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I’m looking for a blank for a project and these are about the lowest priced I can find. Numrich has them listed as new H&R 44 cal. blanks 1 3/6” x 23 1/2” # 585600 for $ 53.50.
I’m a little leary of the quality as it would seem they would be sold out like most everything else they sell ? Anybody use this blank or have ordered one of these and have a opinion on the bore quality ?
Thanks, Jedman
That's a great price if it's a good barrel, which I think an H&R would be, right?
What are you up to? Inquiring minds......
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TbG, I just won a Swedish/ Remington rolling block action with a butt stock on Gunbroker . I don’t have it yet but it looks to be in nice condition but it has no barrel and maybe no extractor.
The way I buy and sell guns , one day I have half a dozen guns in 44 cal. and currently I only have 2 but have over a dozen in .452-.458 bore. I would like to rebarrel it to something strait walled like a 38-55, 41 Mag., 44 Mag. but barrel blanks are kind of scarce and expensive lately.
Regarding the H&R barrel, usually they are decent quality but the listing says they were from a combination gun and I don’t remember any they made with a 44 cal over a shotgun barrel ? Also about every source for cheap blanks I know are out of stock right now.
I did buy 2 blanks once from them that were unbranded manufacture and the bores looked like I made them with a drill bit and a wood chisel so I sent them back and got a refund with no issues.
I still don’t have my lathe wired up yet since my move months ago but I have bought a boat load of guns lately and the projects are way behind.
Jedman
By 44 cal you are meaning 0.430 groove diameter - not 44 cal as in the old days like the 44-77 Remington at 0.446" ?
Yes , I would assume it’s a .429 - .432 groove barrel they list it as a 1-20 twist but nothing else.
Jedman
Maybe by combination gun, they simply meant that an interchangeable shotgun barrel was included?
Maybe ask the Handi addicts on GBO?
Or buy it for inspection, then send it back if it's sub par. Good hunting.
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Thanks, I did do just that. I added a few other small items to get the free shipping and ordered it.
I don’t know what gun H&R ever used with 12 groove rifling ? Sounds like a micro-groove barrel but if it isn’t good I will send it back like you suggested.
Jedman
It seems like I remember that Marlin bought NEF shortly before Remington bought Marlin.
I saw an NEF Pardner shotgun on gunbroker with Marlin stamped on the barrel. Maybe these barrels are microgroove and were prototypes to use on the handi rifles before everything went south.
Theories and conjecture aplenty above.
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After doing some searching online I found that H&R did use some micro groove barrels on some of the handi rifles and that’s probably what this blank is. I know the earlier 44 mags and 444 Marlins had 1-38 twist then later they changed to 1- 20 twist and those may have had the MG barrels ? I own and have owned dozens of handis and I guess I was blind to the fact that some had micro groove barrels, probably because they don’t get their bores cleaned until they start shooting bad.
Jedman
Attachment 286597Well the rolling block receiver came the other day and today the barrel arrived. The barrel is definitely a micro groove, after running some cleaning patches down the bore it looks real nice but boy those grooves are shallow !
The barrel is a big honkin piece of steel. Over 1.2” diameter so there will be a lot of chips to be made to get this down to the profile I want. I haven’t slugged it but from what I remember these have a large .431-.432 groove diameter. Looks good ! I’m happy with the bore quality and the bore is actually in the center of the blank on both ends, better than expected.
Jedman
That's going to be neat. How about a 45-70 necked down to .44?
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I am still undecided as to what I will chamber it to. To be a legal deer caliber in the area I live it needs to be a straight walled cartridge. I have a lot of new Starline brass in 445 super magnum but don’t want someone that may own the rifle after me to think a full pressure 445 would be safe. I am thinking of cutting the brass down to 1.5” and stamp the barrel 44 x 1.5” so a 445 SM wouldn’t chamber. I figure I can load the cartridge with powder in the 3031 , 4895 burn range to keep pressures down but still have good velocity from the longer barrel.
It would still be able to fire 44 mag and 44 spl. with the longer chamber and should be safe with that.
I am still a couple months from having my machinery set up at my new home and have a list of projects waiting now.
Jedman
The swedish RB should be fine for at least 40Kpsi which is about where most 445SM loads will come in at. If what happens with it when you no longer own it worries you, have "black powder only" stamped on the barrel". You're not going to get enough BP in a 445SM case to cause an issue. If someone down the road decides they want to reload it to 444 marlin velocities, then that's on them. Are you going with an octagon barrel? You should consider it. You've got 3 months and 6 days before opening day.
The only issue I've had with microgroove barrels is you may need a floating pilot to get the correct pilot size as the land diameter is usually larger than conventional rifling.
Thanks Moleman ! I will probably use the GBO 445 SM reamer as I have reamed 3 or 4 barrels with it already and it is a floating pilot reamer. I don’t think there are any extra pilot bushings for it but I will deal with that if I use it.
I would like to mill the blank octagonal but don’t have the table travel on my small mill, but do have friends with larger machines ????
Jedman
You should be able to make a pilot fairly easily on a lathe, if not the manufacturers usually will sell different sized pilots. The cheap SS 44 blanks I bought a few years ago were slightly tighter than the blanks from GMB so I went with a floating pilot on the reamers for them. Don't know how big of a mill you have, but sometimes you can bolt a longer plate to your mill table and offset the head to mill something longer than your table in two setups. It's far from ideal but I've done it on a bench mill. Once you draw file the flats the overlap disappears. Bigger mills are much easier to just machine the flats in one pass. Still have the bench mill but also have a 49" bridgeport clone now which makes setup much easier.
I saw those blanks and avoided them because of my experience with an h&r 44 mag micro groove barrel I had. It was a decent barrel with jackets but I had to get lead slugs up to .431 to get to shoot worth anything. With everything else .44 of mine running a .429 it was a pain to cast and load for so it went down the road. But that’s just me, I figured it was easier to build a stub barrel 44 mag on a GM blank then mess with oversized slugs in one rifle.
The price does not sound so much lower than Green Mountain that is known for quality. Having owned micro-grove Marlin and never been able to satisfy its taste for ammo for the sake of accuracy, I am weary of MG.