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AC50_P001_AC couv 11/06/13 16:09 Page1
COLLECTION
L’express Formidable
de Manufrance
JUXTAPOSÉ
Le Beretta 486
est arrivé !
BROWNING MARAL
Les premiers essais
de la concurrente
des Blaser
CALIBRES
Choisir le bon
pour le brocard
MUNITIONS
Les cartouches à étui
carton sont-elles fiables
et étanches ?
DOSSIER
7,50 € N° 50
L 16370 - 50 - F: 7,50 € - RD
JUILLET - AOUT SEPTEMBRE 2013
Dom/S : 8,30 €
Bel/Lux : 8,30 €
Port. Cont. : 9,50 €
Jumelles 8 ou 10x,
lunettes anciennes
ou modernes
Quelles
optiques pour
l’approche?
AC50_P066A068_GAB AC 11/06/13 15:30 Page66
Nouveauté En ligne droite
Browning Maral
Pull, pull and pull again … that’s all!
The Maral is Browning’s new straight-pull rifle. A gun that fills in the gap
left by the Acera and which innovates in several ways, first and foremost by
a re-cocking system which requires just one movement: Pulling!
A gun discovered and tested last January when hunting in Spain.
You pull on the
bolt for ejecting
the empty shell
and … that’s all.
You just let go of
the lever and put
your finger back
on the trigger.
Ten years! That’s the time that was
needed for the Maral to see the
light of day. Ten years of
consultations, studies, discussions,
tests, innovations, prototypes and
pauses as well, for giving other
guns the time to be born. Ten
years of collegial effort, which
involved a large number of people,
not all from the Browning family.
One of the first “outside players”
to take a close look at the Maral in
its cradle was Ernest Dumoulin.
This recognized specialist in boltaction rifles was contacted by the
project’s
managers
for
contributing his unique expertise
… and fresh ideas as well. Ernest
Dumoulin’s investment was such
that, even in his last days on a
hospital bed, he continued asking
his daughter for news on the way
the gun was progressing.
Mobilization like the
good old days
It took a really important project
to mobilize so many people and
resources and so much time. For
the deer head brand, it was
nothing less than a question of reconquering a place on a different
expanding market, the market for
straight-pull rifles. A market
created by Blaser in 1993, which
has been making its competitors
jealous ever since. Except in one
or two rare occasions, the Blaser
has succeeded in nipping any
offensives in the bud. And even
when your name is Browning,
success is still not necessarily
guaranteed. Proof of this was the
launch of the Acera, Browning’s
first straight-pull rifle and the halt
in its production a few months
later, despite of its real mechanical
qualities.
A failure that made the success of
the next project real “must”, all the
resources had to be brought
together for giving birth to a new
rifle, which was most certainly to
be inspired by the Acera, but which
would possess that little extra
needed for it to make a real name
for itself.
This new gun is the Maral, an
original straight-pull rifle which
has come to fill in the gap in the
manufacturer’s range of rifled
barrel guns. Like the Acera, it uses
a part of the Bar’s mechanics, its
receiver and its seven-lug bolt,
which couldn’t be better tested, as
over a million guns have been sold
in the last forty-seven years. The
only difference, even though it is
important, is that the new rifle had
to be a manual repeating rifle and
not a semi-automatic. As a result,
the gas-assisted reloading system
had to be modified and
transformed by fitting a manual
repeater mechanism. This meant
eliminating the gas assistance
system in the fore-end, as well as
the cams and links used for
reloading, and adding a lever to the
mobile bolt. On paper, these
modifications may look easy, but,
in practice, this was not the case.
Details such as the shape and
position of the bolt lever require a
vast amount of study and
discussion.
Browning’s guiding principle was
simple: To make a straight-pull
rifle for use in battue hunts and in
stalking, a rifle that incorporated all
the strong points to be found in the
brand’s different models – safety,
reliability and endurance.
