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Thread: 44 Special Lever Gun

  1. #1
    Member Crazy Dane's Avatar
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    44 Special Lever Gun

    I have 2 GP100s in .44 Special and wanting a companion rifle. I know I can shoot the Special in rifles chambered for .44 Magnum. I have found out Cimarron Arms lists the 1873 in .44 Special but I have exhausted Google in trying to find one and is slightly over budget.

    This brings me to these questions,

    How well does the Marlin 1894 tune to the shorter Special cartridges and is there any negatives in shooting just Specials?(this is the most viable option)

    Have a 94 rechambered/rebarreled to the special?

    Win the lottery and do a full on custom?

    Something I'm missing?

    I'm crazy and shouldn't be posting while drinking gin?


    Thanks, yall are so swell.

  2. #2
    Site Supporter entropy's Avatar
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    Same boat as you, but only one Ruger! I did some “online research” a while back on this as I was (and still am) entertaining the same thing. There are folks much better acquainted with lever guns here, but what I found was that the Rossi’s can be “hit and miss” reliable out of the box with specials and at the same time are somewhat bullet dependent on feeding. Being what it is, I’d imagine we’d both be handloading anyhow. It’s one of those itches that regularly pops up for me, and one day maybe I’ll go ahead and scratch it. Looking forward to everyone’s insight on this as well.

    BTW, is one of your Rugers a 5”? If so, pics pleeease! When they came out on Lipsey’s a while back, funds weren’t available. No matter how much I drooled, it made no difference. Now that they’re gone and difficult to find, I kick myself for not growing a pair and taking my lumps sleeping in the garage. It would have been worth it!
    Working diligently to enlarge my group size.

  3. #3
    Frequent DG Adventurer fatdog's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by entropy View Post
    Rossi’s can be “hit and miss” reliable out of the box with specials and at the same time are somewhat bullet dependent on feeding
    I can offer no help but I will echo this caution. My Rossi '92 would not reliably feed .44 specials every time, about 1 out of 10 would jump the guide rails and tie it up and it got worse trying to run it hard. When I feed it .44 Magnum cases all is well. Best I can figure it is just the way the guide rails are set up.

  4. #4
    Site Supporter Oldherkpilot's Avatar
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    My 1894s (one in .44 and one in .357) were not not particularly happy with Specials and I had the same experience with an IMI Timberwolf in .357. I wouldn't worry too much about it but I downloaded the full-length cartridges to mitigate the wiggling of the lever with Specials.

  5. #5
    Hillbilly Elitist Malamute's Avatar
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    The couple Marlins 44s I had in the 80s ran OK with spls, but they were mostly factory 246 gr RN which are a bit long.

    The 92 type actions can be tuned to feed shorter cartridges. The fact that they are hit or miss from the factory on the rossis is a clue. Id guess Steve of Steves Gunz could make one work reliably. Im not positive, but the cartridge stop in the left side of the frame is probably the part to address to affect length tolerance.

    Steve also mentioned elsewhere that the 92 actions are known to have problems when run fast with straight wall shells, they were designed for bottleneck shells (44-40, 38-40). Still, some seem to work better than others for whatever reason. I havent had any problems with a Browning 92 44, but I also may not run it particularly fast. I may not have ever been sufficiently motivated to do so.

    Rebarrelling a 94 to spl doesnt deal with the cartridge length feeding issue specifically, Id guess the same work can be done to the same gun in 44 mag to make it feed spls fine. You may run into barrel groove diameter differences that make exact same loads to be used in pistol and carbine not perform besat in one or the other. Groove diameter in rifle specs is a couple-3 thousandths larger allowable I believe. Cast may be more of an issue in that regard than jacketed, or you may luck into loads that work great in both. No guarantees either way.
    “Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.”
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  6. #6
    Site Supporter OlongJohnson's Avatar
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    Mentioned it a few times in other threads, so I was going to shut up about it, but since Malamute brought it up...

    Marlin 1894s in .44M often have groove diameter ~ .431, so you can end up with issues where jacketed bullets kinda rattle around and may be less than optimally accurate, and especially with microgroove rifling, non-jacketed bullets tend to have some leading unless they are sized up to .432, which may be an issue shooting them in the GPs.

    If I was still pursuing this, I'd look for a Winchester, Browning or one of the Chiappa Alaskan take-down 1892s. The only one I have hands-on experience with is the Chiappa, which cycled as smoothly in the LGS as something that costs that much should. Haven't shot any of them. I guess I'm just reluctant to take on another Marlin 1894.
    .
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    Not another dime.

  7. #7
    Member Crazy Dane's Avatar
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    I plan on loading for this rifle. If it is any indication of what my plans are, both of my revolvers has never fired a factory round and the 3 inch has never fired a jacketed bullet. I guess I could load magnum brass for the rifle. I even already have loaded rounds and brass from when I had a Ruger Super Blackhawk in .44 magnum. I could always start with a tube full of magnums and feed specials off the belt, if 7 to 10 rounds of magnums haven't solved my problem I don't think any of the quirks of shooting specials is gonna matter.

    I have emails in to Steves Gunz and these guys ​www.grizzlycustom.com
    Grizzly Customs are doing Marlin 94s in 10mm and .45 ACP so if anybody can make what I want, I think it will be these guys. I may have to sell off a kidney though because I have only $1k budgeted for this.

    I have read the Rossi 92s seem to be more problematic out of the box but will tune better than the Marlins but the Marlins are better a feeding specials out of the box. The Rossi's run about $200 cheaper than the Marlins in my area but the Marlin is a flat top that would take to an optic better.

  8. #8
    The Nostomaniac 03RN's Avatar
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    My .357 m92 has no issue with any .38 loads ive tried. Swc, wn-swc, jfp, fmj of various weights and manufacturers.

    I know its not a .44. Just saying.

    If i was going to try what your doing i wouldn't hesitate to use either a marlin or rossi. Ive had a 1894SS that worked fine with .44 specials.

  9. #9
    Member Baldanders's Avatar
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    My Winchester .357 94 is fine with Specials.
    REPETITION CREATES BELIEF
    REPETITION BUILDS THE SEPARATE WORLDS WE LIVE AND DIE IN
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  10. #10
    Member Crazy Dane's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by entropy View Post
    Same boat as you, but only one Ruger! I did some “online research” a while back on this as I was (and still am) entertaining the same thing. There are folks much better acquainted with lever guns here, but what I found was that the Rossi’s can be “hit and miss” reliable out of the box with specials and at the same time are somewhat bullet dependent on feeding. Being what it is, I’d imagine we’d both be handloading anyhow. It’s one of those itches that regularly pops up for me, and one day maybe I’ll go ahead and scratch it. Looking forward to everyone’s insight on this as well.

    BTW, is one of your Rugers a 5”? If so, pics pleeease! When they came out on Lipsey’s a while back, funds weren’t available. No matter how much I drooled, it made no difference. Now that they’re gone and difficult to find, I kick myself for not growing a pair and taking my lumps sleeping in the garage. It would have been worth it!








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