Marlin 1894 lever action feeding problem.

[westtx28]

FIXED - Marlin 1894 lever action feeding problem.

I have a Marlin 1894CS lever action .38/.357 rifle that I am having a problem with. It appears that the lever is connected to the feed ramp so that when it is closed the shell is brought up and forward. The action works fine with only one cartridge in the tube however with more than one shell it looks like the feed ramp is hitting the next shell and the lever is locked open. Any ideas as to what would be causing this?

I tried to take a picture to show what I'm talking about but it is a pretty hard to get a good shot in there.

 

[Four Knives]

Great rifles.

JM stamp or new production?

Are your cartridges w/in the OAL specs listed in the manual?

 

[westtx28]

It is a great rifle. One of my favorites.

The barrel has a JM stamped on it but the rifle is only about 6 or 7 years old.

I've tried several different brands of both .38 and .375 with the same problem. One cartridge in the gun and it cycles very smooth. Two or more and the lever locks open.

 

[hogshead]

Can't tell exactly what you are describing,but have you tightened all the screws on the reciever on both sides.They can cause all kinds of strange behavior on the lever guns.

 

[greyling22]

does this sound right? http://marauder.homestead.com/files/marlin94fix.html

google marlin jam

 

[westtx28]

does this sound right? http://marauder.homestead.com/files/marlin94fix.html

YES! Thank you. That is EXACTLY what is going on.

Man, I'm not capable of performing the work required to fix it. Think I should take the gun to a local gunsmith or send it back to Marlin for the repair?

 

[Old Dog Man]

Marlin Shell hang-ups

Marlin had a problem when the first put pistol cart. in the lever guns, the carrier was not high enough at the shell cut-off to hold the next round in the mag. tube. Call them and they will probably help you out, I have welded the area and ground it to stop the problem, but the newer ones have been fixed. Al

 

[greyling22]

back when marlin was marlin they had pretty good customer service. If you could get to an actual person. now, with remington manning the phones, I dunno. I bet they say "send in the rifle" it will take 6 weeks and may or may not be fixed. But that's just a guess based one some of my past run ins with them.

 

[EMC45]

+ 2 on tightening all the screws. I have a 1894 in .44 Mag and I had to disassemble the gun to clear a jam it was so bad. Went back and a few of the receiver screws were quite loose. Tightened them up and rock and roll!

 

[westtx28]

Problem solved

I FIXED the problem guys. I think it was a combination of a loose screw which caused the symptoms of the Marlin Jam as indicated above. The gun is much easier and intuitive to take apart than I thought. The Carrier Assembly DID have a notch forged into it from the sharp edge of the lever cam. It wasn't too deep so I took a Dremel to it and cleaned and polished that up. I then filed off the sharp edge putting a slight radius on the snail cam on the lever. It was total amateur hour but it all went back together and the action cycles shells perfectly now.

Thanks everyone for pointing me in the right direction.

 

[marcclarke]

I had the same problem with my .44 1894. I sent it back to the factory 3 times and they got it fixed on the final pass.

 

[greyling22]

congratulation on fixing the problem. if only they were all that easy. (I can't figure out why my car door is leaking to save my life.......)