256 Win project

[Boucher]

I have a project that I am working to improve the accuracy of a Marlin 256 Win lever action. This is never going to be a tack driver but it is a good short truck gun that works well for feral hogs. The barrel tang is a cylindrical fit pined into the action. The first experiment was to bed by free floating the action and gluing the barrel into the stock with a bedding block.



Mounting the scope on the barrel and using a long eye relief scope didn’t appeal to me. I remade the barrel-bedding block incorporating a Picatinny rail that cantilevers out over the action without attaching to it.


This has been on the back burner for too long. I need to resume work on this, and will report on the progress.

[tdmidget]

What model is this rifle? What would be gained by free floating the action? The barrel I can see but the action is old news to the projectile. It's the barrel that sends it on it's way or not.

[Bob Ford]

I like your idea, curious to see if it helps. The bedding block scope mount if fit tight to barrel should work well. You might bed the block only and not the whole barrel. Shot the .256 quite a bit with Contenders. Fun cartridge, but was a pain to form cases.

Bob

[Boucher]

The rifle is a Marlin Mod 62 which was a take off of their 22 rimfire mag. Not a great gun to start with but I inherited two of them so to speak. The barrel is all I want to bed. With the weak action to barrel joint I want the scope mounted on the barrel and not on the action. This is all in the old wooden factory stock that is subject to move around. If the action flops around I don’t care if the scope is not attached to it. I don’t have much factory ammunition left. The brass can be formed from 357 mag but bullet selection is lacking. Reloading is showing some promise. I think the most bang for the buck is in improving the bedding. The goal is to get into the 1 1/2" at 100 yards level of accuracy.

[Boucher]

Bob
The somewhat loose fit of the block to the barrel is to be filled with Acraglas the nylon based bedding compound from Brownells. The first test was to glue the barrel into the stock for about 2 1/2" and float everything else . This worked well enough that I probably should have stopped there. A long eye relief scope mounted on the barrel would have solved most of the issues with the action barrel joint. I have a 22 Jet and make the cases for it from the 357 mag also. Both sets of forming dies are from RCBS and work surprisingly well. What bullets did you use in the contender?

[Bob Ford]

I shot the contender in I H M S A. It really did not have enough power to take down the rams unless they were hit in the head or tail. The 60 gr bullets were fine for chickens and pigs, but failed on the turkeys and rams. The 87 gr bullets would barely stabilize and had not enough energy on rams. Depending on how they were set and the wind your best shot would be low in a leg or the head preferably on the nose. When you are shooting standing with open iron sights at 200 meters that is not much of a target. Best score was 34 out of 40, which at the time was 1 point below a world record.

Bob

[38_Cal]

That bedding block idea was popular in the '70's before the ready availability of dedicated benchrest actions. Don't see why it wouldn't work quite well for your application! Please keep us informed on your progress.

David