hey guys i came across a old beauty that was built in 1896 and is in decent shape. spent some time with a gunsmith getting the stock rebuilt. i thought it was in 38.55 but turns out its in 38-56 which id never heard of. so trying to find dies and load data. would love to shoot it and take it hunting next year. hopefully pick it up tomorrow and bring it home. can post pictures if anyone is interested.
38-56 in a winchester 1885
- Thread starter rebags
- Start date
coyoteshooter
CGN Regular
- Location
- Ontario, Canada
i have a 1893 marlin in 38-56 the base brass is 45-70 then a lot of reforming stages and annealing etc actually the round never seemed to take off its sort of a magnum 38-55 ha ha don
vagrantviking
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- High River, Alberta
Sounds very interesting. Pictures would be great.
Shouldn't be too difficult to find or convert things to get it running. If this site can't help I'm betting the ASSRA forum will have many pointers.
Shouldn't be too difficult to find or convert things to get it running. If this site can't help I'm betting the ASSRA forum will have many pointers.
That'll be a lot of fun. I had a .38-56 in a Winchester 1886. To form the cases I started with .45-70 and ran them through a .40-65 sizer die first, and then trimmed a bit, and ran them through a .38-56 full length die. I got my dies from Buffalo Arms as they had them in stock. I also used a 260gr mold from Buffalo Arms which was really close to the original bullet. I only shot black powder in mine. The cases would only accept a bullet that was several throusandths under groove diameter, which wasn't a big problem for the black powder to bump up with 20:1 alloy.
Chris.
Chris.
fingers284
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Alberta Cowboy Ranges
I was unaware the 38-56 was chambered in a 93', possibly a conversion somewhere along the line but considerable work would have to be done...I'm not even sure a 93' action could accommodate the length of a 38-56 round. Are you sure it isn't a 95' Marlin ( hopefully it is, somewhat more valuable than a 93").
Back to the OP's problem. 38-56 isn't an easy cartridge to reform from 45-70. It takes considerable force (don't use a light, inexpensive press, it might get "sprung"). The problem with 38-56 is the long neck and slight body taper that starts not to far ahead of the case web, your crunching some thicker brass than what is at the case mouth. Somehow, either with a series of specifically made forming dies or , as I did, use a bunch of other dies I had on hand for other calibers that I jury rigged to start the downsizing...use lots of lube & as many stages of downsizing that you can come up with. Just trying to downsize in one pass with a set of factory sizing dies will end up in discouraging frustrations beyond description...and a lot of wrinkled, unusable brass.
I cut my own sizing die with a 38-56 chamber reamer that I had access to at the time. I discovered early in the process that, because you are forming some heavy thick brass at the end of the sizing that just running the formed cases into the sizing die didn't make chamber-able brass...I had to take every piece of brass a little deeper into the sizing die to downsize a bit past original brass measurements and then fire form the brass in the gun once and then they worked excellent in subsequent firings. The subsequent firings were just sized in the home built die and worked good.
I will say again, it takes some brute force (especially the last smidge of downsizing). I use a heavy old cast iron Herters press built in the 50's with a snipe extension on the handle to get the job done ( with the snipe it is pretty much effortless for me but the press gets a workout).
Was all of the above worth the trouble...absolutely, My old 1895 will shoot 2" groups with those brass and I have hunted that old girl, bringing home a couple deer with it.
Last edited:
thanks for the information guys I will be doing my best to source brass was give a place or 2 to try. If not i will be resizing brass using alot of hard work and patients, and my 50 bmg press. again thanks and ill post some groups in the future once i get shooting.
I have a couple 86s in 38-56. I have 38-56 dies and have reformed 45-70 brass to 38-56, but for reformed brass ammo to chamber, bullets need to be undersized. To load proper diameter bullets, you need to ream the necks of reformed brass. Another option is to obtain 38-56 brass. 38-56 has a higher case capacity than 38-55. I have seen several guns rechambered from 38-55 to 38-56. You may not need reloading dies if you are loading brass that has been fired in your highwall.
fingers284
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Alberta Cowboy Ranges
I should add that after starting out and realizing the amount of "crunch" was required I annealed a hand full of brass before sizing and pretty much had every brass I annealed wrinkled somewhere in the process so went back to the crunch method.