A
number
of
more
abstract
obligations were to be added to
these
concrete
objectives:
Embellishing the rifle so that the
brand is immediately recognizable,
reloading – most certainly a
straight pull rifle – but with a
feeling of speed, and top-quality
ease-of-handling and accuracy.
AC50_P066A068_GAB AC 11/06/13 15:30 Page67
The Maral, which will be arriving
at gunsmiths’ shops in the next few
days, and which we were lucky
enough to test in a special preview
during a real hunt last January, is
the fruit of all the efforts,
expectations and hopes that have
been deployed over the last ten
years. Quite naturally, at the end of
such a process, Browning made a
point of offering the best possible
conditions to the professionals who
were invited to discover and test its
new model. To enable its guests to
really put the gun to the test, to
confront it with situations where
extremely rapid reloading was
essential or where shooting was
required at very different ranges,
the brand decided to organize a
monteria. A unique big game hunt,
inordinate even, which is a part of
Spain’s hunting heritage and where
sometimes almost as many shots
are fired as in a whole battue
hunting season in France.
It’s new,
but already familiar
We
were
about
twenty
European journalists invited
for the occasion. About an
hour before leaving for the
hunt, each one of us was
entrusted
with
a
rifle
calibre .30-06 or .300 Winchester magnum, with a Leica
Magnus 1-6 x 24 battue scope.
Good choices and the scope’s
high level of magnification can
really prove to be precious in a
monteria where shots are
sometimes fired at a distance of
over 200 m.
We began our examination of
the rifle. The least we could say
is that we really felt at home!
In aesthetic terms, the Maral
possesses all the lines of the Bar
Zenith Wood. It has the stock, the
fore-end, the piped barrel - without
its gas system - the receiver, the
trigger guard and even the cocking
device. The only difference is to be
found in the presence of a bolt
lever. Browning executives justify
this virtually total imitation for two
reasons. Firstly, they would have
regretted having to deprive their
new model of the extremely
successful lines of the Zenith
Wood. … A really “emotional”
argument to begin with. Which
immediately leads to a second,
more
rational
explanation:
Equipping a gun with an existing
stock and fore-end considerably
reduces design and production
costs. The savings made amount to
several million Euros, so the
manufacturer’s choice is easy to
understand. The result … the
stock or rather stocks are those
used on the Zenith Wood and
therefore
offer
a
multiple,
customizable choice.
You can select between a hog’s
back stock with a Bavarian cheek
piece and tulip-shaped fore-end in
grade 4 or 5, a Monte-Carlo stock
and cheek-piece with a tulipshaped fore-end in grade 4 or 5, or
a stock with a straight cheek-piece
and rounded fore-end in grade 5.
As the side-panels that equip the
Maral are the same as for the
Zenith Wood, as an optional extra
you can also fit Big Game or
Ultimate engraved metal panels. .
All you need to make your rifle a
very personal possession, even
though not entirely unique, and,
we must say, a very elegant
possession. Despite the undeniable
charm of the Zenith Wood and,
therefore, the new Maral, this
choice of common aesthetics raises
two questions. Doesn’t it take away
a little of the newcomer’s
personality? And, even more so,
will candidates for straight-pull
rifles want a gun that looks
identical to a semi-auto, no matter
how handsome it may be.
Our test Maral
with its Leica
scope and its 10shot magazine
in .30-06 calibre.
Two days
hunting in
magnificent
countryside in
Spain for testing
the new rifle at
the Finca Los
Claros close to
Ciudad Real.
AC50_P066A068_GAB AC 11/06/13 15:30 Page68
Nouveauté En ligne droite
At present, there are no answers
to these two questions. It will be
up to you to provide them by
the welcome you give to this
“familiar novelty”.
