Home Forums Lever Action Central Marlin 336 Lever Actions Marliin XLR rifle

Just pick up a Marlin XLR rifle in the Marlin 308 express caliber. I'm not a kid and I own and used different tube magazine lever action rifles for target shooting and hunting. I like these type of rifles but the down range ballistics in my opinion droped to fast. THIS RIFLE WITH THE 24" BARREL HANDLES AS FAST AS A 20" BARREL. I think this new caliber is the answer I'm looking for. Dose anyone own or have a opinion?

check out marlinowners.com and the forums at beartooth bullets. lots o' lever guys there.

I ask anyone who uses this site for an opinion. If I wanted another site I'll go to it but I thank you all for your reply. There must be someone on this site who have some insight.

Haven't fired one yet but an XLR in .308 Marlin will be one of my next two purchases. Already have Marlins in .30-30, .375 Win and .45-70 and love them all.

The advice to go to www.marlinowners.com was a good one. You do yourself a disservice by not doing so.

Fish and Coyote gave you good advice.
I have a 22� blue 308MX. This rifle is not quite a .307 Winchester but it is very close. Out to 240 yards there is not a great deal of difference between the cartridges. Past this distance the .308 Marlin Express has a clear advantage that grows with distance.
The Marlin 308MX has a small but clear advantage in accuracy over my Winchester Big Bore rifle with both handloads loaded to full power and factory ammunition. The Marlin 308MX uses a floating forend with nylon strips between the wood and magazine tube. There are other small differences in the fit of the locking bolt that probably have a lot to do with the better accuracy from the Marlin rifle.
The handloader must work hard to equal the accuracy of the Hornady factory ammunition. Your handloads will shoot with the factory ammunition but you cannot just assemble handloads and expect them to perform as well as the Hornady ammunition.

I mixed .308 Marlin Express data in the .307 Winchester thread on the Beartooth forum. If you compare them you will see there is little real difference between the 20� 307 Winchester and the 22� .308 Marlin Express. The 24� barrel should narrow the gap a little more. � This link

http://shootersforum.com/showthread.htm?t=37467

The second link is to the .308 Marlin Express forums on the Marlin Owners board. It is worth cruising through the various threads on the .308ME forum as there is some interesting information in them.

http://www.marlinowners.com/board/viewforum.php?f=60&sid=32ada00d8cd5dd894d9b80e30544b7e3

After reading the latest issue of Handloader and Dave Scovill�s column: �Branding� I intend to write him about the .308 Marlin Express. I believe Dave has not given much thought to the .308ME cartridge and its Marlin rifle. The .300 Savage and .307 Winchester are obsolete and their rifles are out of production. A hunter looking for a lever-action rifle in this power class now has more options than the Browning � which not all hunters like. I believe there is a market for the .308ME and believe Marlin/Hornady were pretty smart to step up and produce a very interesting product. With the return of the Winchester Model 94 I certainly hope someone at Winchester is smart enough to realize there is a market for the Model 64 type rifle in .307 Winchester. The addition of a Model 64 type rifle would make for a real horse race between Winchester and Marlin and give us some great internet threads to boot.

The Marlinowners Website is the place to go to find indepth info on the 308 Marlin!!!

Well, Italy1, my opinion is that for me the 308MX is just about perfect. That may not apply to you because I can't tell from your profile where you reside or what you hunt, unless you are in fact in Italy.

I do not have a long history with lever action rifles and the reason for that is that (in my opinion, right or wrong) they were never really accurate enough to interest me. With this rifle that thinking has changed. I have not started handloading for this caliber yet and really don't expect to improve anything significantly by doing so. For now I'm content to shoot the factory ammunition, although I'm getting things together for reloading this ctg.

My rifle hunting is primarily for elk and deer. Hope you like yours as much as I like mine.

DJR

Well! DJR, I WAS bron in the USA AND STILL HERE. I thought my first poster explained my usage of rifles. Well I Hunt in NYS I like to spend a day at the firing range. I'm a reloader and I'M about to start reloading for this caliber ( Marlin 308 express ) I also own a Win.94 in win.356 cal.. Looking at the 356 cases. I call Hornady and said "if I use Win. 356 or 307 cases and put them through a full sizing die will it work" He said "yes". He also sent me Dater for this caliber. Once it's all together a day at the range will not turn my pockets inside out. My reason for using 356 or 307 brass is that Hornady 308 express brass isn't on the market yet and the 356 & 307 are.

Coyote_Hunter I do thank you and fish30ought6 for the advice. But I think Marlinowner ask for to much personal info. So I dicided not to use that site.

NYS, who woulda thunk....

mr. iorg is a compendium of info on the new chambering. you should be able to read the links without joining the site ...