Well that didn't come out very well but if you scroll on the first pic you can see the breech and below it. Will take my picture problems back to the drawing board.

Resized the photo for you.

I'm not the expert here on Ballards but she looks pretty solid under the barrel.
The guys that know them will be along shortly.

Nice looking rifle by the way!!

Yes, there are several what look like set screw marks but only 6 grooves. Is that a clue?

I would guess that it is not a Peterson or Schoyen and that it was fairly recently built up--but I don't know it all.

Two line address does not indicate when the gun was made. What's on the address does indicate this. A two line address often indicates it's a forged action, which yours is. But if the address is "JM Marlin" it indicates 1881 or before. If it's "Marlin Firearms Co." it's 1881 or later.
Your barrel appears to have a liner in it from the noticeable ring I see at the chamber end of the barrel, so most likely not a Schcoyen bore. But 6 grooves wont be a Schoyen anyway. 
It's a very lovely old Ballard though, and I especially like that lever and buttplaate.

I can tell you which it might be, and which it likely isn't. But impossible to tell exactly what model it is. If the breech block halves match the receiver number, then it's likely it started life as a Union Hill. And a #8 had set triggers, so if the blocks serial number to the action it's likely the #8. The stepped side receiver eliminates some other pistol gripped receiver models like the #6, or others that usually have flat sided receivers.
The very high serial number, and Marlin Firearms Co. stamped receiver indicate it's in the very last Marlin Ballard rifles produced, and almost certain it's from 1890 era.
Yes, it's likely a pieced together gun, as most dedicated schuetzen rifles often were. The question really is how pieced together it is? The stocks, buttplate, lever, are all non Marlin, so added later. The barrel should have a matching serial number under the forearm, and if none, then that too was changed. As I mentioned, if you drop the lever screw and remove the breech blocks, you can examine the rear tail of the breech block halves for a serial number. Each half has the same number, and if it matches the receiver, then they started with a complete Marlin Ballard action to build the rest of your gun.

Fantastic. Will drop the block and check the no's and see how they match. I am delighted to learn about this gun. 
Just for show and tell, below are some of the tools that came with it. 
John

The non-Pope lubricator is one I think I recognize but can't put a name to.  In any case, not only are there two of everything, but I notice that the two powder scoops are clearly for different quantities.  The smaller scoop could be for a "squib load" and the rifle isn't a switch-barrel, but the tools do make me wonder if the rifle didn't have a second barrel.

Bill Lawrence

Also early tang sight for a very late rifle, and I can't see the ring indicating a lined bore, of no real importance, except to eliminate the possibility of Schoyen's hand. A very nice rifle, and with all the tools, even more so. Enjoy it.

That set of tools is amazing, and quite the neat bits to go with the gun! I'd guess maybe the two scoops were for either heavier or lighter bullets, and fixed cased bullets, or breech seated loads maybe too? 
The Pope lube pump appears to have a different handle added to make it more comfortable to use? Or maybe it's one of the copies of Pope's pump made by others" Any markings on the main tube body of the all brass lube pump?

Wow! Nice set of loading tools. 


Could the 2 different powder scoops be black and smokeless? Its what popped into my head.

Marlinguy - The poster stated that the barrel was unmarked, so that suggests that it is a newer barrel and not likely lined or the chamber lined. I am well aware that a factory barrel would be flat at both ends having owned and still owning a few Ballard rifles, but quite possible that the smith that fit the barrel decided to cut that outside contour. Kind of a nice touch. I have a very nice pre 64 Winchester model 70, originally chambered in 7mm Mauser, that unfortunatly(from a value standpoint) was re- chambered to 7x61 Sharpe and Hart early in it's life, and considered having the chamber lined to the original cartridge, but decided to leave it as is, that conversion being popular at the time. The chamber work was done by a long time Weatherby employee, and the rifle shoots factory Norma ammunition exceptionaly well with 160 gr Nosler partition bullets. I am glad I decided to leave as is. At times that is the best course of action.    Krag

Here are another couple of pics. Best shot I have of full gun. 
The collection of stuff includes 2 boxes of colloidal wads, one of which is full. The ammo boxes appear to contain all factory loads and several of them are full also. Is there any collector value for the boxes with ammo? I really don't need them as long as I keep some brass for myself. Have about 30-40 loose pieces of brass that will go into the tumbler soon. Will have to go to another discussion group to research loads. I have 12 grs of 4759 in mind to start. 
I hate to admit it but when trying to drop the block I could not get it all the way out. Took out the lever screw with action open, held the extractor in place  then pulled down and forward as the NRA disassembly
book says but it would not jiggle out. Maybe I should try it again when I am not so excited. 
Your responses certainly have my interest picqued! Thank you. 
Would love to shoot with someone that knows what they are doing. Any schutzen shooters in NH? 
John

The oldest two piece box in the center of the ammo collection has some decent value, but the others not so much. If any are full and all factory loads it will add to their values.
The breech block will never come out if you hold the extractor in place. Need to remove the lever screw after opening the lever. Then with the block about halfway down you can slip the extractor out past the block, and the block will drop out. Repeat the halfway in process to reassemble the block and extractor.

There are loads scattered in this forum, but the 4759 one is a fair beginning. I use 13.6gr. With a bullet of 196gr. I also like 14-14.5gr. of 4227 with same and similar bullets. Fixed or breech seated these are modest pressure, and likely fine in your beautiful rifle, but start cautiously for safety's sake.
Damn fine outfit there. As anoter here is prone to say, I want it-bad!

marlinguy wrote on Nov 20^th, 2020 at 10:37am:


Took me about a week to figure that out when I had my first Ballard!   

