I’ve never been much of a rifle guy. The extent of my collection consists of a lonely 10/22. When I think of pretty long guns, smoothbores immediately come to mind. But I have to admit that a beautiful lever gun is a joy forever. Particularly when you’re talking about a custom version like Navy Arms’ Winchester-made 1873 replicas. At $2,500 you may have to scrape all the spare change from under the couch cushions, but think how satisfying it’ll be the first time you slip a .357 or .45 Long Colt round into it and pull the trigger. Press release after the jump . . .
Navy Arms has returned to the replica business with a completely new line of 1873 lever action rifles built exclusively for Navy Arms to their specifications by Winchester, finished by Turnbull Restorations, and available through fine stocking dealers.
For over fifty years, Navy Arms supplied superior replica firearms primarily built in Italy. The sale of identical product by numerous importers made it impossible for Navy Arms to provide to its customers the unique products and features that built Navy Arms reputation as a superior replica firearms company.
Now, in collaboration with Winchester and Turnbull Restorations, Navy Arms has in production, and delivery, a new generation of 1873 rifles with features and finishes not seen on any other production 1873 rifle.
Navy Arms Winchester 1873 rifles are in production and shipping to fine stocking dealers nationwide, including being featured in Cabelas Gun Libraries across America.
[buy_now link=https://bit.ly/2se3IhO”]
Very pretty, but my old Marlin 30-30 lever gun, built in 1952, functions beautifully every time I pull the trigger and only cost me $300. It was an expensive gun at the time, but worth every penny. 🙂
If I had plenty of money, I’d love to get one of these in .357… but the old Marlin would remain my favorite.
Plus, those old Marlins have nice smooth actions, from both better factory fitting and years of use.
While the one shown is nice, I’ll wait for the synthetic-stocked, stainless-steel version, with a picatinny rail for my holographic red-dot sight. Add a hand-indexed rotating-multi-tube magazine, and it would be perfect!
Can I get it in a bullpup configuration? I like me some Henry, but that’s a purty one.
Well-played!
In my rush to chain-jerk, I forgot about the inherent ugliness of bullpups.
You win this round… 🙂
Ugh.
The whole point is old school. You’re turning it into a piece of garbage.
I lust in my heart after a quality lever gun like this one.
🙂
That is a pretty, pretty rifle.
Very pretty. Turnbull does fine bluing and case hardening. But you can buy a beautiful Uberti reproduction for half that much, and also they build the Browning designed models that chamber big hitters like the .45-70, as well as the Colt Lightning. Pedersolis cost as much and are hand made. And unlike the current crop of Marins, I’ve never read a bad review for any of them.
Odd that they went for a shotgun type of butt plate.
With a pistol cartridge rifle there is no reason not to have a proper crescent type of butt plate. I can understand that some folks find the crescent type painful with rifle chambered guns like an 1886 in 45-90 though I find my grandfathers 1886 very comfortable to shoot and in fact I prefer a crescent style even with a hefty recoil, perhaps because my first gun at about age 9 was a Winchester 1890 pump .22 long so I learned the proper way to shoulder these older stock design guns… I have seen folks at the range who have only modern sporting rifle experience try to mount a crescent stock rifle and put the point of the bottom of the crescent on their shoulder.
This is not recommended with a 45-90 and even with a +P 45 colt might be painful in a light weight carbine. I do think folks feelings about a crescent design butt plate might change if they learned the right way to mount rifles so equipped.
I think your last observation is where the issue is: “…if they learned the right way to mount rifles so equipped…”
The one thing I’ve seen become prevalent in rifle shooting since the explosion of the AR-15 in popularity is the mis-mounting of rifles on the shoulder. So many young people are now mounting rifles very high on their shoulder (or, conversely, they’re mounting the rifle way far towards the toe of the butt), and if you do that with a crescent buttplate, yea, that’s going to leave a mark.
DG, that may be a result of 30+ years of military training with the M16/M16A1/M16A2 telling folks to do just that.
If I remember correctly, the phrase I heard in training was “If I can’t see at least half of the buttplate above your shoulder from behind you, then you’re doing it wrong!”. A little lower was allowed in Prone, but in all upright-type positions, it was properly shouldered quite high.
On the other hand, no one ever had to tell me that this would be a bad idea with a .45-70 of darn near ANY stock type…
DJ9, Yea, I’ve seen that hold in standing/off-hand positions from vets. To me, it’s a sign that the rifle’s stock needs to be re-designed, or they need different training. I don’t shoot my AR’s with the stock half off my shoulder.
When that hold is applied to other rifles, I’ve had to tell some youngsters that “You know, that’s probably going to hurt.”
Once I got a response: “I was a XXX MOS, you never served, what do you know about guns?”
Me: “Oooookay. Fire away.”
(Boom)
“Owwwwww motherf(*&&(*^r!!!!”
Me: “OK, consider this possibility: I still don’t know jack about guns, but I’m related to Nostradamus.”
