.45-70 Big Power At Close Range

High in the Oregon Cascades, I squinted into a wet, blowing snowfall for the antlers of a bull. I could see elk moving through a couple of gaps in the young fir trees about 60 yards away, when I caught sight of a bull. I flipped the cover off my scope lens and waited for the bull to show in the next opening.

As the bull reappeared, I could see antlers distinctly through the brush. I shouldered the rifle and tried to look throught my scope, but the lens was covered with wet snow. I swept it off quickly with a wet, gloved thumb. When I looked up, the bull had passed the opening and was out of sight.

That was not the first time that happened to me. I've lost game several times because a scope was rendered useless by either rain or wet snow. Thinking back about my elk hunting during the last few years in this wet, thick-wooded region, nearly all shots have been less than 100 yards. All this got me thinking about changing my rifle choice.

One hunter I know bought a Marlin .45-70 for elk and fitted it with a receiver peep sight. He was so successful with the cartridge and receiver sight that several of his friends bought the same combination. Local hunters also reported one-shot kills with the 350-grain Hornady roundnose and 400-grain Speer flatnose bullets in handloads. The performance of these bullets on elk-sized game was reported to be awesome.

When you think about it, it makes alot of sense. The rifle/cartridge/sight combination seem like a good match, particularly for elk under these conditions. Big heavy bullets have the mass to deal a powerful blow to an elk even after passing through a fair amount of heavy ferns and light brush. And what better cartridge is there for big bullets than the .45-70?

Iron sights are plenty good for the effective range of the cartridge and the relatively short shooting distances encountered in dense brush and timber. So I decided to give the old .45-70 and a new Marlin Model 1895 chambered for it a chance. The Marlin Model 1895SS is an easy-carrying fast-cycling lever gun. I knew from past experience with lots of Marlins in other calibers that these rifles are plenty accurate.

While everything so far sounds good, there are clinkers in this peep sight and .45-70 plan. First, while a good receiver peep sight is fast to use, there is no denying the fact that a scope gathers light and is a better performer under low-light conditions. An optical sight works earlier and later in the day.

Second, many middle-aged shooters have a problem with iron sights due to far-sightedness.

Third, the .45-70 is loaded mild at the factory, and rightly so, in deference to the old and weak actions are chambered for this round, so if you want high performance from this cartridge, it's a handloading proposition.

SAAMI specs on the .45-70 call for 28,000 either in pounds per square inch (psi) or copper units of pressure (cup). On the other hand, Marlin's lever actions are known to be strong rifles. Marlin's own .444 round, for example, carries a pressure spec of 42,000 psi, same as the .30-30 Winchester. The newer .356 and .375 Winchester cartridges, rounds the Marlins have been chambered for in the past, have maximum pressure standards of 52,000 cup and psi.

SAAMI/ANSI specifications are relatively mild for the .45-70 cartridge in general, handloading manuals have separated .45-70 data into catagories that match the various rifle action strengths. Nearly every major loading manual has plenty of good data developing pressures specifically for the strong Marlin rifles.

I shot several varieties of factory ammo and its performance could be safely exceeded with good handloads in every instance with the Marlin rifle. So, while SAAMI standards limit factory load performance, this is not a problem for a handloader with a strong Marlin and reliable shooting data.

Fourth, the .45-70 shoots large diameter, blunt bullets at relatively low velocity. While these are killers at close range and great for busting through brush, they make for a lot of drop at any distance. The blunt bullets with poor ballistic coefficients (B.C.) not only drop a lot over short distances, energy is also rapidly dissipated for the same reason - blunt bullets. I was interestd to see the downrange drop and energy figures after I determined the velocity to be had from the loads in my rifle.

I figured that iron sights were plenty good for 200 yards, and I like to hit an elk with 1500 foot-pounds (ft-lbs) of energy. While shots are generally close, I want to be able to take an elk out at 200 yards in case the opportunity presents itself. Would the .45-70 shoot flat enough and have enough energy to do it?

Just for test purposes, I mounted a Tasco 1.75-5X scope on the new Marlin. I figured a more honest load comparison could be had with the greater sighting precision of a scope. The scope could be taken off, and the iron sights mounted, after I completed the accuracy testing and settled on a hunting load.

Four factory loads were fired from Federal, Remington, and Winchester. Five bullets and eight powders were tried in handloads. I experimented with several propellants including VV N130 and N133, AA 2495, 2015, and 2520; Varget; H322; and RL 7. As it turned out, my chosen hunting load was 50.0 grains of RL 7 with bullets weighing 300 to 405 grains, which are plenty heavy for elk.

With the components selected, loading and shooting soon revealed the performance of the handloads with my lots of components in my rifle. The highest velocity loading fired during the test series was 2173 fps from a 300-grain Hornady hollowpoint ahead of 61.0 grains of W N133. The case was a Winchester, and the primer was a Remington 9 1/2. The same 300-grain Hornady hollowpoint loading produced the greatest energy at 3145 ft-lbs.

I also have a Winchester '94 in 45 colt that is fun to shoot, but I doubt that it would bring down an Elk, a whitetail maybe.

