Making a Trapper

[Uncle Alvah]

On a scale of 1-10, how would you rate the difficulty for a "skilled tinkerer"to cut down the barrel and mag on a Marlin 336 to a Trapper length barrel, 16.5" lets say?

 

[jmorris]

Define "skilled". What equipment do you have to perform the job? How do you want it to look when you finish?

 

[Jim Watson]

Cut the barrel off.
Square the end.
Crown the muzzle.
Dovetail for front sight.
Groove for barrel band/foreend cap screw.

Shorten the magazine tube. (I don't know which end to cut off a Marlin; if it is not threaded into the action, it might be easier to cut from the rear and save the front plug and barrel band positions.)

Reassemble.

 

[mnrivrat]

The hardest part is to re-set the front sight .

The rest is pretty much straight forward. I haven't done a Marlin, but I have done this to 4 Winchesters over the last decade.

I have carefully cut new front sight dovetails by hand, but the last one I did I took to a smith I know and had him cut the dovetail - hell he only charged me $10 so wasn't a difficult decision for me.