If it were a British motorcycle, we'd call it a "bitza".  Bits o' this and bits o' that.   

Since it's not a perfectly-factory-original specimen, all the more reason to wring it out at the range!

It is an original Ballard sight, just earlier than the rifle. Not a concern. Neither is it a concern that the sight staff is not perfectly perpendicular to the barrel. If it bothers you from an aesthetic standpoint, you could have the detent welded up and recut. I have never tried it, but would think you could use something like JB epoxy to fill and recut the detent. If you didn't use it constantly I would think it might hold up well. You should be able to find the later version in the 2-3 hundred dollar range, depending on condition. If it were me I would use it as is. Enjoy that rifle.

What great information I received, thank you. Now the loading journey begins. I have some odd cast bullets that came along with the gun but have not as yet figured out the breech seating method. I took a cerrosafe chamber cast several years ago but didn't get much farther than that so now I will see if the breech seaters are matched to the gun. I guess just drop the bullet into the chamber then push it in all the way with the seater. Load a precharged case then shoot.
I understand there should be a little space between the case mouth and base of bullet so figuring that out will be my next assignment. 
John

Marlinguy, it looks like you have a #2 Ideal. Sold for $1.00 but don't have a date on the book. Probably worth a little more now. 
I did notice the difference in where the knurled ring is located. 

The Ideal #2 has far more adjustment than the #1, but both work equally well; but not as well as any mechanical seater with leverage.

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Has high quality reproductions of dozens of the old Ideal catalogs. 

It looks like the #1's adjustment is by a screw setting on the case.

oneatatime. There is no adjustment in the No1 tool per say. There is a slot cut in the case to allow fore and aft movement of the case to hold the bullet prior to seating. It always made me a little nervous sliding a case in a chamber, with a steel screw flush(hopefully)with or below the case surface, so replace with a brass set screw. It is fairly simple to make it adjustable by fitting a brass set screw in the case mouth and mounting with a screw threaded into the end of the tool after shortening the rod the required amount, Then after seating depth is determined, holding it in place with loc-tite on the screw. Or, simply buy a leverage tool to simplify the procedure. Sometimes more enjoyable to make something work better or building one yourself!!

CPA sells a nice palm rest for a reasonable price, and a want ad here might pay off. You have a very nice rifle to work with. Keep us apprised of your progress.   Krag

Since your rifle has a later rail added, it appears that someone set it up for the European rail type palm rest. You might look at various sellers of modern rail type palm rests that will slide right on yours and work.
Champions Choice or Freeland both sell those for modern rifles. They use blocky wood now, so you might just remove the wood and build your own ball or shaped wood.

I have a lot of blowback on these cases. I know I have to play with some loads but I had a few loaded with 12grs 4759 and a cork wad and used the 319289 bullet, of unknown alloy,  breach seated. 
Where should I go from here? 
Thank you
John

Smoked necks like that can usually be prevented by sizing the brass so the neck is a snug fit on the chamber.  Flaring the case mouth a bit can help.  Annealing the case necks is another helpful step.  I'd say a faster powder might help, but you're using 4759, which is about as ideal a powder choice as has ever existed.

I'd either switch to a faster powder, or up the charge so it seals the case better. Remember when you breech seat you've basically changed the case to become a much larger volume case, so typical load data will be too light with the extra capacity. 
If you have a chronograph you could see that the velocities are likely much lower than published data for fixed bullets. 
Another good powder for me is 2400, which I use a lot of for breech seated loads. 4759 is a good powder, but once your supply is gone you'll be looking for something else anyway. Might as well work up loads with something common.

I was using an abundance of caution with my load of 12grs of 4759. In Wrights Shuetzen book for beginners he suggests a starting load of 14grs of  IMR4759 with a max of 15.5. For IMR4227 he suggests starting at 12.5 grs with max of 14.5grs.  
Now that we have determined that I have a forged frame I am more confident the gun won't have a problem if I stay within these parameters. 
I only have enough 4227 to try a few rounds and doubt I can find any more for awhile but will give it a shot.

I personally wouldn't do a pound casting of the chamber on any of mine. I'd rather do Cerrosafe, or in a pinch a wax casting than pound lead into my chambers.
But until you can set up a bench, or a good solid rest, it's going to be tough to determine accuracy.

Rotometals in San Leandro CA sells a Cerrosafe clone for cosiderably less. Having used quite a bit of it, seems to be the same, but in name only.

Yes, it will shrink, but I've found it so easy to do that I simply melt the casting back down, and do it again.
I always wondered why guys saved the Cerrosafe castings since they're really useless once they've shrunk anyway. I bought two bars years ago, and quickly realized one was plenty for a lifetime.

vall in my position at a camera company where we made Plastic lenses. When we were making new cavity sets we would use Cerro Bend to get cavity dimensions. The process was actually easy. We just heated up the Cavity's and then the Cerro Bend and poured it into the Cavity. We set them aside to cool off and left them over Night. We had found that Cerro Bend initially shrank quite a bit, but then went into a series of shrink and expansion as it went through temperature changes.
The end result was that 12 to 15 hours later the casting would be very close to the actual cavity numbers within .0002 to .0005and we could use that information to modify our machining system to get the product we wanted. It worked very well and we were able to create multiple cavity's that were all very correct to small numbers. The important issue was giving the sample enough time to go through the shrink and expansion cycles until it settled down and was stable. FITZ. OLD TUCK

fitz is Cerro Bend the same as Cerrosafe?

RotoMetals also has the shrink rate chart for their product on their Web site. I have been using it for years and find it to be a very good product for my own use.