Marlin Under Remington Stewardship Part II

The conclusion reached in Part 1 was that current Marlin Model 1895 product assembled in Remington’s Ilion, NY facility demonstrated that Remington has a handle on the lever gun’s production quality and there are a lot of good things ahead. Point by point, this example had none of the ailments of the gun we had reviewed several months ago. So we went on to assess the Guide Gun’s live fire performance.

It is tough to not have fun with a Marlin 1895G. It is one of the most comfortable little guns to shoot and it is a boomer. Over a decade ago, when I purchased my first Guide Gun, one of the first things I did was replace the recoil pad as an act of self-defense. That wasn’t the case, this time around, as the recoil pad did a good job absorbing the jolt from anything I was shooting. The pad does appear to be made with a softer compound. To take my metallic sight limitations out of the accuracy equation, a 2-10x scope was mounted, trying a couple of different types of mount systems.

NcStar & UTG… My apologies to the Marlin Guide Gun

Every once in a while I step out of the norm to try other products; types and brands. In this case, I tried an NcStar mount and UTG quick detach rings as an approach to mounting a scope while maintaining the options of quick removal and use of metallic sights. I like to use Picatinny rails and rings because they provide the most latitude in scope placement and the components key together, locking scope related mass together and firmly to a firearm.

The Mil-STD-1913 Picatinny mount rail design drawing calls out dimensions of 0.206″x0.835″x0.164″ for each recoil groove. The rail’s active clamping surfaces is 0.367″ high. Weaver recoil grooves are smaller; 0.150″x0.835″x0.105″ with an active clamping height of 0.210″. At least that is what measuring over 200 sets of Weaver rails from virtually every manufacturer, including Weaver, indicate. I have seen 0.180″ referenced in place of 0.150″, but never substantiated with an engineering drawing or a part that actually measure 0.180″.

The NcStar MMLIN piece is listed as a Weaver style rail, but its recoil grooves measure 0.206″x0.835″x0.100″ and the active clamping height is 0.225″.

The example in this case was made of aluminum, powder coated, not anodized. The hole spacing was off and the fasteners were cheaply made; too short for the application and undersized. Additionally, the mount holes were drilled oversize relative to the fasteners. While this gave some latitude for adjustment to overcome the misalignment with receiver hole locations holes, this slop also allowed mount movement under recoil.

Regardless how the mount was oriented to the holes in the receiver, the mount either overhung the receiver to the rear and obstructed access to the gun’s hammer (See very top photo) or it overhung the gun’s barrel and looked… unpleasant. Either way, it was NcStar’s attempt at a one part fits all solution that diminished the appearance of the firearm. After twenty rounds, the scope was pulled and bare metal was exposed where rings dug into the mount’s soft aluminum and movement against the receiver top transferred aluminum from the mount to the gun’s finish.

The UTG quick detach rings were labeled and advertised as Picatinny standard, but were not. They were also not effectively cross pinned and the latching levers were huge. The round cross pins put a shallow radius against the mount’s square shoulder, which tended to lift the ring out of the slot on recoil rather than positively locate it fore and aft. I believe this contributed to the rail damage. In any event, back to Warnes steel mounts and rings.

Ammunition – No home brew

I felt I had an obligation to shoot this gun, and to shoot it a lot. Mainstream factory loaded ammo was used so that anything done here can be duplicated by anyone. Pictured below is about $2.6 million worth of specialized 45-70 ammunition, the equivalent of about $2 worth of handloads.

Why ballistic tables when data can be pulled from the manufacturer’s documentation or a reloading manual? Because the barrel length standard published by ammunition manufacturers is often different than the rifle in hand and because reloading manuals often reflect the same data skew and component variables can yield data that is +/- 150 fps.

Ammunition	Bullet Grains	Bullet Type	Pressure Level	Mfg MV FPS	Mfg ME ft/lbs	Actual MV FPS	Actual ME Ft/Lbs	100 Yd 3 Shot Group “	$/20
Winchester X	300	JHP	SAAMI	1880	2355	1648	1810	1.2	32
Winchester Supreme	300	Partition Gold	SAAMI	1880	2355	1636	1783	1.0	40
HSM	350	Swift A Frame	Hi-Perf	2050	3267	2108	3454	1.0	48
Buffalo Bore	350	JFN	Hi-Perf	2150	3593	2127	3517	1.2	50
Ultramax	405	Cast FN	SAAMI	1100	1088	1092	1073	1.4	35
Black Hills	405	Cast FN	SAAMI	1250	1406	1204	1304	1.5	29
Remington Express	405	JSP	SAAMI	1330	1590	1175	1242	0.8	40
Buffalo Bore	430	Cast FN	Hi-Perf	1925	3539	1886	3397	1.3	56
Garrett Hammerhead	540	Cast FN	Hi-Perf	1550	2881	1532	2815	1.6	80

Ammunition appears on the table in bullet weight order, sub sorted in velocity order. There are some loads that obviously would be excellent for woodland deer hunting and certainly hog hunting. Light on recoil, accurate and with tough bullets. At the big end, the energy levels are at least the equivalent of the 300 WSM and 325 WSM and knocking on the door of the 338 Winchester Magnum, all magnums fired from 24″ barrels. Of course the .458″ bullet makes a huge wound channel by comparison and the Garrett round is the king of penetration with six feet of penetration in wet newspaper. More than the 458 Winchester and more than the 458 Lott.

