My new Rio Grande 30-30

[Centaur 1]

I picked up my Rio Grande two weeks ago and I finally uploaded some pics. They're just crummy phone pics, but it's all I have right now. I bought this gun to be a dedicated cast boolit gun. My Marlin 336ss with its 1-10" twist shoots jacketted bullets extremely accurate, but point of impact with lead is off by over a foot at 100 yards. Rather than constantly adjusting the scope for whatever bullets I brought I bought the Rio Grande. The Rossi has cut rifling with a 1-12" twist, both the deeper cut rifling, and the fact the bullet won't have to rotate as fast, which I believe will help with cast bullet accuracy. It'll be a couple more weeks before I can get to the range and test the gun, I'll keek everyone posted when I do.



Here it is with it's new lever action siblings, that's Henry above and Marlin below.


Here it is after I took it apart for cleaning. As full as the action was with cosmoline, the mag tube was dry as a bone. The wood inside the forearm and where the butt stock is inletted for the action, had no finish on it. I applied several coats of Minwax antique oil to help keep the wood from absorbing water if it rains on me. I also coated the outside of the magazine tube with Lee liquid Alox and let it dry thoroughly before reassembling the gun.



I gave the action a very basic stoning which helped tremendously, but I still have more to do in the future. Anyone who has ever complained about the Marlin hammer bump should feel the Rossi. I'm going to remove metal from the hammer just a little at a time, to try and lessen the bump. If anyone has done this before, I would appreciate any tips about how much metal can be removed before I go too far. Since I know the bump has to be there to ensure that the hammer is fully cocked, I'm thinking about using a dial indicator and see how much hammer deflection I have with my Marlin 336ss, then try to duplicate thee same amount of hammer bump.

[akuser47]

I am gonna be getting one of these soon and will do the same good work to prevent anhything negetive, give a range report asap.

[Ranch Dog]

Oh boy, new toys. My 30-30, now 38-55, did not bump at all. The 45-70 did but the back, underside of the bolt looked unfinished and uneven so that is what I squared up to correct the problem.

[pricedo]

I didn't bother coating the barrel channel on my Rossi RG in .30-30 Win.
It looked like the porous wood had absorbed enough oil from the rather generous application of oil I applied to the metal when I put it in storage.
I would have had to sand the oil permeated wood out of the barrel channel for an epoxy coating to "take" and the oil saturated wood is an effective moisture barrier.

[pricedo]

Did a fair amount of shooting with my Rio Grande in .30-30 Win this summer and settled on the factory Hornady 160 grain FTX cartridges.
I have some slick leverguns but this one with its relatively cheap Bushnell Trophy 1.75-4x33mm scope is one of the slickest and most accurate.
I would proudly take this gun on any hunt with the exception of the great bears in Northern Canada & Alaska.
The gun would probably do the job but I want something a bit beefier to face off a Grizzly, Polar or Kodiak.
This would be an appropriate time to deploy "The Clydesdale".
Is it a culvert pipe with a trigger? Is it a disembodied Abrams Tank?
No........it's The Clydesdale !

[Centaur 1]

Well, I've been fooling around with my new rifle. I did another complete takedown and broke out the jewelers files and assorted stones. I came to the conclusion that the difference between Marlin and Rossi is that Marlin puts all the gun parts in a vibrating tumbler to knock the sharp edges off. Both guns needed the same amount of work to smooth the action, but the Rossi needed extra stoning because every edge was sharp. I even had to use a countersink to break the edges of all the holes, the hammer and lever had burrs that were rubbing on the pins.

I also just added a much better scope. I picked up a gently used 1.5-4.5x32mm Bushnell from our fearless leader, Mr. Ranch Dog. I have to say that I like this scope better than my Bushnell 2-7x32mm, and it was 1/6th the price, thanks Michael. A piece of information that I'd like to pass on to everyone, the hole pattern in the receiver matches the Marlin 336 exactly. My new scope is so compact that I had interference issues between the scope eyepiece and the mounting rail. My two options were to use high rings to get the scope higher off the rail, or what I did was swap out the rail that Rossi supplies with the rifle for a Weaver two piece mount from a 336. The whole idea of a compact scope is to get away from high rings, so I'm glad the 336 mounts work. The screws don't interchange though, Marlin uses a #8 and Rossi a #6 screw. No big deal because the Rossi screws fit the Marlin mount.