[Buckaroo]

Good day

I just recently purchased a 1895GS 45-70 of course. I do not intend to scope this rifle. I don't have a handloading set up as of yet and I feel I need a lot of education on the subject before that ever happens. That being said, I really want to use this rifle every chance I get. So... I need your help with some factory loads. It would be great if I could reach out to 100yrds. Can you folks fire off a few of the popular loads that I may try out at the range.. Remember this is my first Marlin lever.

I have researched quite a bit but, I feel this is the place to get some truly solid answers. Also, man am I ever happy I stumbled across this site. Cheers from western Canada.

 

[six_gunz]

Welcome to MO's Buckaroo!

It's going to get expensive shooting factory ammo, if I were going to buy some factory ammo I'd buy Remington 300gr or 405gr ammo. Or Hornady Lever Evolution 325gr flex tips.....it pretty mild stuff IMO.

I have the exact same rifle as you....... enjoy your new rifle and let us know how it shoots!

 

[Buckaroo]

Yeah expensive!

I'll do this for a little while, just to get out there eh. I see some of the prices. It's like I'm back shootin my 300 win mag.lol I'm very interested in handloading, I have just started looking into it.

 

[Time Bomb]

Winchester power point are accurate out of my gs as well as the mentioned hornady le's.

 

[dag]

I would encourage you to get into reloading, especially when shooting 45-70. Either find someone you can trust in your area to walk you through the reloading process or use the mentoring on this site. Scroll down to the reloading section read some of what is posted there. The next section is titled mentors/students you will find all the help you need with the guys here. Good luck, welcome to the forum.

 

[rhendrix]

You will not have any trouble reaching out to 100yards with almost any of the factory ammo.

If you use the Hornady LE, which is about the cheapest good factory ammo on the market, you can have a mpbr of 133 yards with a zero at 114 and not ever be over 1.5" high or low from muzzle to 133 yards. It is a lot longer range and flatter shooting gun than you seem to realize. Even with a mpbr site in you will not be but 3.3" low at 150 yards and still have over 1500 ft. lbs. of energy which is the lowest reccommended energy for big bull elk. You have a lot of gun there so shoot it, enjoy it, and have confidence in what it can do.

 

[byf43]

Welcome to MO!!!!

You're going to find that shooting 'factory' loads is going to be expensive!!!!
I've seen .45-70s going between $32.99/20 all the way to $49.99/20 rounds!!! (This is in Southern Maryland, Northern Virginia, Southwest Virginia, and even Southeastern West Virginia!!!)

With that said, I've gotten really good accuracy with both Federal 300 gr JHP and Winchester 300 JHP rounds, in my Guide Gun.

With the monies you'll spend buying (a quantity of) factory fodder, you could get started in reloading.

 

[riverhunter]

welcome aboard fellow canuck!...where abouts in canada are you from?....lots of good info here! good luck, and yes, if you want to be able to make that gun sing, you should "eventually" hand load ;D...larry(prince george BC)

 

[findrichard]

My guide gun likes the Hornady 325 gr. LE ammo, most accurate factory ammo I have shot to date. However if you need a premium bullet then for $5 more, I would recommend the Federal 300 gr. JHP. Federal uses the speer 300 gr. hot-cor bonded bullet which means the lead core won't separate form its jacket, which will happen with Hornady's LE bullet. Three other things to consider concerning Hornady LE ammo: 1. You will need to ensure your magazine follower is the one specifically designed for the LE bullet (if not marlin has them available). 2. Hornady LE brass is shorter than standard 45-70 brass which will limit its reloading applications. 3. don't believe Hornady's velocity claims for their LE ammunition. their actual velocity from a guide gun is right at 1800 fps. which is the same velocity listed by Federal for their 300 gr JHP. Sorry, I have not read any independent velocity testing data for the Federal round. Now if you plan on hunting dangerous game ignore everything I have just said. In that case look online at Garrett or Buffalo Bore websites. Hope you enjoy your guide gun as much as I have mine.

 

[BlueMntCeltic]

Welcome to the Board!

