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marlinguy
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Ballards may be weaker,
but they sure are neater!

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Ballard "kit"
Dec 18th, 2025 at 10:50pm
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This one slid under the Ebay AI radar recently! The seller posted the DST breech block first, and I bought it complete with the loop lever. 
Then I looked at his other items and saw the stock set and bought that also. Stock with forearm, and Union Hill buttplate and through bolt.
I then contacted the seller on the outside chance he had the action and barrel too? He said he would list the "barrel and connecting parts" the next week, but weeks went on to a month before I finally got a message with an Ebay listing number. It took awhile to get it to show up, it finally did and I got the barreled action today to complete the Union Hill.
The barrel is pretty worthless with no finish, and a very poor .38-55 bore. It's good to bore out larger, or to line back, but that's about all. I have a brand new blued Ballard .32-40 barrel with the same half octagon contour, plus a really neat George C Schoyen .40-50SS #4 weight full round barrel. I'm leaning towards the Schoyen barrel as I've had it awhile waiting for a place to use it, and it is already setup for a Ballard. Maybe I'll get lucky. Hope the old barrel doesn't fight me too much coming off!

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« Last Edit: Dec 19th, 2025 at 10:34am by marlinguy »  

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830singleshot
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Re: Ballard "kit"
Reply #1 - Dec 18th, 2025 at 11:18pm
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As much as I love 38-55's, I'm going to vote for the 40-50ss.  What a glorious problem to have.
Let's make it easy on you.  Send it to me, I'll get the 40-50 barrel on it and get Al Springer to freshen up the blue and case colors.  You will be welcome to come visit it at my house anytime.
  

J. Scott McCash&&New Braunfels, TX&&830-237-2376&&jsmccash@yahoo.com
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DWT1885
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Re: Ballard "kit"
Reply #2 - Dec 19th, 2025 at 7:10am
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Vall, it's unreal the deals & things you come across. Can't wait to see the completed "kit" come to life.
  

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moodyholler
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Re: Ballard "kit"
Reply #3 - Dec 19th, 2025 at 8:53am
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Vall used to be called THE "MAGNET" on Marlin Owners! Looks like it is still working! Nice Marlin. moodyholler
  
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marlinguy
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Ballards may be weaker,
but they sure are neater!

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Re: Ballard "kit"
Reply #4 - Dec 19th, 2025 at 10:32am
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Since Schoyen's barrels were browned mostly, my .40-50SS barrel is also browned. I believe it had a rest dovetailed into the lower barrel at sometime in it's life as there's a larger maybe 5/8" dovetail ahead of the forearm that's too far forward to be for a palm rest. Someone made a filler for it, but not a great job. I will probably make up some sort of rest to fit the dovetail, or maybe just clamp a spare Pope style I got from Rodney Storie over that area later.
The action looked pretty bad when this arrived as it was a lovely orange on one side! I used an old razor blade to shave the orange off and then cleaned it with steel wool and acetone/atf. Surprised to see it wasn't pitted under the rust, and should easily polish out.
Someone at sometime tried to remove the serial number on the receiver, but didn't get it all. They also were ignorant to all the places Ballard rifles have serial numbers, so all the other matching numbers are still there, plus I can still read the number where they tried to obscure it on the receiver. No idea why they did this, but they did it to the barrel number under the forearm also.
These parts together piece by piece were embarrassingly cheap!
« Last Edit: Dec 19th, 2025 at 10:38am by marlinguy »  

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bpjack
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Re: Ballard "kit"
Reply #5 - Dec 19th, 2025 at 12:54pm
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Good job Vall.  You owe me one for finding that stuff:)
  

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marlinguy
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Ballards may be weaker,
but they sure are neater!

Posts: 17464
Location: Oregon
Joined: Feb 2nd, 2009
Re: Ballard "kit"
Reply #6 - Dec 19th, 2025 at 5:44pm
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bpjack wrote on Dec 19th, 2025 at 12:54pm:
Good job Vall.  You owe me one for finding that stuff:)


Well you're right Jack! You were the one who pointed me to the DST breech block and lever! Thanks!
  

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bpjack
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Re: Ballard "kit"
Reply #7 - Dec 19th, 2025 at 5:58pm
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I was tempted to buy the two lots myself, but then I realized they were not for a high wall.
  

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