The best Marlin I've ever owned happens to also be the first firearm I've ever owned, and it is a Model 336 in .30-30 that my parents bought for me when I was going on 12 years old.
Back when the rifle was new to me, my dad fitted the rifle with a clamp-on band type swivel stud on the magazine tube. During the course of a hunting trip years later, I was boulder-hopping in some rough country with the unloaded rifle slung over my shoulder and the magazine tube, spring, and follower shot out of the rifle. The rifle landed butt-down on a sharp, jagged California High Desert rock, causing the buttplate to split into four pieces. I managed to catch the gun in my hands before any further damage to wood or metal was done. It sat forelorn in my gun cabinet for about 16 years because I couldn't find a 'smith willing to fix it in the area I used to live in.
I recently had the local gunsmith fix the rifle. He did a half-magazine conversion, hanging the mag tube from the barrel like Marlin currently does with three-quarter mag tube lever guns. This obviously eleminates the forward barrel band. When the rifle broke, I never did find the mag follower, so a new "LeverEvolution Frinedly" unit was installed. The rearward forearm / barrel band was retained. The gunsmith releived it a little so there is some clearance between it and the barrel to allow the barrel to expand a bit when it heats up. He also drilled and tapped the bottom of this band to mount a sling stud to it in the fashion of new Marlin lever guns. A nice, soft, cushy black buttpad replaced the shattered factory plate. The trigger was pretty good from new, feeling kind of like the single-action pull on a Smith and Wesson M-19, and the gunsmith didn't think he could improve on it much, so we left it alone. The rifle currently wears a Williams 5-D peep.
My dad was a sucker for wood, and my Marlin sports far prettier wood than I've seen on any new 336. I took pretty good care of the wood and metal on this gun, so the end result after the mag tube conversion is pleasing to my eye.
In its original configuration, it always shot "pretty well for a levergun" and had little trouble grouping under 2.5" and did much better with ammo it liked. Now, with the abbreviated mag tube, the rifle is a solid 1" grouper, printing all four shots from the magazine into pretty four-leaf clover patterns. I've been having big time fun with this old rifle again because it is accurate enough to be entertaining at the range, the report is mild, and felt recoil is now virtually nil. Plus, at about $10.00 a box for Federal 170 grain loads (which it happens to like really, really well) it is about as cheap to shoot factory ammo through as a .223 and the felt recoil isn't that much different, so I can shoot the thing all day long.
I am looking forward to hunting with this rifle again in the fall, and for many more to come.
JP