IMHO, I would consider the game that your planning on using it for, or against, for that matter and select your ammo based it it's projected performance. The standard 405 Remington factory has worked well for over a century and at ranges over 200yds, one has to know ones gun and how it shoots at that range. Under 100 yds and you find it will do fine on any animal in your parts.

Reflex64 (hope I got that handle correct) has an awesome youtube video on long range shooting with the 45-70 that I believe is a sticky toward the top of the forum. He takes you through how he does it with video of him making some really nice shots.

Range estimation is also a critical consideration. If you know the range, and how your gun performs you're pretty well got 'er done. Those that advocate mpbr (maximum point blank range) are also good to listen to as sighting in for mpbr will allow you to 'hold on hair' and put the animal down.

Best of luck and I know you'll enjoy your rifle.

BMC

 

[Buckaroo]

Thanks a lot gentlemen!!

This is all very good info. I'm gonna really have to get into reloading sooner then later. Again, thanks a lot.

 

[eaglesnest]

I bought a GS a year ago and immediately got sticker shock at the price of a box of shells. $40 for 20 rounds!! I bought one box and still have most of them sitting in a drawer as I went ahead and invested in a Lee hand press, scale and dies and other misc stuff. $100 for the Lee stuff, some more for bullets, powder, primers and cases and I never looked back. Now I hand load for 25 cents a round instead of shooting factory for $2 a round.. The prices I can hand load for sure puts the fun back into it for me..
Good luck with your 45/70, it is certainly a nice little cannon.. ;D

 

[rhendrix]

I bought a GS a year ago and immediately got sticker shock at the price of a box of shells. $40 for 20 rounds!! I bought one box and still have most of them sitting in a drawer as I went ahead and invested in a Lee hand press, scale and dies and other misc stuff. $100 for the Lee stuff, some more for bullets, powder, primers and cases and I never looked back. Now I hand load for 25 cents a round instead of shooting factory for $2 a round.. The prices I can hand load for sure puts the fun back into it for me..
Good luck with your 45/70, it is certainly a nice little cannon.. ;D

I want to get into reloading too but I didn't know you could relooad for 25 cents a round. Most of the suppliers I have been looking at want at least $1 for each piece of brass and anywhere from 50 cents to $1 dollar for the bullets depending on what bullet you get and then there is the price of powder and primers and I am sure that is only pennies a round. I know you don't have to keep buying brass everytime you load but you do have to get an initial supply and then you can only reload them so many times. I can get Hornady LE on line for $23 a box and if I get 4 boxes the shipping is only $12 and that brings the cost to $25 per box or $1.25 per shell. I just can't get my calculator to come up with .25 cents per shell for reloading when I still have to buy the equipment and the components. Maybe I need to get my pencil out and sharpen it a bit more. I figured it was just like tying your own flies. I do that and really enjoy it but don't let anyone tell you that you save money by tying your own flies. For the money I have invested in equipment and supplies, I could have bought flies for the rest of my life and never used one more than once. I still want to get into reloading but I just can't see the economics of it yet at least unless I start shooting the 45-70 more often. It might pay for itself if I consider reloading my other calibers too and start shooting more paper.

 

[dag]

You most likely will not save any money by reloading because you will shoot much more. I do not even figure in the cost of brass because they have been reloaded at least 20 times without a single case failure or one even showing signs of being stressed. I do not load hot, in fact quite modest loads but I think a 390 grain bullet traveling at 1450 fps will do all the damage necessary to put down a deer.

Here is my cost, of course I am not figuring my time is worth anything. I also cast my own bullets.

390 grain bullets 4 cents a piece, primers 3.5 cents, powder 10 cents per round, if I am using 535 grain bullets the cost goes up to nearly 6 cents per, but still my rounds are less than 25 cents each.

