably swap out his carrier to see if the gunsmith that chambered this rifle in 44 special might have done a little too much monkeying with the carrier in some way.

Also I'm not sure if this is at all related but it can be hard to load the magazine at times like the edge of a SWC or the "case mouth" of a snap cap is getting caught on the mouth of the magazine tube. Does this happen from time to time if the magazine tube was shortened?

Thanks for looking!
I'll try to add some pictures of the jam.

[Michael J. Spangler]

[Michael J. Spangler]

As my father would say “Pretty, but can she fight?”

[Winger Ed.]

I've had a long barrel CB in .357Mag that would sometimes balk unless I cycled the lever rather briskly.

Don't beat on it, but cycle it firmly see if that helps or not.
That was the issue with mine, and I just dealt with it that way.
If nothing looks amiss, everything is clean & lubed; I'd try that before I started taking things apart and filing on them.

Including check if one particular cartridge does it every time, and others don't.

[popper]

Barrel set back!

[Michael J. Spangler]

I think I figured it out.
After much fiddling and holding the gun on weird angles and more fiddling.

It appears that the carrier has been modified on the front end. The whole ting ground down in the middle and the widened a bit between the ears. The ears lower and the middled lowered too.
So when the lever (which acts as a cartridge stop and eases the cartridge back as it opens) is almost all the way opened, the top of the carrier should lift a bit (enough so the bottom that protrudes through the trigger plate lifts fully inside the action) as the cartridge transitions from the lever to the back of the carrier the front of carrier is now lifted that 1/8" or so acting as a cartridge cut off for the next cartridge coming out of the magazine.
With this carrier the top front that should interact with the rim of the next cartridge as a cartridge stop is lowered to the point that the next cartridge rim just slips over the top a touch and the carrier catches on the underside of the rim. Basically short of the Marlin double feed jam. Sometimes the carrier will act perfectly as a cartridge stop and other times it just catches under the rim and holds things up.
Someone has already put a heavy bevel on the front of the carrier to attempt to ride over the rim and gently push it back in to the magazine.
Not really my cup of tea though.
So I loaded a couple RBC 45-250K so the whole crimp groove was exposed. The slightly longer OAL kept the chambering cartridge in contact with the next cartridge in the magazine long enough to raise the carrier the touch more that it needed to properly act as a magazine cut off.

So the timing was off a bit but not due to the typical worn carrier but a lowered carrier cartridge ramp.

So I'm going to borrow a buddies brand new carrier tonight or tomorrow to confirm that it will solve the problem. Then order a new one from Numrich tomorrow

The install a new rear sight seeing as it's a little bent. Then I should be in the game.

[Baltimoreed]

You might want to break the inside edge of the magazine tube if thats where the edge your rounds are occasionally hanging up when loading. There might be a ‘corner’ catching your bullet or case.

[Michael J. Spangler]

You might want to break the inside edge of the magazine tube if thats where the edge your rounds are occasionally hanging up when loading. There might be a ‘corner’ catching your bullet or case.

I think that issue was the SWC catching on the mag tube. I think I might not have had it seated in very well. Seems to be fine now.

New carrier is in and it lift a tad too early for long ammo but fine for the stuff I'm loading. So I should be fine and once it wears in a bit I could probably use a tad longer ammo if need be.

[Baltimoreed]

Glad you’ve got it running right. Years ago my 1894 cowboy ltd .45 developed the Dreaded Marlin Jam. JB weld and a end of a coping saw blade on the lifter fixed it. Hasn’t come apart yet and I run mine pretty fast.

[Michael J. Spangler]

Glad you’ve got it running right. Years ago my 1894 cowboy ltd .45 developed the Dreaded Marlin Jam. JB weld and a end of a coping saw blade on the lifter fixed it. Hasn’t come apart yet and I run mine pretty fast.

I've hear that is an awesome fix.
I probably could have done that to the last carrier to solve the issue but I hate having parts in my gun that look like bubba got on them with a dremel. Whether the work or not. I can't stand sloppy work

[W.R.Buchanan]

The fix for wearing of the underside of the carrier is to radius the top end of the Cam on the lever. They come with a sharp edge which wears the bottom of the carrier to the point where it is completely out of time. A .030 to .06 radius on the sharp end of that cam prevents this from ever happening. otherwise you need a new carrier.

This gun should not know the difference between Magnum length rounds and Special Length rounds. My 1894 CB of 2004 vintage will cycle all lengths and bullet styles as fast as you can run the lever.

Also see the sticky at the top of this forum on how to bevel the chamber mouth of your gun, It helps feeding more than any single thing you can do to it.

The carrier/lifter bounces off the bottom of the receiver during the reloading cycle. It bounces because it is being pushed past the rim of the first cartridge to allow it's passage over the lifter, and then holds pressure against the bottom of the that cartridge until the bullet passes the front end of the carrier, and the lifter raises up slightly to stop the next cartridge.

The lever must be operated somewhat briskly in order to accomplish this task uniformly. You don't have to go stupid on running the lever, just a positive motion all the way thru the cycle to the front of the lever throw. At that point the spent cartridge is ejected and as the lever is closed the lifter pins the cartridge against the top of the receiver so it can't fall out.

However the gun still needs to be close to upright for these actions to work properly. If you cycle the action slowly with it turned on its right side the gun will drop the new cartridge. You'll just have to live with that.

Hope this helps.

Randy

[beagle]

The .44 Marlins are strange when it comes to timing. I had one and the extractor/ejector are set up to function properly with Magnum length cases. I had problems in using .44 Special cases in it.
To elaborate further, I once had a M336 in .44 Magnum (yes, they made some). It had a different ejector and a long extractor. It was a bear when firing .44 Special cases./beagle

[John Taylor]

The timing on the carrier can be changed by adding a little weld to the the bottom where the lever raises it. As the cartridge goes back on the carrier the lever should raise the carrier to stop the next cartridge, it does not move it very far.

[buckshotshoey]

As my father would say “Pretty, but can she fight?”

I take it you like "The Dirty Dozen". Lol