Double rifle fun

[bigpete]

Finally bit the bullet and got the Baikal double rifle out yesterday. Been a 2 year process trying to get it regulated,with much hair pulling. Main issue being a height difference between the barrels. Well,I had an epiphany the other night,and shimmed the floating barrel from the bottom with some cardboard...
Well....first right and left combo put both bullets through the same hole ! Thinking man that was easy, proceeded to try to sight it in....wrong ! For some goddamn reason it started printing the barrels a foot apart at 30m !
Pissed off,and down to my last 8 shots,I just wound the crap out of the jack screw till I saw the barrels bend out in the middle....vióla ! 4 shots,right and left,into roughly an inch and a half at 30m...a little out of line...but bloody hell,that's just moving sights ! Finally have a good hard hitting load that actually regulates ! Woo !
Now for the harder job...getting laid...

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[marksman]

happy days pete

[Stix]

Well what ever crosses its path will fall over...

Look forward to the pics...

[bigpete]

It's only a 45/70 but it should work alright out to 70m or so

[marksman]

"its only a 45/70"
l dont reckon you will have any problems pete
perfect bush gun

and fun

[bigpete]

So far I've found the 45/70 a poor killer....but I've only shot fairly light,cast lead loads at animals...these ones should go ok.
And yeah....i don't particularly think the 45/70 is as great as others think.lol

[grumpy308]

Hi bigpete. I had a similar issue with my Baikal 45/70 with one barrel shooting higher than the other. (I think it was the left one high). I looked at fitting an adjusting screw between the barrels on the same lugs as the jackscrew to adjust one in relation to the other. However with some fiddling with the jackscrew and loads I was able to get pretty good results with left and right barrels now about one inch apart and level at 50 yards. It is mainly used as a fun gun and just happened to come up for sale while a 9.3 double of mine was away being re-regulated. It is running 300gn cast gas check bullets at around 1750 fps so is quite tame and fun to shoot. It had a few issues when I bought it and the owner said he never really got it to shoot all that well. The timing of the cocking levers was not right and the barrels had to be held open to give clearance for rounds to be loaded or unloaded. A bit of work on the levers fixed that. I also stripped the stock finish as it has quite an acceptable piece of timber and gave it an English oil finish which really improves the appearance. Some quick detachable mounts and a 1 to 4 Leupold makes for versatile sighting. The bore finish on my particular rifle is amazingly good and way better than an average sporting rifle, maybe the Russians haven't heard of cost cutting yet. The only thing left to do is sort out the overly heavy front trigger one of these days. The only real shortcoming is the relatively thin barrels which heat up pretty quickly after 6 or 8 shots but it is not much worse than other side by side doubles. All in all for the money they are a heap of fun to own. Regards Malcolm.

[bigpete]

Cheers Malcolm, I have virtually the exact issues with mine. I'd love to chat to.you especially regarding the cocking levers.

[Ward12constable]

@grumpy308 what work did you do to the baikal to keep the barrels from having go be held open during loading. I have a Baikal 45/70 and mine you almost need 3 hands to load it. I’d like to have mine worked as to remove that impediment.

[grumpy308]

My issue with the rifle was the fact that to open the barrels enough to load or unload without fouling the cases on the top of the action the cocking levers (or cocking limbs) had to be held past the point of the sears engaging. This means you are holding pressure against the mainsprings to keep the barrels opened far enough to easily load. If you carefully and slowly open the action (after it has been fired) you can feel and hear when the sears engage and each side of the action cocks. The timing on both sides of mine were different (no surprise). To rectify this I worked out which barrel was cocking first and then blued the top of the cocking lever just in front of the hinge point to find the contact area where the fore end metal pushes down on it to cock the action. Using a dremel with a fine grinding stone remove small amounts of metal from that contact area on the top of that cocking lever until both barrels cock at the same time. Take small amounts and check often preferably with the grinding stone working the debris away from the action. When both sides of the action cock at the same time it is a matter of removing metal evenly from both cocking levers until the barrel opening angle becomes great enough to allow cartridges to be inserted or withdrawn without fouling. You want to go just far enough so both barrels cock at the same time as this angle is achieved. If the mainsprings are held compressed by the sears at this point then the barrels will hold open by themselves to allow proper loading. Regards Malcolm.

[Ward12constable]

Thanks Grumpy308 (Malcolm) I am going to have to do this. Also going to be fun regulating it too. I am going to put on a new front site and rear, either 3 spring or peep style, not sure just yet. It will be my “Stalin and Stalin”. Haha.

[bigpete]

It was that " fun " I sold it last week....

[Ward12constable]

Wow. Well I thank you for helping me with my questions. It is very much appreciated.

[MtnMan]

45/70Govt- The only Government you can trust

[bigpete]

45/70Govt- The only Government you can trust

Bahahaha

[dnedative]

It was that " fun " I sold it last week....

Baikal double rifles are like boats.
Your only happy twice; the day it turns up and the day you sell it.
People have been screwing around trying to regulate these things since they came out

[grumpy308]

I was able to regulate my 45-70 Baikal sxs with the cast bullet load I wanted to use after a bit of playing around with adjustments. More than could be said for a far more expensive European sxs I bought that had extensive hours spent on it by a professional at regulation only to be returned to the distributor as unusable. For the money I think the Baikal gives people with a bit of a nostalgic love of sxs doubles the chance to own one at a bargain cost. If it takes a bit of stuffing around with loads and adjustments to get it to shoot acceptably then that is the trade off. Not too many can afford a Holland or a Rigby so the Baikal fills a spot, but just needs a bit of tinkering to get it right. Regards Malcolm.

[bigpete]

Well,I spent 5 years i reckon screwing around with it,finally got it sorted ( so I thought ), took it hunting,missed a 30 yard shot with it,put it on paper,found the regulation had gone to s**t AGAIN,sold it the next day to a mate who's wanted it for years.
I've literally had sxs shotguns shooting slugs that were more reliably accurate. Mores the pity