Noob question - Marlin 60

[edglock21]

Just picked up a Marlin 60 (.22LR) and have a question.

I was reading the manual and it says "Never add cartridges to a partially loaded tubular magazine"...why is that? I've never had a weapon with a tubular magazine.

Thanks

[4runner]

if the spring is partially compressed, it will allow the part you pull out to shoot out and be damaged...

[J P]

Might be because your sorta looking down the buisness end of a loaded / one in the chamber , end of gun ?

[Jeepy1981cj]

Originally Posted by J P

Might be because your sorta looking down the buisness end of a loaded / one in the chamber , end of gun ?

This is the answer, no damage will occur to the gun or the cartridges by by doing this, just a safety issue.

Removing the spring is the only way to unload too, other than shooting them all off.

[zukitough]

Safety thats all. Watch out, if it slips it will tag you in the face, then you drop the rifle, it goes off, kills a busload of nuns. Thats why. I have one, the youth model with the commemorative medalion in the stock. I rack the bolt till one is chambered then add 2 more shells. Memory serves me correct I think it adds to 13 or 14.

[edglock21]

Thanks guys - makes sense

[87manche]

for reference, I pop mine out to unload it. Just point it at the ground, twist the end and let the spring push it out. You can keep your fingers on it and it will stop when the spring is uncompressed. Then you can unload it while safely pointing it at the ground.

that bit was in the instruction manual for the lowest common denominator.

[edglock21]

Originally Posted by 87manche

that bit was in the instruction manual for the lowest common denominator.

Kinda figured that, just wanted to know if there was a "mechanical" reason for not doing it (i.e. you'll f-up the spring or mag or something like that).


Safety is always forefront in my mind when handling any weapon.

[zukitough]

your not gonna fuck anything up but be careful if you remove the bolt. it is too easy to put a kink in the operating spring on reassembly

[SilverZuk]

Originally Posted by J P

Might be because your sorta looking down the buisness end of a loaded / one in the chamber , end of gun ?

Yep.
Can't say that I have followed that advice.
I have reloaded before empty while hunting many times.

However, the safety is on and the muzzle is pointed away from me at all times. I imagine that a bullet is going to be coming out of the muzzle at any time - so I keep clear ot it while loading.

[87manche]

Originally Posted by zukitough

your not gonna fuck anything up but be careful if you remove the bolt. it is too easy to put a kink in the operating spring on reassembly

yeah, you might as well order a spare 6 dollar spring right now.

Oh, and check over at rimfire central, a post by Arrow(?) is very good on making the trigger less suck. When mine was new you could cock it, and hold the rifle up by the trigger and bouce it and the trigger would not break. Now it's a clean 6 lbs after an afternoon in the basement and a few thousand rounds.

[intenseimages]

Here is a link for the Marlin Model 60 trigger work with lots of pics in it

http://votefordavid.blogspot.com/200...igger-job.html

[87manche]

Originally Posted by intenseimages

Here is a link for the Marlin Model 60 trigger work with lots of pics in it

http://votefordavid.blogspot.com/200...igger-job.html

yep, that's the same writeup.
I honed this sht out of mine with some ceramic stones, and took two loops off the hammer spring. I've not had a problem with light strikes, regardless of what shitty bulk ammo I feed it. It's not even had the action cleaned in a few thousand rounds.

I'm waiting till it malfunctions, and it's nasty, but the damned thing won't quit.

[Jeepy1981cj]

I'll have to weigh the trigger on my 60 now, I'm curious to see what it goes at. No way I could hold the gun up with it and it is stock although been used thousands of times.

I get a lot of failure to eject + load next shell. I have to keep it real clean. Type of ammo dosen't matter. Wet lube, dry lube, no lube, still the same. I just figured it was age and wear. Replaced the main spring and the firing pin as it was wore out if that's any indication of use!

Some day a nice stainless 10/22 will follow me home.

[intenseimages]

Originally Posted by 87manche

yep, that's the same writeup.
I honed this sht out of mine with some ceramic stones, and took two loops off the hammer spring. I've not had a problem with light strikes, regardless of what shitty bulk ammo I feed it. It's not even had the action cleaned in a few thousand rounds.

I'm waiting till it malfunctions, and it's nasty, but the damned thing won't quit.

Only thing I didn't do was remove the loops from the hammer spring. Everything else was smoothed and polished.

