I love the 30-40 cartridge for hunting.  I have an 1875 in 40-70 SS and it shoots lights out but kicks like a mule with stout loads.  I have a smokeless load using a 330 gr paper patched bullets at about 1850 fps that is going to be my elk rifle this year.  It took me awhile to get an accurate load but it shoots minute of elk to 200 yards.  My HiWall 30-40 is undergoing load development using a 135 grain copper bullet and if it works out will be included in the mule deer hunt this fall.  I like full length stocks but not sure how it would work with no hanger.  Good luck with your build!  Tom   

Bulseyetom wrote on Jun 3^rd, 2023 at 6:11pm:


Many old German full-stock rifles lack a hanger. I think my starting point would be full-contact to the barrel with no contact to the receiver face. Next approach would be bedded hard to the receiver and 3-4 inches of barrel then free-float the remainer to the muzzle and a wrap-around band bedded to the wood with no contact with the barrel. In most Full-stock work I have done here I route a significant channel in the barrel channel for a threaded steel rod. I put the rod in with bedding compound to eliminate any chance the stock may warp and cause pressure points. I usually combine this with a full-bed. That means I bed in stages (action then TG/mag box on a repeater) and I eliminate all wood in the receiver bedding area.

The 30-40 is pretty hard to beat despite what "modern" hunters seem to think.  I have a Shiloh 1874 in 30-40 that was either the first or second one they made.  It is a bit over 9 pounds with the half round barrel, but so are most bolt action scoped rifles.   I was thinking of it mostly as a hunting rifle when i ordered it back in the mid-1980s but it has ended up as mostly a paper puncher.  I still go back to my rebarreled original 1874 Sharps in 45-70 for hunting.  Not much lighter, but MY rifle.

George

I have a Uberti High Wall in .30-40.  Shoots pretty good, but that long barrel would be a pain to carry very far when hunting.  I put the butt stock from a Winder Musket on mine.  MUCH EASIER on my shoulder.

That might be an easier & much cheaper way to get a single shot hunting rifle.

I've one of the MVA "Winchester" reproduction scopes.  I might put it on the Uberti.

I'm not having much luck finding a doner 1875. Thinking now perhaps the best is I have my son order one and then I pick it up from him when he graduates from college in 2024..

Perhaps an option of a roller is worth consideration. I have a Remington marked Swedish roller action. It has the two ugly retaining screws for the hammer/breechblock pins but those could be dealt with as the time the action us thinned. It looks like someone tried to re-profile the military triggerguard at some point, there is still a hole visible for a sling swivel

Grand Slam,
I wish I could answer your question about how is my Farr highwall stocked, but I can't. I've never tried to remove the action from the wood and I've never had any reason to. The way it shoots as is I don't want anything to change. I will include a diagram of a flat spring highwall. Note the positions where the upper and lower tangs are cut off. What holds the knockoff spring is anyone's guess. The Lyman tang sight on the rifle uses the normal front screw hole but the base is cut at about the same place as the upper tang is cut and the sight screw is forward of the indicated position of the large screw through the tang. Where that screw goes and what kind is is will remain a mystery to me because it may somehow go down and hold the knockoff spring but note that there is no lower tang for it to touch. Any ideas?

Grand Slam, maybe not. Just went sniffing around and found another member who has one. Sendaro has a rifle built in 1946 by a smith named Hartung in Ohio and stocked by Farr. Seems Hartung was a favorite smith of Farr's. Sendaro's has been rebored to a 30-30 wildcat but still does 3/4 MOA as does mine. He mentioned a rifle that looks just like his is in C.S.Landis's book Woodchucks and Woodchuck Rifles (1951). I pulled that book and in the chapter on Farr it says that he (maybe Hartung?) tied the barrel to the stock with a "plate" and freefloated everything else. To be sure my action does not touch the stock except maybe at the end of the top tang and maybe with the screw that is under the tang sight mount. So, I'll call that the possible answer as to how it is stocked.

Have a friend that has a .405 in a Shiloh, he loves it.