Are you sure it is a Winchester '94?

The engineering of that rifle was not designed to handle a .45 Colt... the carriage and lifter would have to be designed and the lever throw modified. I know of the Turnbull Restoration sets in .45 Colt (very rare, 5 I think, and exceedingly expensive) and the .45 Colt Legacy Winchester '94s. Is your's one of those??

A Winchester '92 (basically a miniaturized 1886 Browning design) possibly could be rechambered for the .45 Colt from the .44-40 Winchester it was designed to handle. The '92 was made in .44-40, .38-40, .32-20, .25-20 and some very rare .218 Bees.< In the '40's and '50'2 some were converted (unsafely) to .357 Magnum.

There are some REPLICA 1892s that were manufactured in .45 Colt in Japan in a limited run of 500 in 2002.

I also knew a doctor who touched off a .458, scoped, without a good firm grip. He stitched up his hanging eye brow in the rear view mirror of his car.

Ouch - nothing like a case of "scope eye" to ruin a day at the range. My old Horanady reloading manual has data for the .460 Weatherby cartridge. They mentioned that the only way they could shoot the test rifle enough to develop the load data was to drape a bag full of lead shot over the shooter's shoulder to absorb the worst of the impact. Even then, they said the recoil was tremendous.

I did a pretty good number on my wrist with a Winchester 12 gauge shotgun with a pistol grip I had a few years ago. I was hip shooting it, using 3-inch 00 buckshot shells. The pistol grip was hard plastic, and it was a typical Florida afternoon in late July, so my hands were very sweaty. That damned gun just about jumped out of my hands, and it took a decent-sized hunk of skin out of the base of my thumb, as well as really popping my wrist backward. I had to wear an ace bandage on it for a couple of days

A Winchester '92 (basically a miniaturized 1886 Browning design) possibly could be rechambered for the .45 Colt from the .44-40 Winchester it was designed to handle.

Rossi makes and EXCELLENT Winchester 92 copy in 45 Colt that you can load for all get out. They also chamber it in 454 casull .... and mine runs like a champ.

I bullseyed the first shot, but by the tenth shot I couldn't even hit paper anymore, I was whimpering and flinching so badly.

This is the main reason I prefer a nice semi-automatic rifle over a bolt action about any day. I have a .308 semi-auto and it is fun to shoot (though I know a .416 magnum round is no comparison to a 7.62 N.A.T.O. round).

Yeah, those pistol grips are for the birds, unless you really need something that compact. You can shoot a stocked 12 guage from the hip all day and it won't hurt you. When I was turkey hunting, I sighted in some 2-ounce turkey loads. My Mossberg has the rubber recoil pad, but about 4 shots was all I could stand before the tears started flowing. :(

Even the 2 3/4" slug loads are too much for me off the bench. I had to use a sand bag between my shoulder and the butt when sighting in off the bench. Made me happy though, that my cheap smooth bore with Remington rifled slugs, was out-shooting my brother and his friend with their fancy rifled bores and sabot slugs. Out to about 65 yards, anyways, trusty old Mossberg can keep it in the black.

I once had a double barrelled .577 Snyder Elephant gun... it was only about 24" long... but the cartridge was almost as long (I'm only slightly exagerating). It had no sights at all. The story went that pygmy hunters used them for elephant hunting by running UNDER the elephant, sticking the gun up into the elephant's gut, pulling the trigger and running out before the elephant fell down!

Now, if you think that is funny how about the .577 Snyder PISTOL???

According to Fr. Frog:

The British "Howdah" pistols were basically a .577 Snyder double rifle with the barrel cut off to seven inches(!) and a pistolgrip stock. They were designed to shoot a attacking tiger off the back of the elephant you were riding through the jungle. Legend has it that the way you employed it was to hand it to the tiger and let him fire it! (Consider that the .577 launches a 480gr bullet on top of 70+ gr of black powder--in a three pound pistol, and with its tendency to "double" it was truly a pistol for the "manly man.")

They mentioned that the only way they could shoot the test rifle enough to develop the load data was to drape a bag full of lead shot over the shooter's shoulder to absorb the worst of the impact. Even then, they said the recoil was tremendous.

I think the most I could handle, if I ever went on an Alaskan dream hunt for Grizzly, would be the BAR in .338. I'd get it Mag-na-Ported, then it would be sweet. Of course, I'd want an experienced guide backing me up with something nasty and reliable, like the .458 or .416 in a Mauser-style bolt rifle, in case the semi-auto decided to malfunction. I guess a lot of us must fantasize about a hunt like that, or going to Africa for the Big 5. Oh well.......maybe some day, before the old bones get too old...

I know what .458 Win Mag and .416 Rigby feel like. In each case, I took one shot, handed the rifle back to the owner, and wiped the tears from my eyes.

When I was working in a gun shop in Sacramento, a gunsmith that worked there built a .458 WinMag rifle that weighed only 4.5 pounds! He had a standing offer that if you paid him $50 and could shoot the gun three times in an hour, you could have it. Last I heard he still had it.

