Maynard Mystery. Can you help figure out what I have?

[doug strong]

On new years eve a buddy brought over his great grandfather's 1873 Maynard rifle. It has two barrels one for a shotgun and one for a rifle. He wants me to get him set up to shoot it. My first question is what caliber and gauge are they. Once I figure that out I will have some custom brass made up and start working on finding an appropiate boolit mould and developing a Black Powder load. Rocky Mountain Cartridge makes this brass but I need to figure out which one to order. I made chamber casts tonight of the two barrels and here is what I found.

Rifle barrel
Chamber: .397" by 1.492"
Lands: .353"
Grooves: .366"

Shotgun Barrel
Chamber .679" by 2.41"
Bore .637"

Any ideas would be excellent.

[pietro]

My WAG(s):

Rifle: .35-30 or .35-50 Maynard , 1882 versions, which have normal rims - the 1865 .35-30 has a huge-diameter rim, about 2x the case diameter.

Shotgun: 64 cal brass shell.


.

[calaloo]

Go to the American Single Shot Rifle Association web site: www.assra.com . There are Maynard folks on there that will help you.

[uscra112]

Agree, it's awfully close to being a .35 Maynard of some sort, but the chamber is too short for even a .35-30 1865. The base diameter is close, though.

https://www.buffaloarms.com/default.aspx has .35-40 Maynard in stock, but it'll probably be for the 1882 version, and will require a lot of trimming for your short chamber. It's also expensive, but you won't need a lot of it just to play around. Dies will be a headache. Rocky Mountain Cartridge in Wyoming may be able make some right to size, since they machine it from solid.

Go easy. The Maynard was considered a very good rifle, and a fairly strong one in it's time, but that's 140 year old metal, and who knows? I have fired my 1882 Maynard (.32-40) with very light loads, but not more than a dozen times, just for the nostalgia of it. They're more collector's items now.

A coupla photos with the breech closed would help.

And see if you can buy a copy of "The Maynard Breechloader" by George Layman. I can't get mine to lay flat enough to scan, but here's a page:

[STP22]

I hope both barrels are stamped with the same serial number as the receiver. Extra barrels were hand fitted to the frames then stamped.

My 1st Model`s 2 barrels are. (rifle and shotgun)

Enjoy them!

Scott

[doug strong]

These barrels are completely unmarked. They are certainly for the 73 model as there is the large gap for the huge heads.
I think mine is a 35-30 or 35-40

[uscra112]

Here's the first of two pages from Layman's book on how he made brass for his '73 Maynard .35-30:

[uscra112]

Second page:

[doug strong]

Thanks for that!

[doug strong]

Thanks to some helpful folks here I have been able to obtain a number of .357 Maximum cartridges and an appropriately sized boolit. I have made a washer to fit over the rim and the cases feed and extract nicely. I will be taking this old girl out to the range tomorrow. A report will follow (in more ways than one!)