If factory ammunition doesn’t do it for you, there are lots of jacketed and milder cast bullet handloads that will produce similar or even better results and save a bunch of cash in the process. The 45-70 Gov’t, when treated respectfully, is a handloader’s cartridge and it doesn’t take more than the little Guide Gun’s 18 1/2″ barrel to make it shine.

A 100 yard myth?

The original 45-70 Gov’t cartridge earned its reputation in 1,000 yard competitive shooting, however, rainbow trajectory, critical range estimating requirements and low terminal energy have few benefits in hunting situations. Based upon trajectory and terminal energy, the 45-70 definitely has 200 yard hunting potential. However, beyond 200 yards, the large bullet diameter, low ballistic coefficient and velocity conspire to slow things down. The following tables were generated based up the best zero for the greatest point blank range.

Indices	300 Grain Winchester X – SAAMI
Range -yds	0	50	100	150	200	250	300
Velocity – ft./sec.	1648	1555	1467	1385	1308	1241	118
Energy – ft.-lbs.	1809	1610	1433	1277	1140	1025	927
Path – in.	-1.5	2.4	2.6	-1.1	-9.5	-22.8	-41.9
Hog, Deer and other thin skinned game

Indices	350 Grain HSM – High Performance
Range -yds	0	50	100	150	200	250	300
Velocity – ft./sec.	2108	1885	1677	1489	1325	1191	1089
Energy – ft.-lbs.	3453	2761	2184	1723	1364	1102	921
Path – in.	-1.5	2.0	3.0	0.9	-5.2	-16.2	-33.3
Elk, Moose, Black Bear

Indices	540 Grain Hammerhead
Range -yds	0	50	100	150	200	250	300
Velocity – ft./sec.	1532	1402	1285	1188	1108	1046	996
Energy – ft.-lbs.	2814	2355	1981	1691	1473	1311	1190
Path – in.	-1.5	2.5	2.1	-3.5	-15.3	-34.2	-61.0
Big Bear – Close In – Penetrating Round

Perspective….

Indices	308 Winchester 180 grain
Range -yds	0	50	100	150	200	250	300
Velocity – ft./sec.	2620	2514	2410	2310	2211	2116	2022
Energy – ft.-lbs.	2743	2525	2322	2132	1954	1789	1634
Path – in.	-1.5	1.1	2.2	1.9	-0.0	-3.7	-9.4
Heavy 308 Winchester Load – Elk, Moose

The little 308 Winchester, with a heavy 0.308″ bullet for heavy game, moves ahead of the 45-70 Gov’t round, including the heavy 45-70 Gov’t loads, beyond one hundred yards. The 308 Winchester has nearly twice the retained velocity and kinetic energy at 300 yards. Trajectory isn’t even close over the longer haul. But stubby little carbines are not intended for long ranges and open spaces and there are many more hunting situation where the 45-70 Gov’t will grossly out perform the 308 Winchester.

Inside 150 yards, the 45-70 Gov’t is bone crushing and tough controlled expansion or hard cast deep penetrating bullets can open a large wound channel. There is no place in North America, and no game of any type, that could not be hunted in confidence with the Marlin Model 1895 Guide Gun and the 45-70 Gov’t.

When Marlin Model 1895G and 45-70 Gov’t ammo combine…

I’m glad we got to take another look at the Guide Gun at this stage of production transition and to see how well things have progressed. Contrary to the opinion of some folks out there, everyone doesn’t get excited about reviewing firearms. It takes staff away from critical shop work, handloading and gunsmithing projects. Personally, fifty-five years of shooting firearms has conditioned me to not go all tingly when someone suggests that I take a week out of my life to assess the virtues of a firearm. This time, I enjoyed the project.

There are so many places the 1895G fits in for a hunter. Open sights or scopes, loaded light or literally loaded for bear, this is an extremely flexible combination. The Guide Gun is light, it holds up to being flogged and it looks good. The finish quality these days is excellent, accuracy rivals many bolt guns and the price is right. How sincere is this assessment? I bought this rifle and you’ll see it often on Real Guns.

Marlin Under Remington Stewardship Part I
Marlin Under Remington Stewardship Part II
Marlin’s Official Website

Marlin Under Remington Stewardship Part II

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