Marlin Cowboy .38-55

[JudgeBAC]

I am considering a Marlin Cowboy .38-55 but have run across some very vague information about chamber dimension inconsistancies. Can anyone elaborate on this for me. Thank you.

[howdy doody]

Yup, I bought one about 5 years ago. Started off with some factory loads to get the brass. It fed them pretty good, but accuracy was poor beyond 100 yards. Then I slugged the bore and found that my rifle had a .3785 bore. That calls for a .379 or 380 boolit. I bought some bullets and dies and went to loading my own. The first thing I noticed with the 379 boolits was that the case neck showed the bullet outline. I measured the factory loads and the boolit was only 375. I tried them out and sure enough about every other of my rounds would not chamber fully. So, I called Marlin and they had me send it back. Cost me $24 IN shipping and they reamed the chamber and sent it back. I now use a .380 boolit weighing 250gr and no problems at all with my handloads and the accuracy is great out to the 200 yards I shoot it. I mounted a Marbles tang sight on mine. I shoot cowboy silhouettes with it. From what I gather, the original Marlins were chambered for .375 about like the Winchesters, but the new Marlin 336 cowboys have a bigger bore and the old size chamber. Anyway it is nice to know Marlin fixes things and I had my rifle back in about 3 weeks. If you call them, ask for customer service and a Mr. Tim Looney. There was no charge.

[BRENN]

got one three years back its ben shooting good with hand&factory loads .i must have got lucky on mine.

[Mulegunner]

I had one a year ago.  I ran into 2 major obastacles with it....first factory ammo (for hunting) was too pricy for my blood and bank account and second,  I had a hard time finding brass for reloading my own.   Time being a constraint for me....I finally traded it off.  However,  It was a fine shooting firearm!!!

[olympian]

Howdy,

What kind of accuracy do you get with your 38-55 at 100 yds or so?  I have no experience with these kinds of guns and I want to shoot some NRA Lever silhouette.

[sig232]

I understand the ole 38-55 is a real sleeper of a woods hunting round for deer and black bear!

I was not aware of the chamber issue with the marlins, that surprises me that they would allow that kind of a mfg inconsistancy.

[Nobade]

It's not inconsistant; they used the old original chamber dimensions at first. That works great if you use a bore sized bullet cast from 20:1 lead/tin propelled by black powder. The bullets swage up to seal and shoot accurately. But if you go trying to use groove size hard bullets and smokeless powder it won't work. It didn't take Marlin long to realize that they needed to update their chamber reamers, since modern shooters usually don't know to handle something that needs 110 year old loading techniques and modern factory ammo won't shoot worth beans in the old dimensioned barrels.