Vly
11-23-2008, 07:16 PM
Update - 50 yard target results in post #14
Back in mid-October I posted about a Marlin Model 1889 that I had received as a gift from my father in law. In that thread the overwhelming opinion was I should get the old gal shooting again. Here is link to that thread with photos of the rifle.
http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=37689
Many hours have been spent cleaning the rifle and preparing for the first shooting session. The first area of concern was the bore. This rifle was manufactured in 1892, so was in use during the era of corrosive priming. Many guns of this era have dark bores due to corrosive priming and inadequate cleaning. This rifle fared like many others, and the first 4 inches in front of the chamber is dark in the grooves. The lands are bright and well defined. I spent many hours cleaning and made much progress, but it obviously will never look like it did 116 years ago when it left the Marlin factory. The encouraging thing for me was reading how many guns shot just fine in spite of the dark bore. So there was hope.
The second challenge was the bore diameter. I slugged the bore and measured .308 x .315, not what we are accustomed to in modern rifles. Where to get a boolit appropriate for a 32-20 that measures around .315? Thats where fellow board member Woody1 stepped in and gave my reloading project a huge boost. Woody sent 3 boolit styles of the diameter I needed.
http://www.fototime.com/B0C3EB738F54CD9/standard.jpg
These are the boolits sent by Woody. Left to right they are the Willbird Plinker Group Buy, the RCBS 32-98-SWC, and the Lyman 3118 beagled up to .315. Thank you, Woody!
So with a supply of boolits I loaded some test rounds. I also loaded 5 rounds using a 100gr JHP and 4.2 gr of Unique. The plan was to fire these first to both smooth up the bore and hopefully get some more black crap out. I fired all the test rounds at 25 yds as I had no idea what to expect as far as accuracy. All my j-word bullets and cast boolits fed correctly through the magazine and chambered correctly with no issues.
http://www.fototime.com/AC93A4FCDE6E35B/standard.jpg
They all made nice round holes and hit alittle left of point of aim. I then cleaned the bore again and got alot of black out, far more than the fouling of 5 shots.
Next I tried the Lyman 3118 over 5.0 grs of SR-4756. I think this charge needs to be boosted alittle. The boolits show evidence of tipping.
http://www.fototime.com/7D500CB7181F091/standard.jpg
Next was the Willbird Plinker boolit over 4.2grs of Unique. I only had 3 of these - wish I had loaded more as the results looked very promising. Nice round holes!
http://www.fototime.com/A1A0DC92647A6E6/standard.jpg
I also shot a few of the RCBS boolit and they appeared to be very stable as well. So for a first time out with a rifle that has not been fired in decades, I was very happy with the results. This evening I have loaded a larger sample of the Willbird Plinker over Unique to try next time. Lots of fun with a 116 year old rifle. Much more load development to do.
Back in mid-October I posted about a Marlin Model 1889 that I had received as a gift from my father in law. In that thread the overwhelming opinion was I should get the old gal shooting again. Here is link to that thread with photos of the rifle.
http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=37689
Many hours have been spent cleaning the rifle and preparing for the first shooting session. The first area of concern was the bore. This rifle was manufactured in 1892, so was in use during the era of corrosive priming. Many guns of this era have dark bores due to corrosive priming and inadequate cleaning. This rifle fared like many others, and the first 4 inches in front of the chamber is dark in the grooves. The lands are bright and well defined. I spent many hours cleaning and made much progress, but it obviously will never look like it did 116 years ago when it left the Marlin factory. The encouraging thing for me was reading how many guns shot just fine in spite of the dark bore. So there was hope.
The second challenge was the bore diameter. I slugged the bore and measured .308 x .315, not what we are accustomed to in modern rifles. Where to get a boolit appropriate for a 32-20 that measures around .315? Thats where fellow board member Woody1 stepped in and gave my reloading project a huge boost. Woody sent 3 boolit styles of the diameter I needed.
http://www.fototime.com/B0C3EB738F54CD9/standard.jpg
These are the boolits sent by Woody. Left to right they are the Willbird Plinker Group Buy, the RCBS 32-98-SWC, and the Lyman 3118 beagled up to .315. Thank you, Woody!
So with a supply of boolits I loaded some test rounds. I also loaded 5 rounds using a 100gr JHP and 4.2 gr of Unique. The plan was to fire these first to both smooth up the bore and hopefully get some more black crap out. I fired all the test rounds at 25 yds as I had no idea what to expect as far as accuracy. All my j-word bullets and cast boolits fed correctly through the magazine and chambered correctly with no issues.
http://www.fototime.com/AC93A4FCDE6E35B/standard.jpg
They all made nice round holes and hit alittle left of point of aim. I then cleaned the bore again and got alot of black out, far more than the fouling of 5 shots.
Next I tried the Lyman 3118 over 5.0 grs of SR-4756. I think this charge needs to be boosted alittle. The boolits show evidence of tipping.
http://www.fototime.com/7D500CB7181F091/standard.jpg
Next was the Willbird Plinker boolit over 4.2grs of Unique. I only had 3 of these - wish I had loaded more as the results looked very promising. Nice round holes!
http://www.fototime.com/A1A0DC92647A6E6/standard.jpg
I also shot a few of the RCBS boolit and they appeared to be very stable as well. So for a first time out with a rifle that has not been fired in decades, I was very happy with the results. This evening I have loaded a larger sample of the Willbird Plinker over Unique to try next time. Lots of fun with a 116 year old rifle. Much more load development to do.