I don't figure in the cost of my reloading equipment either as my press is over 40 years old, dies are 15 to 40 years old, Lyman DPS scale is 7 years old etc. it would be impossible to figure out how many rounds I have run through this equipment over the years, the press has easily done 80,000 rounds

 

[moofy07]

Hi Buckaroo welcome from Bundaberg, Australia.
Regarding reloading, if you plan to shoot a lot you will not regret reloading. Dag had some good advice. I also suggest a decent reloading manual. Most will have a step by step instruction manual in the first few pages or somewhere in the book. There are plenty of decent manuals, but before buying make sure there is some instruction in it, it should be quite substanial. It is not hard and when you have experience in reloading maybe you might want to try your hand at casting. That's what happened to me.
Hope this helps.

 

[eaglesnest]

I want to get into reloading too but I didn't know you could relooad for 25 cents a round. Most of the suppliers I have been looking at want at least $1 for each piece of brass and anywhere from 50 cents to $1 dollar for the bullets depending on what bullet you get and then there is the price of powder and primers and I am sure that is only pennies a round. I know you don't have to keep buying brass everytime you load but you do have to get an initial supply and then you can only reload them so many times. I can get Hornady LE on line for $23 a box and if I get 4 boxes the shipping is only $12 and that brings the cost to $25 per box or $1.25 per shell. I just can't get my calculator to come up with .25 cents per shell for reloading when I still have to buy the equipment and the components. Maybe I need to get my pencil out and sharpen it a bit more. I figured it was just like tying your own flies. I do that and really enjoy it but don't let anyone tell you that you save money by tying your own flies. For the money I have invested in equipment and supplies, I could have bought flies for the rest of my life and never used one more than once. I still want to get into reloading but I just can't see the economics of it yet at least unless I start shooting the 45-70 more often. It might pay for itself if I consider reloading my other calibers too and start shooting more paper.

I don't count my brass in that 25 cent figure because the way I reload they are going to last indefinitely and so consider it part of my initial investment of reloading supplies and equipment. I was shooting Laser Cast 350's last year but may try Dardas next time as they are considerably cheaper. anyway the 350gr Dardas RNFP cost about $39for 250 which is around 16 cents each give or take. Primers here in AK are 3.5 cents, and powder, say 27gr of 5744 which a pound sells here in AK for $35 and will load about 350 rounds, so figure 10cents, and 3.5 cents for primers looks like 30 cents a round for 5744 loads. Going with Unique and say 15 gr we can get over 450 rounds out of a pound and at only $25 a pound so that works to 5 cents a round for powder and so we are around .25 cents a cartridge that way. It isn't as easy as last year with prices for lead going up, and remember these are AK prices which are about 1/3rd more for powder.
Granted these are more or less plinker rounds although I suspect those 5744 loads would do serious harm to anything walking. You can surely spend far more by shooting the best cast or jacketed loading to the max with 45 or 50 grains of powder. If you just want to plink with trapdoor loads you can do it for .25 a round by loading them yourself!

 

[rhendrix]

Thanks for the break down. I had no idea I could load plinkers for that low of a price. I have got to get into it and get started.

 

[MarlinGreg]

I'm in the same boat..have yet to begin reload, however thats definitely the next phase of this "obsession". The hornady 325 grn at 100 yards...my 1895 xlr loves em. I live near Cabellas in Lacey WA, and can usually pick up a 20 round box for around 27 bucks. Definitely time to learn to reload heh..

 

[SgtDog0311]

When I bought my 45/70 1895STBL I hadn't reloading in mind yet and got a good deal on three boxes of LEVERevolution. Right now I'm thinking about buying two more boxes for an even-hundred-count of brass and recycling those with their soft-tip. That would be more expensive than the plinking rounds you guys broke down but still way cheaper than store bought. Using your figures for powder and primer, and Hornady's for bullets, after the initial investment in brass I'd probably spend close to .65ea from there out to the life of the brass. Maybe when the brass is played out I'll be interested in casting.

My real concern is with locking myself in with their Hornady's brass. It's shorter to accomadate their flex-tip, so I'm reading and understanding that crimping is a problem unless I go with their round and their die.

Any thoughts on that approach vs a fresh start with other brass??

 

[papadelta]

Well, you are correct about using their dies, otherwise you'd have to modify at least the crimp die.

But with 100 rounds to play with you can go out and get some unloaded normal size brass.

It will still be less than the price of loaded rounds.