Originally Posted by Jeepy1981cj

I'll have to weigh the trigger on my 60 now, I'm curious to see what it goes at. No way I could hold the gun up with it and it is stock although been used thousands of times.

I get a lot of failure to eject + load next shell. I have to keep it real clean. Type of ammo dosen't matter. Wet lube, dry lube, no lube, still the same. I just figured it was age and wear. Replaced the main spring and the firing pin as it was wore out if that's any indication of use!

Some day a nice stainless 10/22 will follow me home.

From having the same experiences I can say that doing the trigger job has helped my Marlin 60 be super reliable as well. I used to have the same issue after a few hundred rounds with lots of FTE/jamming/cases sticking.

That seems to be the biggest complaint about the Marlin 60. After a few hundred rounds they get lots of internal crud built up and then they start to jam or FTE.

Doing the trigger job and smoothing all of the internal surfaces has made it shoot 100 times better and seems to help eliminate a lot of build up on the internal surfaces.

To the OP, sorry about the slight hijack. As was stated above, it is mainly a safety issue when removing the magazine tube while loaded.

[PONY_DRIVER]

Originally Posted by Jeepy1981cj

This is the answer, no damage will occur to the gun or the cartridges by by doing this, just a safety issue.

Removing the spring is the only way to unload too, other than shooting them all off.

No it's not. A great deal of my misspent youth was spent running around the woods of Southern MD with an 18 shot Marlin model 60. You can either pull the tube or just rack the bolt until it unloads. It's also easy to pull the tube and top off the mag without ever looking down the barrel.

I still have that old gun and it's so beat to shit it won't even fire anymore and I wouldn't trade it for the world and two blow jobs.

[intenseimages]

While still not the way to guarantee it is 100% safe you can always pull the slide back and push in on the charging handle. The rifle has a bolt hold open hole that the charging handle slides into. You can then be a bit safer when pulling out the magazine tube to unload or top off the magazine.

[edglock21]

Originally Posted by intenseimages

To the OP, sorry about the slight hijack. As was stated above, it is mainly a safety issue when removing the magazine tube while loaded.

Not a problem - I enjoy learning ...and few, if any, threads on Pirate stay on the original topic


I'm gonna check out that trigger job after I shoot it a time or two

[PONY_DRIVER]

I'll have to read that trigger job. The biggest problem with them is poor geometry. He's not kidding about parts flying. My Army buddy sent pieces flying from mine about 10 years ago and I'm not sure if I ever found them all or not.

That safety catch in the side that allows you to lock the bolt to the rear will wear over time. Mine will hardly even hang up at all and that's trying to get it to lock open. A light tap on the butt stock sends it home.

[SilverZuk]

I had problems with mine jamming. I cleaned it several times. That improved the problem, but didn't correct it. I used solvents, brake cleaner, and everything I had. Each time I cleaned it, I got more crud out.

The last time I took the stock off, got a can of WD40 and the garden hose.
I hose from every angle with garden hose. Cycle the action a bunch of times, then hose again. Then I would spray WD40 all through the action and work the action over and over. I repeated this until it felt like a new one when the bolt dropped.
Since then it works fine.

I just did the same thing to a neighbor's model 60 the other day.
He though the firing pin was broken. I told him "I can fix it".
After about 10 minutes of the water hose and WD40, I dried it off, sprayed and wiped everything down with oil, and took it shooting. It cycled perfectly.

[87manche]

Originally Posted by intenseimages

While still not the way to guarantee it is 100% safe you can always pull the slide back and push in on the charging handle. The rifle has a bolt hold open hole that the charging handle slides into. You can then be a bit safer when pulling out the magazine tube to unload or top off the magazine.

I had forgotten about that. it's such a PITA that I never bother with the hold open.

regarding the trigger. I did mine before it ever fired it's first round that's how disgusting it was.
I've never had a failure to feed or extract and I've shot remingon, federal, cci bulk through it.

only problems I've ever had in my 60 were ammo related. Shitty ammo not going bang when you pull the trigger. The gun itself has been flawless since the day it was new. If you're getting failures to feed I would look into the elevator spring, I bent mine a litle bit when I was in there doing the trigger so that it would lift the cartridges with a little more force. Could be that yours is wore out.

I can't bitch though, it was half the price of a 10/22 and more accurate out of the box. There's no aftermarket like the 10/22 has, but I wasn't interested in building a .22, just a cheap reliable tube fed gun. It's the perfect SHTF gun, no mags to lose, always goes bang bang bang.