Never buy a überti my single action 22 broke after 2 weeks of light use, sent it back and they told me it would take 3 months……15 months later they send me the wrong thing
I’m glad I picked up my Beretta Renegade chambered for .357 Magnum when they were discontinued.
Man, if I had more cash laying around…
I wish we ALL had more cash laying around.
Me like. I’ll probably settle for a used Rossi lol. For $2500 I can buy a lot of toys…
What am I missing? They’re less than half that on their site: http://www.navyarms.com/18731866_rifles.html
The Navy Arms link posted in the first paragraph is where the author got the MSRP price; it’s in the last line, near the bottom of the page. The models you linked to are all slightly different than the one in this post, although (to me) it doesn’t look like it should be double the cost of the ones you pointed out.
I’m not sure how you got to the page you linked; I can’t find it from the current Navy Arms home page. Is it an old page you’ve had bookmarked for a long time? In any case, each of the models on the page you linked to are showing “out of stock”, so it’s a moot point.
.44-40. .45 colt has a smaller rim as it was designed for a single action revolver with an ejector rod that entered the case mouth. The rim was only needed to keep the round in the chamber. .45 colt can hang up in a lever gun.
If you’re going to do the one round for hangun and rifle then .357 is good.
Back in the day apparently there was a problem with 45 Colt in lever rifles. These days in cowboy action shooting we do our best imitations of a machine gun shooting modern Winchester 1873 type 45 Colt lever guns with no problem.
I stand corrected. My experience with the type is a while in the past.
Beautiful.
.44 mag maybe? Or .50 Beowulf…
Good thing I read your post with no pants on, cuz I just shat myself! A lever action 50 Beo? Fuuuuuuuuuuck yeah!
I guess I need to read the advertisement more closely. I missed the description of the gold enlays and the diamond site post. Did they mention the use of unicorn horns in the checkering process?
Seriously. Nice gun. But not $2500 nice.
Your paying for the color case hardening, octagonal barrel and the factory shortstroke kit. That is the premium over the other models it sells and competitor replicas.
There will be a few of these in SASS events especially with the short stroke kit installed.
Exactly.
Color casing, done properly, is a very labor-intensive process.
Octagon barrels, done properly, are also labor intensive. Round barrels are pud easy – set the whole deal up on a CNC lathe between centers, start the program to profile the barrel and then it is off for minimal polishing (these days, anyway).
Octagon barrels used to be done on horizontal mills, back when horizontals were in most every shop in the country. Doing a octagon barrel today is a bunch of bother and setup, possibly on an antique horizontal mill.
Last issue: Turnbull’s finish is much better than most all mass-production companies’ stuff. Someone is putting in some time doing some real polishing and finishing on Turnbull’s products, and that’s yet more labor time.
Hmm…I thought the 1873 didn’t have the wooden forearm?
After the 1860 (?) Henry, Winchester decided to make loading and handling easier…with the King patent, the side loading gate, they were then able to put a fore grip on. The Henry’s loading system (into the tube from the muzzle end) was awkward and wouldn’t allow for the fore grip.
Problem is, it is so pretty. I wouldn’t want to take it outdoors and use it as it should be.
Remember when you could buy a Winchester 30/30 for just over $200 at KMART
I bought my first 94 for 99 bucks at sears.
Thats a lot of money. Probably go for a Henry and call it a day.
WANT!
This is exactly what I want in a lever gun, including the shotgun butt plate, I hate crescents. Now, to find out if “Winchester made” means in the US with a very high level of attention to detail. It also needs to be drilled and tapped for a tang sight, and lack any sort of lawyer device.
A ha. Made by Miroku in Japan, shipped to Turnbull for metal finishing. Still want.
http://www.americanrifleman.org/mobile/blog.php?id=31499&cid=44
I think most of you are missing the point.
This rifle is designed for Cowboy Action Shooting, not for hunting. The stock is a squared off shot gun style for speed. It is easier to mount than the cresent butt. The short stroke kit is the single most popular mod for 1873 rifles. Once again it is installed for speed.
The stock is hi grade walnut. The Turnbull color case and bluing is top notch. So you are paying for custom features all the way around. Oh, and it has the Winchester name on it!
As for calibers other than .357 or .45 LC, these two are the most popular for Cowboy Shooting.
The 1873 would not handle any of the modern cartridges mentioned; it was designed to feed and shoot round nose lead bullets loaded to black powder specs. This works out to around a max of 15000 CUP using modern powders. The design of the firearm is such that cartridges with an OAL longer than the .45 colt will not function in this gun.
Once again, this is a cowboy competition rifle, not a sporter for hunting. It’s got the best you can get in an 1873 and I can’t wait to order one.
I saw the new lever action at Cabelas in Ft. Mill, SC. The rifle is beautiful but it was a real downer to see the price tag of $2999. It seems Cabelas is gouging already.
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