Hey all, I am looking at a "greenfield" rifle purchase in the next few months. I want to get a lever-action (preferably) for use with hog hunting primarily but also be acceptable for deer and maybe black bear. However what I'm most interested in is the caliber of the cartridge to be something that has "interesting" load possibilities. Ideally, I would like to be able to develop both a reduced load for plinking and my daughter to learn rifle shooting eventually as well as something more powerful for taking game. I've looked at a few things such as .338 Marlin Express, .35 Remington, .450 Marlin, .45-70 Govt, and of course the .30-30.
I don't mind something a little esoteric as long as I can reasonably purchase a firearm for the chamber - where reasonable is I can pick one up for < $1000, I can get parts for it assuming it's used, and it doesn't seem to be a "flash in the pan" cartridge.
I really want to like the .338 Marlin Express or the .450 Marlin as I'd like to help support newer innovations in the lever-action market, but both of them being newer there's not a lot of performance data for them yet and especially there really little bullet choices for the .338 Marlin Express. I believe that Marlin doesn't even make new .450 Marlin guns so I'd already be starting from the "used only" position there which is probably a poor choice.
Does anyone have some thoughts on lever-action cartridges that are "interesting" to handloaders?
(I'm posting this here instead of the rifle section because I'm mostly looking at this from the handloading perspective but I apologize in advance if the mods think it really belongs in "Rifle Country")
I don't mind something a little esoteric as long as I can reasonably purchase a firearm for the chamber - where reasonable is I can pick one up for < $1000, I can get parts for it assuming it's used, and it doesn't seem to be a "flash in the pan" cartridge.
I really want to like the .338 Marlin Express or the .450 Marlin as I'd like to help support newer innovations in the lever-action market, but both of them being newer there's not a lot of performance data for them yet and especially there really little bullet choices for the .338 Marlin Express. I believe that Marlin doesn't even make new .450 Marlin guns so I'd already be starting from the "used only" position there which is probably a poor choice.
Does anyone have some thoughts on lever-action cartridges that are "interesting" to handloaders?
(I'm posting this here instead of the rifle section because I'm mostly looking at this from the handloading perspective but I apologize in advance if the mods think it really belongs in "Rifle Country")
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