Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 444Marlin Question

Folks,
I had occasion to shoot with a fella who was using a 444 Marlin chambered Winchester timber carbine who was having problems feeding the Hornady Lever Revolution ammo, especially the last cartridge. Being a friend of mine, he asked me to look at it and let him know what to do.
I took the rifle and thoroughly checked the chamber, rails, cartridge elevator, magazine follower, etc. and found no problem other than the Hornady Lever Revolution ammo would not feed correctly. I then got a box of plain jane Remington 444 Marlin ammo and it fed perfectly every time.
Upon examining the Hornady and Remington cartridges the reason for the problems became clear. The OAL of the Hornady ammo was 2.580 and the Remington ammo was 2.531. The SAMMI spec is 2.570 and the Hornady ammo was out of spec by 0.010, which in this case was causing feeding problems.
Another thing I noticed was that the Hornady cartridge case length was much shorter than the Remington cartridge case length. (2.066 as compared with Remington's 2.226 for a difference of 0.159)

Can someone here please explain to me how Hornady can sell this non SAMMI spec ammo as 444Marlin and worse yet, why nobody but Remington to my knowledge makes plain jane 444Marlin cartridges. Of course, this just begs the question of what is the case length of the Hornady unprimed brass for reloaders and is it also 0.159 shorter than spec.?????

Any thoughts / opinions / facts or ideas are welcomed to reply to my question as I wish to gather as many viewpoints as possible and truly find out how this can occur. Thanks.

Flower Child

It seems I have read that they use shorter cases in the .45/70 ammo too.

the following is copied from a Brian Pearce article in Handloader concerning the length of the case.

Yeah, okay, hell yeah Hornady is doing this but where the hell is our SAMMI standardization enforcement if any? Hornady's ammo is not made to the 444Marlin specs listed by SAMMI and should not be listed as 444Marlin. It needs another classification like Hornady 44Short Rifle. It is NOT 444Marlin. The 38spcl and 44spcl can be used in 357mag and 44mag respectively but they are not 357mag or 44mag cartridges and are not represented as such. So how come Hornady can make a cartridge that is not to specifications and call it a 444Marlin?

Flower Child

I believe SAAMI specifications are voluntary, not mandatory.
Cheers...
Con

I guess we'll have to change the name of the CCI Stinger .22LR as well.

Since no other cartridge( 44mag for instance) can be fired in a 444 Marlin there can only be one, a couple thousands of an inch in OAL and case length doesnt make it anything else. Bet they feed just great from a Marlin lever rifle. Guess there are no SAAMI gestapo officers around to go and arrest the folks at Hornady.........;)~

It is also possible that the profile of the magazine follower may have a bearing on the feeding. I don't use leverevolution ammo, but is it not a flex tip??

I have no experience with the Hornady 444 Marlin ammunition. I load for four of the Big Bore Winchesters, 307, 356, 375 and 444. With some of the smaller meplat flat point bullets, I am able to use a 2.600� COAL. Using most common meplat flat point bullets a COAL of 2.550� is maximum in my rifles. I find a COAL of 2.500� gives best accuracy in all of the Winchester rifles with their short throats.
I have measured a few factory Remington 444 Marlin cartridges and my notes indicate they average 2.512�.
The Winchester rifle does not have the cutout in the left receiver sidewall and this restricts COAL when loading the wide meplat bullets. The wide meplat bullets will not make the turn from the loading gate into the magazine tube. When loading the wide meplat LBT bullets or the 310-grain Lee I must restrict the COAL to 2.490�.
My guess is Hornady collaborated with Marlin in developing the LeveRevolution ammunition and did not consider the out of production Winchester rifles with their limited production numbers.

In the Marlin riffles it seems that 99% of the feed issues can be fixed with the replacement of the magazine follower to a Lever Revolution compatible one, likely a similar issue with the Winchester?

Thanks for your input fellas,
I talked to my friend and we are going to try another follower. If that fails to fix his feeding problem, then he wants to start reloading his own cartridges since the Hornady pointed bullets introduce so many potential problems to gain a few extra yards of trajectory.

Flower Child

Midway USA has ammo for the .444 in 10 different loads plus the Remington and the LeverEvolution.

The LE brass for the .450 Marlin is slightly shorter too. When the LE ammo first came out there was a problem with feeding in the older rifles because of the shape of the bullet so Marlin changed the follower to make them work. The newer rifles have the new follower and the older rifles can be easily updated. Not sure about the Winchesters.

I'm hoping to get a job with the SAAMI police. Those guys should have it made.

Just avoid the LE ammo. All the leverguns are better served with cast bullets anyway. The LE stuff is an answer to a question that was never asked.

You know this how???

Shot plenty of LE ammo......nothing wrong with it!

Ask your parents to buy you some cast bullets like the big boys use. The LE bullets suck on game.

Yeah.........how did you know???


And I suppose you have shot a truckload of game with your 700 chambered in 308 Marlin Express???

Not sure about that. The buck I shot with the LE .450 is just as dead as the one I shot with the .450 Interlock.

Of course that could just be because the .450 is just that much better than the .45-70. With a .450 Marlin you can shoot marshmallows out of it and they just blow right through deer.

Thank you for posting with credibility!!!

She's blowing smoke, but I'm sure you enjoy that.