Home Forums Lever Action Central Marlin 336 Lever Actions Just picked up a 1980 Marlin 336T Texan in .30-30 Win

Danish hunter and gun collector here - I thought I would introduce myself by showing my "new" Marlin.

I have been wanting a Marlin 336 in .30-30 Win for a while - but I was not too keen on a new Remington "remlin", those I have seen has been quite scratched up out of the box and the action and trigger felt stiff and clunky.
Here in Denmark older 336's are not too common - and those who have them are normally not interested in parting with them.

A few weeks ago I paid my old boss at Jagtstuen (a hunting store in Aarhus) a visit - I usually go there when I am looking for uncommon guns. An lo and behold; this is what he had in store for me:



I did not recognise the model - but the price was right and I liked the fact that it was a pre-safety version, so I went for it.
Arriving back home a quick google search revealed that it is a 1980 model 336T Texan - apparently a sought after model and (even in the rough condition mine is in) worth a lot more than I paid for it. It is hard to complain about that

The rear sight is special, it looks like a standard rear sight with a small piece of metal, with a small hole, inserted between the horns. I have no idea what a sight like that is called, I will post some photos of it asap.

The overall condition of the gun is sound, yet slightly rough - especially the wood. I'll have to get that refinished. I'll propably leave the metal parts alone, aside from cleaning and oiling them.

Any thoughts or recommendations on the gun?

Your new rifle looks fine to me, Wait to refinish the wood once you have some field time into the rifle.


What is 30-30 ammo availability like for you in Denmark?

Doc

.30-30 ammo is available here, but it is unfortunally not that commomon.

At most hunting stores you can find Remington Core Lokt 150 g - and at some you can get S&B SP 150 g or Barnes Vor-TX 150 g.

Some of the larger stores have started carrying Hornady Leverevoulution 140 g - but they are far and few between and it is expensive here! More than twice the price of regular .30-30 ammo.

Sometimes one can be lucky to stumble upon a store that has a stock of military surplus .30-30 ammo (mostly Remington, but it varies), dating from the cold war where the Danish army kept huge stocks og ammunition for almost any known modern western caliber. But even those are depleting rapidly, as the .30-30 and leveraction rifles are gaining in popularity here.

I have bought a Vortex Optics Diamondback 2-7x35 (V-plex) scope for this rifle - and managed to find a pair of old stock Weaver see-through mounts, matching the age of the rifle.

Dane,

Many old marlins bought here in pawn shops and from old timers will have the Weaver see thru mounts on the rifles. Almost all are removed and replaced with low rings to place the scope as low as possible for a proper check weld on the butt stock.

The times have changed regarding scope mounting on Marlin 336's.

Your choice or the 2X-7X scope will allow you to mount the scope lower on the receiver than a 40 mm front scope objective.


Doc

I appriciate the advice. But for this rifle (which will not be my only 336), I am going for the "grandpas' rifle" look.

If it doesn't work for me, I will change it - that is one of the luxuries of working at a hunting/outdoor store; though we do not sell guns, we have plenty of optics and mounting hardware in stock.

Congratulations on your find. Even here in the States the Texans are not that common. I have owned several and they are one of my favorite hunting rifles for whitetail deer and wild boar. You might want to consider outfitting it with a Williams FP receiver sight and 1/16" brass or ivory bead front sight. You will be amazed how handy and easy to shoot quickly with a receiver sight.

I have been quite lucky with my gun purchases lately, the other day I picked up a 1979 (october) Remington 600 Mohawk in .243 Win. w. a Mannlicher stock. Used but in good condition. Another not too common gun to find here in Denmark.

As for the 336; I'll go with the scope option for this one, But the Williams FP reciever sight may come into play as soon as I find a nice pre-safety North Haven produced 1895 in .45/70 Govt.

Welcome to the 'fire. That looks like a nice example of a 336. Congrats. I've never heard of war surplus 30-30. That said, I'd be careful of corrosive powder in that ammo. Other army surplus ammunition from yesteryear sometimes has corrosive powder and/or primers and they can play havoc with your weapon, especially its bore.

Thank you.

I learned that shooting original German wartime ammo in my 1944 98K - luckily I was adviced about the issue beforehand, so I made sure to clean barrel and action thoroughly after shooting. But, thank you for the warning though, being safe is always better than being sorry when it comes to taking care of our prized vintage firearms.

