CAS Rfiles

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kevinasch

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Hi. I am looking at "tooling up" for CAS. I already have revolvers, Remington pattern cap and balls, but am now looking at rifles. I have found prices starting at around $600 and going way up from there. I have seen adds for (from lowest price to highest) Rossi Puma R92, Chiappa 1892 Skinner, Henry Big Boy, Uberti 1866 Yellowboy, Uberti 1873, and Uberti 1860 Henry. I have also seen adds, but found no price for an upcoming Pedersoli Lightning Rifle.

What would you reccommend? Any comments on the pros and cons of these different rifles? Have I missed any obvious choices?

Thank you for any comments or suggestions you may have.

Kevin
 
Currently most shooters these days use a clone of a Uberti M73, 7-8 years ago the most popular and reliable was the Marlin M1894. I shoot both and they are excellent guns for the price you pay. With either you won't need to replace it ever.

I also own a Rossi Pums M92 in .357 mag which I use as a main match backup rifle. Very reliable carbine but is very sensitive to overall cartridge length. Keep in mind that all M92 clones are sensitive to overall cartridge length. The chiappa, well my brother in law shoots one, it works but requires a good gunsmith to make it "flow" in matches. The Henry Big Boy, I shoot 20-25 matches a year, including Winter Range in Arizona where you have over 800 shooters at a match, if I see 3-4 shooters a year with the Henry, I'd be surprised. Very few aftermarket parts available and difficult to "slick" it up.

I see a couple of Henry 1860's every year, but in a match where you have to "load on the clock", it is slow. I have 1 friend who has has his Uberti M1866 for over 15 years (early model) and it was a little rough until it seen a good gunsmith.

Hope this helps
 
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very few shooters use the colt style lightening rifles. They require a lot of tuning to run well for the sport. As mentioned above look for a 73 It is better to just buy one now. You will end up getting one eventually if you stay in the game. If you do a search for SASS clubs in the Kamloops and Kelowna areas you should find a link to the Canadian final. If you can make it to a shoot there will be plenty of people there with good advice on rifles some will even let you try them and see what you like.
 
Pass on the Chiappa. A local smith cringes at the short cuts that cause problems that they put inside the nice looking exterior. And it seems to be the case in use as well. Two of my shooting buddies bought Chiappa firearms and both had troubles with them right away.

The Rossi is the cheap way to go but the 1892 has a lot of quirks of it's own. And the Rossi really needs a slicking up job and spring kit to make it sing. Mine has taken me quite a while to tune it so it's fast enough for me for the foreseeable future.

If you're going to shoot Frontiersman with the C&B guns then you might want to go with the Henry or Yellowboy just to keep your whole kit somewhat more period correct. And of course get a hammered side by side as well. But of course these are a pretty good amount of cash to plunk down.
 
If you are going to shoot Cowboy Action, remember one thing BEFORE you spend money READ the SASS manual to decide which category you want to shoot in and purchase your guns accordingly. While most clubs are not affiliated with SASS, they all pay lip service to the SASS rulebooks.

The Pedersoli Rifle will set you back $1,600 at minimum. I know one shooter with one and it is very reliable.
 
If you are interested in shooting cowboy in the Interior go to heffleycreekgunclub.com for info about upcoming CAS matches. We have a couple of fun shoots coming up in the next couple of months. Also the SASS Canadian Championship is being held at the KTSA range here in Kamloops on the Sept 1st long weekend.
The only CAS rifles that I would recommend are either a pre Remington Marlin 94, or a Uberti 73 or 66, I think the new Winchester 73s are good, however I have no experience with them and do not know if the aftermarket springs and parts will work with them. Most of the 92 clones that I have seen need extensive tuning by a professional to insure that they work reliably, when run at high speed the ones I am familiar with have a tendency to stovepipe live rounds.
Give me a call if I can help you at all. My contact info is on the HCGC website under Palmers Gulch.
 
I had the same issue with my Rossi as Lefty mentioned above. I've done my own work based on reading the tuning articles off the web and talking to our local CAS gunsmith who's been very helpful with additional hints. I've gotten to where it can cycle very quickly. But MY version of quickly. I haven't given it to someone like Lefty or the other very fast shooters in my club to try.

But that's an idea worth doing. I'd like to see just how good it's gotten.

Anyhow, the moral of this story is that Rossi starts out the least expensive but by the time you get it smith'ed up well enough you might encounter some frustration along the way. If it's more for fun (which I'm thinking is the case given that you're messing with C&B :D) then by all means don't shy away from the challenge. Especially if you're decent at some basic metal working and don't mind learning some basic to moderate gunsmithing tricks. But if you're the sort that figures a Dremel is the only tool a gunsmith needs then pay a smith to do the work.
 
I picked up the Chapparal 1873 Carbine in .45 LC from Marstar for my CAS rifle. It was giving me light primer strikes until I cleaned up a burr on the half-#### notch. and the rear sight is not staked in place (which I liked), so after confirming my point of impact, I staked it in. Other than that, the rifle has been running like a champ. This is the third year using it now.
 
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