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Something for our Northern brothers


unforgiven

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You can shoot my 45-70 when you come out here for the Fall Shoot.  As much as you want.  :thumbup:

I've been reloading and hunting with a Marlin 45/70 since for at least 40 years.  I own two of them, straight stock, no recoil pad, square lever, no safety. 

My brother and nephew also have them as they are now legal here in Ohio for deer.  I load a 300 grain bullet backed by a full charge of Reloader 7.  It goes across the chrony at 2400fps and good to at least 300 yards without worrying much about holdover.

When we sight them in the first thing you do is to take off your hat and glasses.......because they are going to be on the ground after you touch off the first round anyhow!.....LOL.....

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"Y'all are a bunch of ladies. 45-70 ain't that bad."

I used to shoot with a Lieutenant that I worked with, we hit the range nearly every weekend testing out our hand loads.  One day handed me his Ruger #1 in 45/70 with some loads he worked up using 500 grain cast bullets and a full charge of Reloader 7.  That was in the late 1980's and my teeth are still loose from touching off one round with that little rifle!

I got really stupid a few years ago checking my Marlin 45/70 right before deer season and used one of those rifle rests that support the stock and keep it off your shoulder.  My nephew had just bought it and I'm getting old enough that I'd had enough of getting thumped by the 45/70 at the range.

Well talk about a DUMB idea.  I touched off a round and it split the stock in half and broke the butt-plate into two pieces!  It took me nearly a year to find another straight walnut stock and matching butt plate for that rifle.   You'd think at almost 60 years old I'd have been a little smarter than that.....DUH!

Anyhow, no more rifle rests I'll take the beating instead.  I will say that in a hunting situation you never notice any of that and I've killed everything with my 45/70 from ground hogs to Elk.  Nothing I've ever shot with it takes another step!.........Cliff

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14 hours ago, Cliff R said:

"Y'all are a bunch of ladies. 45-70 ain't that bad."

I used to shoot with a Lieutenant that I worked with, we hit the range nearly every weekend testing out our hand loads.  One day handed me his Ruger #1 in 45/70 with some loads he worked up using 500 grain cast bullets and a full charge of Reloader 7.  That was in the late 1980's and my teeth are still loose from touching off one round with that little rifle!

I got really stupid a few years ago checking my Marlin 45/70 right before deer season and used one of those rifle rests that support the stock and keep it off your shoulder.  My nephew had just bought it and I'm getting old enough that I'd had enough of getting thumped by the 45/70 at the range.

Well talk about a DUMB idea.  I touched off a round and it split the stock in half and broke the butt-plate into two pieces!  It took me nearly a year to find another straight walnut stock and matching butt plate for that rifle.   You'd think at almost 60 years old I'd have been a little smarter than that.....DUH!

Anyhow, no more rifle rests I'll take the beating instead.  I will say that in a hunting situation you never notice any of that and I've killed everything with my 45/70 from ground hogs to Elk.  Nothing I've ever shot with it takes another step!.........Cliff

:hail: I had both shoulders worked on and their sore from reading these links :laffs:

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17 hours ago, Cliff R said:

 One day handed me his Ruger #1 in 45/70 with some loads he worked up using 500 grain cast bullets and a full charge of Reloader 7. 

Ruger #1 action is the strongest one out there for the 45-70s.  That thing is no joke.  There's 3 levels of load data, depending on your gun...

#1 (strongest action), Ruger #1

#2, Modern lever guns

#3, trap-door guns.

You mess up and find a load and decide to use it - find a Ruger #1 load, and you have a trap-door...   You don't have that trap-door, no more...   :banana:

There's tons of load data on 45-70s out there, but you have to be careful with what you have, and what you load...

When some of you guys shoot mine (and the ones that have shot it), keep in mind, I'm 50.0 grains of IMR 3031, with a 405gr projo.  The chart for that one load goes up to a max charge of 55.0 grains!   Yep, nope, don't need another 5 full grains in THAT load, at all!...  :lmao:

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18 hours ago, 98Z5V said:

Ruger #1 action is the strongest one out there for the 45-70s.  That thing is no joke.  There's 3 levels of load data, depending on your gun...

#1 (strongest action), Ruger #1

#2, Modern lever guns

#3, trap-door guns.

You mess up and find a load and decide to use it - find a Ruger #1 load, and you have a trap-door...   You don't have that trap-door, no more...   :banana:

There's tons of load data on 45-70s out there, but you have to be careful with what you have, and what you load...

When some of you guys shoot mine (and the ones that have shot it), keep in mind, I'm 50.0 grains of IMR 3031, with a 405gr projo.  The chart for that one load goes up to a max charge of 55.0 grains!   Yep, nope, don't need another 5 full grains in THAT load, at all!...  :lmao:

Just think of all that velocity you could get. How flat shooting it could be. 😆

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From my personal experience with these things a full charge of Reloader 7 pushing a 300 grain bullet in 45/70 is remarkably hard on the shooter.    Hat and glasses removal highly recommended before you touch one off.

Moving up to a 400 grain bullet is brutal!  Some added padding between the stock and your cheek required, unless you want some loose teeth.

I'll no plans now or to NEVER touch off a 500 grain round from one of those rifles again as long as I live!  

Even with that said standing up and in most hunting situations you'll probably not notice it all that much......FWIW.

As a side note here my "hand loads" for 45/70 would be consider +P so I'll keep all that to myself and recommend others working with this sort of thing to go the reloading manual for starting loads and work up if/as needed........at your own risk........FWIW

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Wow, went down to the safe today as talking about 45/70 stuff got me motivated to pull out my old friends and check them out.  I also searched and located the stock that I split and repaired but ended up not using it as I was able to find one in mint condition from a guy on one of the Forums.  The upper rifle in the pic is the one that got a new stock.

While looking for the stock I found a couple of plaques that brought back some memories...........

IMG_2867.jpg

IMG_2870.jpg

IMG_2865.jpg

IMG_2866.jpg

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Thanks.   Got to do a lot of cool chit back in them days, been all over that region.  Can't remember ever being in a hotter place than Guyana, never checked but it's probably only a couple of clicks North of the equator.  Probably best known for the Jim Jones thing........

Edited by Cliff R
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Thanks......not sure if anyone noticed but he plague from SAI School was for being on staff at the Instructors School, or train the trainers course.  I can't think of a better job, teaching others to be SAI instructors and shooting guns all day!  Sadly, I couldn't hang out there very long.  It was a nice break from chit-tons of deployment, and Deb was getting tired of me being around so much anyhow so I short toured from there and back to the grind......

 

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