The wood foreend has been
removed
showing the flat
spring return
system
Let’s follow the
cable …
of the vacuum
cleaner
© DR
Browning’s staff begin the
presentation of their creation,
starting with its mechanical
innovations. Straight-pull rifles
owe a part of their success to their
reloading speed. Logical, instead of
the four movements required for
taking two shots with a Mauser 98,
for instance, (lift, pull, push, lower),
the linear-pull only requires two
movements - pull and push. Quite
naturally, this is faster, even much
faster for certain avid hunters used
to their good old rifle and who fire
very fast without unshouldering.
But where the Maral is different, is
in the fact that reloading only
requires one single movement: Pull
and … that’s all! In fact, you also
have to let go of the bolt after
pulling it backwards, but then it
recloses by itself. This automatic
device called the “Quick Loading
System” has been developed,
finalized
and
patented
by
Browning’s engineers. In fact, it
was Claude Dodrimont, present at
the press presentation, who had the
idea.
“Quite a simple idea”, he explains,
“it’s the principle of the flat plate
spring used on the metal tape
measures we have all used. You pull
on the spring for measuring and
then let it go so that the tape can
roll itself up. In the present case,
there are two springs of this type
that bring the bolt back into the
barrel and lock it in position
automatically. You pull the lever
backwards, towards you, as far as
possible and then let release it. The
bolt
closes
automatically,
guaranteeing that it is perfectly
locked in position.”
When asked how he found the idea,
Claude gives an astonishing reply:
“By watching my wife vacuuming
the floor!
68
Armes de Chasse n° 50 / Juillet - Août - Septembre 2013
With a spot of practice, firing one
shot straight after another
becomes really fast
I was thinking about the innovations we could still make to the
Maral project, when I saw my
wife winding up the cable on the
vacuum cleaner by pressing a
button: The idea of using a return
spring for the rifle’s bolt came
from there”. As is always the case
with engineers, their replies are
disconcerting as they are only
obvious to them. But we should
recognize – with a little bad faith
– that it is a good thing for
hunters that Belgian engineers
watch their wives doing their
housework when sitting on the
sofa!
If the idea described so humorously by Claude seems simple,
reaching the spring’s final design
was complicated.
Firstly, a
manufacturer was needed, who
was capable of creating a type of
metal that was both elastic and
resistant at the same time. Then
Claude had to admit that two
springs needed to be installed for
reaching the right combination of
length, width and thickness and
an optimal long-lasting solution.
The only point that was obvious
was its position: The wooden
fore-end emptied of all its cams
and links was just the right place
for installing the system.
So that’s the story of the birth
and development of the quick
loading system.
But…what
purpose does it serve? Quite
naturally, the return spring on
the bolt limits the reloading
phase to a single movement,
pulling (and releasing) the bolt
lever, then the bolt closes by
itself. But besides economizing
movements
of
the
hand,
automatic locking is also the
guarantee that the rifle is ready
to be fired again. With a
traditional configuration, it may
just happen that, in the heat of
the moment, you haven’t pushed
the bolt far enough forwards, or
that have pushed it jerkily. In
both cases, the result is never
simplifying
the
good.
By
movement of the hand to the
extreme, as in this case,
effectiveness of loading is
guaranteed. The other benefit
expected is the speed of
reloading. In theory – at least – a
single movement is faster than
the two movements required on
a Glaser R8 or a Merkel RX
Helix.
In a single monteria,
almost as many shots
may be fired as in a
whole battue hunting
season in France
AC50_P070_GAB AC 11/06/13 15:31 Page70
Perfection right from
preproduction versions
Nouveauté En ligne droite
A fine twelvepoint taken
with this rifle
on the second
day of tests
70
Is this theory confirmed in practise?
Well, it didn’t seem to me that the
Maral was any faster than the rifles
referred to above, with which, I must
admit, I have fired several hundred
rounds. Because, if the Blaser or the
Merkel need for the bolt to be pulled
back and then be pushed back
forwards, the second movement
brings the right hand and the index
finger back towards the trigger
anyway: The firing sequence is very
fast. With the Maral, you have to pull
the lever back to the stop, then release
it and bring your hand back into
position on the trigger by initiating a
new movement. No gain in time, but
no loss either.
