( 4 out of 5) A few Manufacturing flaws but overall I love this Rifle!

by Chris from Irondale, MO on October 24, 2018

I've always wanted a Big Bore rifle and I've always wanted a lever action, this rifle fits both of those. I gave this 1895 Marlin 45/70 and overall rating of 4 because there are a few issues I'd like to point out.

#1- The trap door for loading the ammo was super stiff and I found a fix for that on a Marlin Owners website.



#2- Evidently there was a burr that was scratching my brass and which also caused issues with the last round in the tube not wanting to chamber. So I used a 12 GA. bore brush with some light grit sand paper and my cordless drill to polish the chamber throat, I also found this bit of info on a Marlin Owners website. After polishing the throat chamber and a thorough cleaning afterwards, every round chambers smoothly and not as much scratching of my brass, and because I do reload for everything that I own this was definitely an issue for me.



#3- Even though I put a scope on this rifle with High Rise mounts, I still want the capability of shooting open sights by looking under/through the scope rings, and the iron sights that come on Marlin rifles are a bit hard to see. It would be nice if Marlin would put the fiber optic TruGlo style iron sights on their rifles, but sadly they don't and I've been looking into after market options for that. With that said, I mounted my Nikon 3-9x40mm BDC scope and bore sighted it by pulling the lever and bolt. There are YouTube videos on this and bore sighted it down my hallway at about 12 yards. Everything looked fairly close so I went to the range the following Saturday. My first shot at 25 yards was dead center left to right and about 3 low of center. I was Amazed at how close it was and thought it might be a fluke since this beast of a gun bucks so hard. So I fired 2 more rounds off the bench and all three shots produced 1 ragged hole group. I raised the scope adjustment up about 2 1/2 full turns 1/4 @ 100 yards, do the math, and my 4th shot was nearly dead center of the Bull.



BTW- I was using the Hornady FTX 325 gr. bullets and the trajectory for this load when zeroed +0.2 @25 yards is as follows 50 yrds. +1.4 @75 yrds +2.0 @ 100 yrds. +1.9 @150 yrds -0.6 @200 yrds. -6.5.



Hope Ya'll find this info useful and if you Think that the 45/70 isn't capable of taking game at 200 yards, Think again. An average whitetail deer is about 18 from the top of its back to its belly, a 200 yard shot at a whitetail deer if aiming just below the spine would produce a smack down shot right in the boiler room. I'm extremely happy with the accuracy of this rifle! I hope and pray that I get a chance at a whitetail this year with this rifle in my hands. Go get Ya Sum!!