Marlin 336A .35 Rem. feeding problem

[26Charlie]

Does anyone have recommendations ho to fix this problem:

The 336A is .35 Remington caliber. With a regular length bullet like RCBS 35-200-FP there is no problem feeding from the magazine.
With a short bullet, such as Lyman 358477 150 gr SWC, the following cartridge catches on the extractor groove instead of the base, allowing the base to protrude into the path of the lifter, which jams the gun.
I have to reach into the receiver with a screwdriver and pry the cartridge forward to clear the jam, but I do not see why the length of the bullet makes any difference to the mechanism.
I of course would like it to feed short bullet rounds, since I shoot reduced small-game bullet loads now and again.

[Dan Cash]

Worn cartridge stop?

[largom]

Length of boolit could/does determine position of cartridge in lifter.
Try seating your short boolit out for an OAL same as RCBS 200gr. and see if problem still exists.
Larry

[35remington]

Seating out a pistol SWC to equal the OAL of the RCBS 200 FN loaded round will mean the round won't chamber, as the bearing surface is too far forward.

The length of the round does, to some extent, determine feeding reliability, but I have seen mixed reports from various Marlin 336 owners as to whether the short OAL pistol SWC's will feed through the magazine. This is fixable in some cases.

My 80's 336 35 Remington gags on short rounds especially with a lot of tube spring pressure, while my 2003 336 35 Remington fed them flawlessly right off the bat. The difference seems to be the behavior of the carrier in cutting off the following round - in the properly feeding 336 this is in a higher position before the round in the tube completely slides on to the carrier. Since it is bearing with upward pressure on the round as it comes out of the tube and it isn't too low, as soon as the end of the carrier hits the smaller diameter neck of the round it moves upward a little, positively cutting off the round in the tube, which, of course, is fatter than the gap present. The round stops properly.

The first question to be asked is are all your screws tight, including those on the bottom of the rifle behind the forend? If this is loose, the rifle will choke sometimes. The bottom screw is the main culprit but I will not guarantee this will be a fix. Make sure it's tight, and if that fixes it, use some mild Loctite to hold it in place.

Check to see how many rounds must be in the magazine to cause this jamming. One of my 336's positively will not feed SWC's of short OAL unless there is no more than two rounds in the tube. You can always use the rifle as a two or three shot, depending upon the sensitivity to rounds remaining in the magazine.

[26Charlie]

Yep, screws are tight.

A cartridge feeding properly is held back out of the receiver until the lifter rises with the preceding round to point it at the chamber, the bolt picks it up and chambers it, and the lifter descends again, at which time it trips the cartridge stop to allow the next cartridge to move kerthunk! into the lifter/receiver area. Why this depends on length I still am not sure, but I measured the OAL of several loads as follows:

Remington 200 gr. JSP crimped to cannelure 2.525 "
SAECO 250 gr. GC crimped in Crimping groove 2.517"
RCBS 200 gr. GC crimped in crimping groove 2.411"
Lyman 215 gr. 358615 GC crimped in crimping groove 2.288"
All those feed fine, the following two do not:
Lyman 112 gr. 358302 PB seated to cover grooves 2.234"
Lyman 150 gr. 358477 SWC crimped in crimping groove 2.224"

So there is what I know so far.
Thanks for the comments and consideration of this puzzle.

[Papa Foxtrot]

I had a problem with my 336 where the rim of the case would hang on the loading door. Then it would pop free and the next cartridge would slip past the magazine "gate"(don't know the proper name for the part) and tie up the gun. Stoning down a rough edge on the loading door fixed it.

HTH

[35remington]

Have a look at this and see if it's relevant:

http://marauder.homestead.com/files/marlin94fix.html

[rfcpython]

I wrote to Marlin about this very situation 30 years ago. Here, essentially, is what they told me:

The rifle won't feed ammunition that is shorter than SAAMI min length. It can be modified to do so, by making semi-permanent modifications to the cartridge lifter and the interrupter in the magazine tube that keeps more than one round from feeding at a time. If these mods are made, the rifle will no longer feed standard-length ammunition.

My experience with several Marlin and Winchester rifles since then verifies this. Centerfire lever guns with tube mags simply won't feed cartridges that are too long or too short. I load a lot of ammunition that fits this description. When using such ammo, my rifles become single shots.

Before Marlin re-introduced the 1894, I saw a .444 that had been modified to feed .44 mag ammo. It would no longer feed .444s. The owner said his gunsmith spent many, many hours getting it to work, and charged for the hours. It still had the original .444 chamber, and accuracy was nothing to write home about. So if you want to mod your rifle, bring money. Me, I'll just continue dropping the rounds into the chamber by hand.