He let me fire it once for free... and I put a heck of a lot of padding on my shoulder before the attempt... and I was sore for over a month and had a bruise you would not believe.

HE could fire it that many times... but then he thought nothing of taking an unstocked 10 Ga. Magnum and test firing it holding on to the tang...

What is it about girls with guns? I love it. I can't even get my wife to fire my Browning .22 much less my S&W CS40.

Tell her that women are better natural shooters than men. It's true.

I took my mom and dad out to the gravel pit one day. My little, 5-foot, 100-lb., 60 year old mom. She had never fired a handgun in her life. We set up a Coke can about 25 feet away. I gave her a short course in semi-auto handgun safety, then handed her my Ruger Mk II stainless bull .22. She fired a 10-shot clip at the can. The can didn't move a fraction, all the dirt kicking up behind it. We all thought, "Nice try Mom, you're a good sport." Walked up to the can, the damn thing had about 8 holes in it, right in the middle. Jaws dropped to the ground. On top of that, she says, "I could shoot somebody with this, if they came in my house." I was so proud of my little mommy that day. :)

He let me fire it once for free... and I put a heck of a lot of padding on my shoulder before the attempt... and I was sore for over a month and had a bruise you would not believe.

There's a technique to it. I know you have to grip the forearm very tightly, keep the butt very firmly into your shoulder, but at the same time keep your arms very stiff to absorb the recoil. I just have zero meat on my shoulder, there's nothing separating the gun butt from my shoulder joint but skin. Bad genetics.

My all-time favorite gun writer, Finn Aagaard, God rest his soul, used to say his petite wife could handle the .375 H&H with ease...grrrr.

When I was younger (and wilder), I had "a hankerin" for a handgun that was BIG! Sure, I had my Ruger Redhawk in .44 Magnum, and I handloaded some really hot loads, with either 180gr SJHP or the big 300gr Sierras... But for some reason, I just didn't feel that they were enough...

So, I series-ly thought about getting myself a Thompson Center Contender... Either in .45/70, or possibly even in .375 JDJ (I had previously spoken to J.D. Jones about getting a "big" bullet for my .41 Mag S&W Model 57... When I asked about the powder charge, his response was, "fill the case with 296, and put the bullet on!"). At the time, I figured that having an "elephant gun" for a handgun at home would ensure that there would never be any rogue elephants storming about my neighborhood... Eventually, I did come to my senses, and never did buy either one... But it was fun to dream!

Mark

There were several model years for the 45-70 "Trapdoor", the first of course being 1873.

Trapdoors were being produced from surplus musket stock as early as 1865 and chambered with much larger loads.
Though there were several 45-70 models fielded, they all tended to look like the the 1873. The differences in these models were things like barrel bands, sights, bayonets etc.

I would have to look it up, but I believe the last 45-70 goverment model to be fielded by the Army was 1885. These weapons were in use to well past 1900.

My experience with trapdoors started when I went to a gunshop and they had a nice looking one for a ridiculous price. I bought it and some ammo and started to check it out. The cartridges were too small for the chamber. I took it back to see what was going on and the gunshop owner told me they made a mistake. It was a 50-70. He then went into the back of the shop and gave me a trapdoor 45-70 without the lock mechanism.

He told me to go home and just switch out the parts. I now had two for the price of one. I just had to find a lock for the one I wanted to shoot.I went to Dixie Gun Works and Turner Kirkland fixed me up with a new lock. Everything was working just great. The only problem was the 45-70 was in so bad of shape that I sold it for about 200. I kept the 50-70 but I never put the cartridges together in order to shoot it.

The worst recoil in a handcannon that I ever experienced was with a friend's T/C Contender. He thought along the same lines as you, that he just had to have a pistol capable of stopping an elephant, should one ever bother to go on a rampage in northern Califonia. He contracted with J.D. Jones to have one built - a 14 inch stainless bull barrel model with a Jones muzzle brake. A really nice looking unit. That thing was O.K. to shoot if one kept the handloads down to the lower levels of the trapdoor range; but when it was loaded up to the levels of the Ruger No. 1 with 400 grain bullets, it became very, very unpleasent. After shooting that gun, I decided that I would ONLY shoot .45-70 in a rifle.

One of John Taffin's famous "Taffin Tests" is about heavy loaded .41 magnum. I have actually made up some really nice 260 grain BRP hard cast copper gas check rounds and fired them in my Blackhawk. They have about the same recoil as the .44 mag.

That sounds good. IIRC, the Marlin will take full-power handloads in 45-70 (?) Is that a custom compensator, or can you actually buy it with compensator?

I had a chance to buy a sporterized Mauser bolt gun in 45-70 at pawn shop for $250. It sat there for a good three years before I PCS'd. Probably shoulda bought it, it was a bargain. As far as that .416 goes...I fired it once, offhand, with a PAST recoil pad...major OUCH! Really rattled my teeth. I wouldn't even dare shoot it off the bench, I'm pretty sure it would break my shoulder. Even shooting my T/C Renegade .54 off the bench all afternoon, I ended up with bursitis, and that doesn't kick any worse than a 12-guage, 1 1/4 oz load.

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