It is interesting to see folks from your area so interested in American arms, especially a Marlin lever. That is a nice gun, I also would like an 1895, but kept getting tightfisted at the wrong time. Since the Remlins hit everybody wants big money for the older ones. Hopefully the quality improves on the new ones.

Generally brands like Winchester, Browning and Remington are big here in Northern Europe. Marlin not to the same extent though.

Here in Denmark leveraction rifles are most often associated with Winchester - Marlins are mainly prefered by Danes who have lived and/or hunted in the US or Canada.

I learned about Marlins from an elderly couple who used to live in Colorado. I used to attend the same black powder shooting club as them - as well as occasionally joining them on re-enactments in 18C. French-Canadian trapper costume

I am still waiting for my permit for the 336T (usually takes 10-30 days here). It should be on the way.

I thought with movies and other media Winchester would be popular. Kinda funny you all are interested in our stuff and many here are enamored with the Northern European brands. There are a half dozen or so Sako and Tikka rifles in the safe here, and only 1 Marlin. Ironic.

Tikka T3 rifles are excellent value for money - though as far as I can gather, they are a lot more expensive in the US than here. But I guess it is the same with Remington 700, just the other way around.

Sako makes excellent high-end rifles, I would very much like a Sako 85 Grizzly in 9.3x62 Mauser.

I liked your post, given that my father's mother was danish and lived in southern denmark, till the german's annexed it. I bought a danish Kraig a few years ago. It had been sporterized. I contacted someone at the time in denmark about replacement wood for it, but could never get it finalized with them.
I think from memory it was a first year production rifle too.

I'd remove the butt plate and toss out the white line spacer. Then re-install the butt plate. I'm no fan of white spacers.

Sherwood

There is such a thing as "military surplus" 30-30? What army ever used it?

I picked a 100 of the surplus 30-30 Win cartridges when I picked up the gun, they are regular Remington 170 g Core-Lokt.

The Danish army kept huge stocks of almost any commercially available western (and some eastern) made calibers during the cold war. The idea was to distribute the ammunition among hunters, in the event the Russians invaded, so that they could form partisan groups (here in Denmark we have mandatory national service - I am personally not fan of that, but during the cold war it actually made sense).
During WWII, where the Danish government collaberated heavily with the German occupational forces, Danish hunters and shooters had their rifled weapons confiscated by the Danish police, who handed the weapons to the Germans(!) After the war several laws were passed, making sure that hunters' weapons were protected against such mass confiscations in the future (though in the recent years, a lot of these laws has been changed - and not to the better).

During the late 90's the Danish army started liquifying their stocks of ammunition. In the beginning they sold from it to commercial civillian suppliers - now they destroy whatever stock there is left. It was deemed imoral, by the powers that be, for the army to sell ammunition to civilians(!) Rather, instead of making a little money for the state, they prefer to decomission and destroy the surplus ammunition

Just snapped a few photos, before dissasembling the rifle, this morning:





Overall condition of the gun is fair. Though everything - including the forward barrel band - was heavily set in dried up gunoil. It took a little persuasion with a wooden mallet to get everything apart.

The barrel has some shadows in the bore unfortunally, right now it is soaking in a cleaning agent - fingers crossed it is mostly just dirt, copper and lead.
Aside fromt that everything seems to be intact and in working order.

The bolt is engraved, with what I assume are the initials of a previous owner:

Here she is, taken apart, cleaned and oiled:



The amount of rust, both on the inside and outside was manageable. There were a few very small rough spots in the bore, but they have cleaned up nicely (i can see a few tiny tiny pits, mainly because I know where to look). Nothing that should interfere with either safety nor accuracy. The rest of the bore stands very sharp and clean.

Overall the mechanical condition of the rifle is, considering it's age and the fact that it has obviously been shot quite a lot, quite good. I will not have to order any new parts.
The screws looks like they have been screwed (pun intended) by a gorilla with parkinsons (not my doing, I only use dedicated gunsmithing bits), that is a bit sad - I may replace them one day.

Overall I am happy about the gun. Now I just need to get the stock done (I'll pay someone to do that for me ans I do not have the time and working space to do it atm.), assemble everything and mount a Vortex Optics Diamondback 2-7x35 (V-Plex). I did try the see-through mount on before disassembling the rifle, as forseen by Doc it doesn't work for me - so I have ordered a Weaver rail and some medium Weaver Lever-Lok rings for it, that way I can still fairly easily get to the iron sights in the field.

Just got a few photos from the guy who is working on my stock:







A big improvement I must say