Henry Big Boy 44 Mag

[starnbar]

Went to the range the other day and a young man had a Henry 44 mag with the octagon barrel I got to talking with him and he let me shoot it with Winchester 240 grain loads factory. It shot very nice at the 50 yard line good feel and heft to it not much recoil at all one thing though it loads like a 22 from the front of the magazine tube and the cutout is pretty generous so it looks like you could probably load a 300-350 grain pb without any problems. I checked at my local Walmart and they told me there were two coming in a 44 and a357 If the price isn't too bad I might have to do Christmas early.

[claude]

Just a word of advice, the cutout does not determine how long a cartridge will feed through the action. From experience I know for a fact you can load longer cartridges through the cutout than will run through the action, and it can suck big time getting the stuck cartridge out of the half in half out position. There are two ways you will succeed with heavy bullets, one is to seat them deep enough to reliably feed, or two, you can load them as a single shot.

[starnbar]

Been there done that with my model 94 and you are right about that but the feed on this henry looks pretty generous just saying it looks like it should go but the real test is to try it.

[tazman]

As Claude said, there are definitely constraints as to what will feed through the action. My neighbor had one of those in 45 Long Colt. It shot well with both jacketed and cast. He was limited to bullets of 270 grains or less to be able to feed through the action.
I see no reason the same thing would not apply to the 44 mag version.

[Themoose]

You definitely want to limit your overall length or you will be taking the rifle apart... how do I know? Tried some cast 44's for my other two rifles... Ended up seating to slightly under Henry's limit and end of problem... I modified a 94 marlin(carrier, I think) to handle longer cartridges, but my Henry is inherited from a close relative and I do not want to alter it...

[Hannibal]

I have a Henry Big Boy in .357. It would shoot most anything pretty well @ 50 yds, but shooting to 100 yds was like going to Mars. To make a long story short, it turns out the barrel had constrictions every place a dovetail was cut. (Front and rear sight, plus mag tube hanger. I hand-lapped the barrel, about an 8 hour process, and it will now hold an honest 4" @100 yds. Not stellar, but before it was not unusual to loose a few rounds off an 8 1/2" x 11" piece of paper @ 100. If you plan to shoot 50 yds and under, this will not matter. But if you plan to reach out to 100 yds and more, you might want to keep this in mind. I suspect my rifle barrel was not an unusual anomoly.
Good luck with your choice, whatever your decision.