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Hello all, I am a new guest to the forum and working on a 2nd model 1873 with a set trigger that is not working properly.
The trigger will set but when it breaks it does not release the hammer. I have disassembled and cleaned everything but I just can’t understand what it is not doing or how it is supposed to cause it to release the main trigger sear. I believe all the parts are there and nothing really looks unusually worn, bent, or altered but obviously something is wrong.
Is there a diagram available and/or a description showing how it is supposed to work so I can determine what is wrong?
I have another with a set trigger that works perfectly, it may come down to taking that gun apart to see how it works but I would like to avoid that if possible. It is an early 1st model gun in good condition and would rather not tamper with it just to see how it works.
Thanks in advance for any help
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Clifton,
When it breaks does the kick off try to knock the sear? If it is then the pin with the flat ground (kick off spring rest) on one side might be installed wrong. Trouble shooting a set trigger is very difficult since there is a lot of things that have to work right for it to work at all. The neat thing about a 73 is you can remove the lower tang and work on it out of the gun. Just make sure you don’t let the hammer fly forward on its own. In the gun it would hit the fire pin and without that to stop it you could break the sear or something else.
Here is a copy of a article that explains a set trigger, The web site (https://www.tapaderaswinchesters.com/) it came from does not work any more so I can’t link to it but I saved a copy.
Bob
WACA Life Member--- NRA Life Member---- Cody Firearms member since 1991 Researching the Winchester 1873's
Email: [email protected]
Bob, Thank you for the article, I had done a search and found the link but couldn’t open it. Unfortunately I had already checked out everything the article mentions with no luck. It seems very simple how it should work but I’m not clear on what isn’t quite right.
To answer your question, no it’s not knocking the sear off of the hammer. The flat side of that pin under the knockoff spring is down. The springs are stacked right and the knockoff spring does push up on the knockoff piece. The trigger is catching and releasing but not knocking the sear off of the hammer.
Is the knockoff and trigger supposed to be flush with one another on the face that contacts the sear? The way this is the knockoff can only contact the sear if it brings the trigger with it. Is that how it is supposed to work?
I ask because my other set trigger gun hardly looks like the trigger itself moves when it releases but this one looks like the trigger itself will have to move however much the knockoff moves to contact the sear.
Nothing looks recently filed and this gun had not been apart for many years because there was gunk around the screw heads as I took it apart but that doesn’t mean someone in the past didn’t alter something and messed it up.
If my other set trigger 1873 wasn’t a first model with perfect screws I wouldn’t hesitate to take it apart and see how it works but I’m hesitant to mess with it.
Thanks for your assistance, Cliff
Cliff,
I’m at the Tulsa show so I don’t have my trigger assemblies to look at to give you a good answer. I have a bin with parts and working assemblies I have collected over the years just for fixing guns I buy. To the question of trigger movement, When the trigger is set you don’t need to follow through with the trigger to get it to drop the hammer, that would defeat the purpose of a set trigger. When you pull the trigger with out setting it, does it pull harder than your other gun? If you set the trigger and trip it then keep setting and tripping it without resetting the hammer, will it eventually drop the hammer?
Bob
WACA Life Member--- NRA Life Member---- Cody Firearms member since 1991 Researching the Winchester 1873's
Email: [email protected]
Bob, No it would not eventually trip it. It was not hitting the sear at all.
Comparing it to my other set trigger 73 I noticed it wasn’t snapping as hard. I checked to make sure the flat side of the little pin was down, it was a little off but still didn’t help so I filed the flat a little more on the pin so the kickoff spring could come up a couple thousands higher.
Walla, that fixed it. It’s amazing that couple thousands extra movement on that spring made such a difference but now it works top notch.
I kinda looks like that pin is not original and someone had filed on it so I dressed it up and made it look a little better while I was at it by comparing pictures of what I thought it should look like.