Armes de Chasse n° 50 / Juillet - Août - Septembre 2013
It would most certainly be
interesting to quantify this
impression with a stop-watch and
after becoming more used to the
gun. For the time being, it seems to
me that reloading is much the same
on all three rifles. Incidentally, it
must not be forgotten that the
Maral’s elbowed lever and its
length play a major role: Leaving
the lever perfectly vertically above
the trigger. The Maral also derives
its speed from its design. The
breech is totally enclosed in the
breech casing, which means that it
never comes out of the casing when
reloading and the firer does not
have to unshoulder to avoid the
breech getting close to his nose,
which can sometimes happen with
a Blaser or Heym SR30, where the
mobile bolt is particularly long.
With the Maral, the hunter remains in position
between two shots and, even more important,
his target stays in his sights. This is undoubtedly
the point where the gain in time is the most
appreciable.
Two days’ hunting were planned for this test
event. First and foremost, it must be pointed out
that no incident or dysfunction was reported.
Neither my colleagues nor I observed the
slightest defect. A test organized in real hunting
conditions with preproduction versions – in this
case, the first twenty Marals produced – that
takes place without any problems is sufficiently
rare to be mentioned.
Taking part in a monteria is always a special
experience. You hunt non-stop for four to five
hours staying in the same position and, unless
otherwise specified, you can shoot at 360° from
0 to 200 m, even 300 m. Long-distance shots of
this type are made possible by the hilly terrain,
a judicious selection of firing stations and the
long distances between hunters. Sometimes,
however, firing zones are much smaller. This
was my case on the first day. I was posted halfway up a slope with a dense covering of holm
oaks and I could only fire at targets half-way up
the slope opposite me about 100 metres away
on an open strip of land 10 metres high by 15
metres wide. It was better to keep an eye
permanently on the top of the slope to avoid
being surprised by any deer running down
through the open strip of land. I shot at three
deer on this first day’s hunt, one of which I
missed. With so few shots fired, it was difficult
for me to get an accurate idea of the Maral’s
qualities, even if handling, aiming and swing
seemed to be very natural and fast.
The next day, however, was one of those days
that mark a hunter’s life. I was placed almost on
the summit of a mountain with a firebreak at
my feet about fifteen metres wide and two
hundred metres long that ran down to the
neighbouring slope before sloping slightly
upwards again, just like a ski-jump. One single
side to be watched and a large number of
animals that crossed at random between 30 and
200 metres away. The position was good, very
good even, because three hours later I decided
to stop shooting… Three hours of intensive
hunting, which, this time, really gave me every
possibility of assessing the rifle’s potential.
After testing the .300 Win¬chester on the
previous day, on the second day I had a .30-06
and its ten-round magazine, which is a high
capacity but very welcome at this type of hunt.
With 6, 8, or 10 round magazines, as in this
case, inserting the last rounds is often difficult.
You need to force them in and, when firing, the
first rounds are liable to get stuck. I often tell
people not to fill their magazines completely so
that they work more smoothly. But on that day,
for testing purposes, I filled the magazine
completely with my ten .30-06 rounds.
And … from the first to the tenth bullet, the
magazine was easy and smooth to fill without
forcing. Reloading as well. I discovered this
very quickly when a group of five does ran
across the firebreak about 30 metres away from
me.
AC50_P072_GAB AC 11/06/13 15:31 Page72
Except for
the bolt,
the lines
of the
Maral are
the same
as for the
Bar Zenith
Wood
The time for pushing the cocking device
forwards and putting the rifle in position and
the second doe fell while I reloaded without
even thinking about it, or almost – here the
risk is that you want to push the lever back
forward because you can’t change twenty-five
years of rifle-shooting habits just like that – to
succeed my first double with the last doe in the
group: In this first firing sequence, I was the
one to slow down the Maral’s rhythm by
forgetting to release the bolt. Despite this “trial
and error” method, the rifle reloaded quickly
and correctly, which was by no means
guaranteed with so much hesitation. Straight
after firing, I pushed the cocking device back
by gently pressing on the end of it and slid two
new rounds into the removable magazine.
