As a proud new owner of a
Marlin 39A (with 24" barrel),
I'm subscribing to this information ladden thread.
Even before I bought this little sweet heart of a rifle,
I'd been thinking that once I got one,
I'd have the barrel cut down.
A 24" barrel, I thought,
would be just absurdly long
for a rimfire. What's the point?
(Yeah, yeah: sight radius. I'm going to scope it.)
Indeed, when today, I picked it up for the first time,
I said to myself, "Self, this is the right .22 rifle. Buy it."
and
"It's front end heavy. Get it cut down."
Now, the person who sold me this 39A, a gunsmith,
asserted that I can't cut it down much less than about 3"
because it has a magazine tube attached to the barrel
3.5" back from the end of the barrel.
If I cut it back more than that,
then re-attaching the magazine tube to the barrel
becomes very expensive.
Still, a 21" barrel seems more reasonable
(and no less accurate) than a 24" barrel.
Thus, I'm reading with interest.
Nem