A person can build one that will work for a "reasonable" price these days I suppose. Probably 1k for a barrel if you have a suitable action, gettiing one of those is another question at the prices on used #1's and 1885's these days.Stevens 44-1/2 action is still available from CPA, or a complete gun, or a barreled action. The kicker will be the wood, build your own or buy it, and that or getting an action can be the make or break part of it. I took a Browning 1885 in 22-250 I got at a discount from Frenchy's fire sale, rebarreled it to 32-40, built the stock myself from a piece of maple I got at Black Forest, that's not so cheap either these days, but, better than some of the upper grade walnut stuff around. I wouldn't ever have called it a finished gun, but, good enough so that it looked half decent and it shot really well. I learned a lot about shooting from it and a #1 in 32-30Rem I had before it, bench and offhand. Cast bullets at 14-1500fps will teach you a lot about the wind, same as the .22lr is doing for people these days, with less problems with the quality of the ammo, and they can shoot some pretty tiny groups as well. Casting bullets is not for everyone, I used to run 1000 or so every other week during practice season, which lasted about 3 mos of the year. Got to meet a bunch of good people at the shoots I went to, didn't finish last the first time I went, but, had a great time. Got into archery after doing 4 yrs of the Schuetzenfest, and the practice and travel were more than I wanted, as I was doing that for archery too. And Coors stopped sponsoring it after the range dispute in Golden Co, so, I quit going. And now, they lost the range they shot at in Edm when Spruce Grove got shut down, so the ASSRA shoots disappeared up here.