A magazine that drops down easily and with a
certain degree of familiarity as it is the same as
on the Bar except that, in this case, it is not a
rotary but a drop-down unit … essential on
repeater rifles. You press a notched plastic pin
in the shape of a trigger located in front of the
trigger guard and the magazine drops gently
down into your hand. Putting it back in place
is just as easy. The following three hours were
marked by firing about twenty rounds at
targets about 30 metres away, but also and
above all, at targets between 150 and 200
metres away. In this extreme gaming situation
where you never know where the next animal
will appear, the Maral proved to be easy to
handle, accurate, fast and reliable. Little by
little, letting go of the bolt after ejecting
becomes familiar, and the sequence of firing
becomes faster. The magazine is still as easy to
fill, to remove and put back in its housing. The
gun gives the impression of being tried and
tested and sure, even though we have a
preproduction model in our hands, one of first
twenty ever made! It must be said that
Browning pushes its prototype testing
extremely far, with thousands of rounds fired
every time and their validation process is
extremely demanding. Every time a problem
occurs, the gun goes back to the research and
development department.
3 days’ testing for
you as well
There is a very good chance that
this rifle will be successful,
especially because its price is
relatively attractive. At 2300 €, it is
between the Verney-Carron LA
and the Merkel RX and Blaser R8
or R93. It is true that it doesn’t have
an interchangeable barrel like the
other two, but is this really
important for a battue hunting
gun? The rifle can be dismantled
because the stock is easy to remove
with an Allen screw placed behind
the grip, a good point for transport.
And it has a whole number of
trumps in its hand: The quality of
the break, the rapid loading system,
the really well-designed and made
ten-round magazine (for .30-06
calibre only), the 9.3 x 62 and .300
Winchester magnum calibres and
its customization capabilities.
Browning has done its homework
extremely well on the Maral, it is
now up to you to give them a mark
and say whether the gun will have
the success expected of it. To give
you the possibility of getting an
idea of its performances, the Maral
will be made available to the public
for testing it on running boar at the
Chambord Game Fair to be held on
June 21, 22 and 23 (2013). But take
care, testing the rifle could well
result in adopting it!
Technical
datasheet
Make : Browning.
Model : Maral.
Type of gun : straight-pull boltaction rifle.
Stock : pistol grip and straight
cheek-piece in oil-rubbed walnut.
Magazine: removable 4 rounds, 3 in
magnum et 10 in .30-06.
Trigger action : direct.
Locking: 7 lugs in the head of the
bolt locked into the barrel.
Calibres tested: .30-06 and .300
Win. Mag; 9,3x62 and .308 Win. are
also on offer.
Canon : 56 cm for the .30-06, 58
cm for the .300 Win. Mag.
Overall length : 109 cm.
Poids : 3,1 kg.
Recoil pads : interchangeable, 12,
20 and 25 mm.
Price : 2300 €.
Our opinion
• Value for money
• Ease of handling
• Well-designed magazin
• Interchangeable stock
• Limited choice of calibres
(until the law is modified)
• Loading system
• Lines identical to the Bar
Zenith Wood
• Bolt well-positioned but
very long
© DR
So, all in all, it was not a surprise that the
rifle revealed zero defects after three
hours’ intensive hunting. Claude, my
accompanying engineer, has every
reason to be happy. His rifle works
perfectly and, above all, it offers a
rational approach with an ultra-fast
adaptation phase. You get used to the
Maral very quickly! And accuracy is no
way neglected!
© L. Bedu
Nouveauté En ligne droite
72
Armes de Chasse n° 50 / Juillet - Août - Septembre 2013
Laurent Bedu,
photos Denis Leruse