1894 357 marlin

[legend]

hi,i have spent a frustrating four hours,disassembling,and polishing he places that needed it badly(this one should have never left the factory)
after re bluing the polished parts and re-assembling the only 357 it will take in the mag is the first one....
it jams and i cant shove a second one in.
the portion of the frame where the shell comes out was BADLY burred,and scrapeing the brass(gouging it),i ground off the offending burr,polished and re blued etc.

last year it jammed at the range and i decided to remove the mag spring to clear it,well i didnt know enough to catch the spring(laugh now)

i ordered a new one from marlin and recieved it.

PHEWW that took a while to say..

now,the gist of my questin is this,are the 357 and other cals a different size spring? it seems like the follower in the magazine is way too stiff,and the spring very large(might the spring be tipping and preventing the follower from working)?

looking at the spring it looks too fat and wont go into the muzzel end of the follower.

would someone please measure thier 357s spring ? diameter please.
and it might help if a second person would measure thier .44 or 45 colt also.

thanks for the help.

im tired of being mad and need sleep

[Denver]

The magazine spring as well as the follower should slide freely thru the tube. I'd remove the plug and spring and see if there is something restricting it. One thing to check is where the notch in the tube for the barrel band screw is.

[cajun shooter]

You might want to invest in a book. It's called Gunsmithing Guns Of the Old West by David R. Chicoine. It has the drawings and info you need to work on this gun. One thing that most people do is change out the follower with one of stainless. When you have your gun working again you can let the spring stick out the end of the magazine tube and cut it to the length of about 3 cartridges from the end. It will make loading a better chore. Check the screw that is behind the loading gate. If it's loose it will not load. You can also buy parts for your Marlin from Brownell's.

[legend]

thanks to you both,i will try your sugestions and report my findings.

[Wally]

What is nice about this load is that you use little powder and the lighter bullet saves lead. I got a std deviation reading of 3.31 FPS and a spread of under 10 FPS...by far the best that I have ever achieved with cast boolits in the carbine. At 1,460 PFS the MV is quite good for the shooting that I do. I never tried this before as I assumed the bollit & the load would not be all that good...

[Bassleg]

report my findings????????????????????

[Four Fingers of Death]

How'd it go Lege?

[legend]

i have de-burred untill i am blue in the face,it was awfull.
the magazine spring sent by marlin is way too fat,it binds badly and a new one is in order when i can..
everything else now works well,so,i just need the right spring;money is real tight as i am still jobless,this project is on the back burner..

sorry for the delay

[Four Fingers of Death]

Thats cool, first things first. Good luck with it all. When you get it sorted you will have a rifle that will last a few lifetimes at least.

[SciFiJim]

One thing that most people do is change out the follower with one of stainless.

I have a .357 Marlin lever gun. Why do people change out the follower? Is it just for aesthetics, or is there a functional reason? I kind of like the orange plastic follower, it can't be mistaken for anything else on the rifle.

[O.S.O.K.]

If this were my gun, I'd call Marlin and explain the whole whole deal and see if you can send it in to them to work over. Yes, even though you did the polishing and such - they will most likely help you out. After all, it should've been right from the get go....

[Jack Stanley]

I had a Marlin like that once , I wrote a letter to them , enclosing some fired cases that were so far oversized at firing a blind man could see something was wrong . There attitude was the the cases are within specifications , we don't advise reloading of ammunition , suck an egg and enjoy it . Somehow the warm relationship I expected from them turned into what I'd come to expect from Lyman .

It's really to bad too because I do have a Marlin that shoots ( and gets fed reloaded ammo ) real well . Maybe their attitude has changed since they made my bad experience and perhaps they will do right by you . I'd like to think they will .

Jack

[beagle]

My first M1894 was like that. Wouldn't feed from the mag to save your butt. Either reloads or factory, .38 Specials or .357 Mags. I put a bunch of rounds through it single shot hoping it would smooth up and finally carried it to my gunsmith. He said it was fairly new so it went back to Marlin. Came back the same way so we sent it again with a letter taped to it no less. Came back the same. He reached over and called Marlin and I got a brand new rifle. We tested it in his test fire pit before I left. It's been a good one since then with over 20K of assorted stuff through it and onlt a broken firing pin./beagle