38 spl. in 357 rifle, any problems?

L

lostintheozone

New member
I'm close to buying a new Win. 73 or something like it chambered for 357. I have several revolvers that are 357 but I shoot 38 spl. LSWC in both. I reload and I have a ton of 38 spl. brass already. I can buy 357 brass if I need to but thought I would check here first. I have heard that fowling can be an issue and I see some of that in my revolvers but the cylinders are easily cleaned. Being as a rifle has only one chamber and a bit harder to get to is the fowling from a short case going to be an issue? I'm likely to put several thousand rounds a year thru this gun and I want to keep it clean.

Any advice is appreciated.

Thanks.
 
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I don't shoot 38s out of my Rossi R92 too often but when I do, I never have a problem beside when I work the action too slow(it's really hard to do that since I LOVE hearing and feeling it when I go quickly) but that also happens with .357s.
I can't say much about fouling but I'd imagine it would be quite a bit harder to clean out if it did foul.
 
The result of a lengthy sequence of shooting .38 Special in a .357 chamber is a grunge buildup in that 1/8th-inch space ahead of the case. It can then make chambering a .357 cartridge difficult.

A bit of extra care in cleaning the chamber avoids the problem.
 
I have a couple of Rossi 92 clones that function flawlessly with 38's. The Marlin spits out a 38 occasionally. I have no personal experience, but I have read that the lifter mechanisms on 71/73 Winchesters are very COL sensitive and usually jam with shorter cartridges as they allow the next round in the mag tube to jam up the works.
 
The only problem I ever had with my Marlin 1894C was when I was running full wadcutters. It functioned fine (feeding was flawless), but I noticed over the chronograph that I was losing velocity. What was a normal 660 fps in my revolver turned into an honest 600 fps from the carbine. All I could figure was that the small charge of Bullseye was running out of "oomph" in the longer barrel and simple friction was slowing the bullet. I quit running target wadcutter loads through the carbine with no problem whatsoever.
 
+1 On arts comment. Shoot a martini in 357 it eats mostly 38. No problems.

Although that's a single shot. Like some others have said the bullet designs may pose some problems in a repeater of some sort or another.
 
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