I got it all put back together and took the old girl out for some shooting yesterday evening. Not a bad old shooting 73 still with a decent bore, 30 inch barrel with set trigger. I got the factory letter on it and it seems all original.
Thanks for your advice.
Cliff
Cliff,
Glad to help. If you wouldn’t mind I would like the serial number and configurations of the 73’s for my survey I doing . You can PM them or send to my email listed below if you don’t want to post them. I’m trying come up with numbers of guns with the different feature.
Bob
WACA Life Member--- NRA Life Member---- Cody Firearms member since 1991 Researching the Winchester 1873's
Email: [email protected]
Bob, I’ll get the info and send them this weekend.
Are you doing them all or just the special ones in non standard configurations?
Cliff,
I’m doing all 73’s. I record all the features including if the wood is deluxe and if you have a letter and how does it letter. If any sights letter I record that so I can get a idea of how many sights of the different types were documented factory installed.
Bob
WACA Life Member--- NRA Life Member---- Cody Firearms member since 1991 Researching the Winchester 1873's
Email: [email protected]
1873 man, sent you an email with some numbers.
Cliff,
Thanks, I got the email while I was at the Tulsa show and just got home.
Bob
WACA Life Member--- NRA Life Member---- Cody Firearms member since 1991 Researching the Winchester 1873's
Email: [email protected]
1873man said
Here is a copy of a article that explains a set trigger, The web site (https://www.tapaderaswinchesters.com/) it came from does not work any more so I can’t link to it but I saved a copy.
This is excellent! Do you know who “Jim” is? I’m guessing from the prices quoted & the references to Buckingham’s, that it was written quote some time ago. I’m going to copy it myself.
It is Jim & Jan Grueter from Winchester, ID. I think he retired out of California. I have no idea if he is still involved with Set trigger parts or not. I know his web site is no more and when someone tried to see if he could get him to make some leafs for a sight he didn’t do it anymore and that was in 2016/
Bob
P.O. Box 216 302 Lapwai Street Winchester, Idaho 83555 Phone: (208) 924-5037 Email: [email protected]
WACA Life Member--- NRA Life Member---- Cody Firearms member since 1991 Researching the Winchester 1873's
Email: [email protected]
By the way, what do you make of a SS trigger with the adjustment hole screw plugged, but the hammer never cut for a fly? This is on an ’85, #2310. What the original configuration of this rifle was, I don’t know.
Clarence,
Post some pictures of the parts. That would be interesting to see.
Bob
WACA Life Member--- NRA Life Member---- Cody Firearms member since 1991 Researching the Winchester 1873's
Email: [email protected]
1873man said
Clarence,Post some pictures of the parts. That would be interesting to see.
Bob
Wish I could, but my photographic incompetence would make that hard for me to do. Just imagine a SS trigger with the screw removed, and a plug (nail ?) driven in.
clarence said
By the way, what do you make of a SS trigger with the adjustment hole screw plugged, but the hammer never cut for a fly? This is on an ’85, #2310. What the original configuration of this rifle was, I don’t know.
It is quite common on the early production Model 2885 rifles. There was a period of time when Winchester manufactured all of the triggers with the set screw hole. I own two early high-walls that are the same as the one you mention.
Serial number 2310 was a Special Sporting Rifle, 38-55, 30-inch ½ octagon No. 3 barrel, plain trigger. It was shipped with a Mid-range vernier tang sight, and Wind gauge globe front sight. It should have the early style “CAL. 38-55” marking on the barrel.
Bert
WACA Historian & Board of Director Member #6571L
Bert H. said
Serial number 2310 was a Special Sporting Rifle, 38-55, 30-inch ½ octagon No. 3 barrel, plain trigger. It was shipped with a Mid-range vernier tang sight, and Wind gauge globe front sight. It should have the early style “CAL. 38-55” marking on the barrel.
Bert
Bert, your description matches the rifle perfectly…except, unfortunately, for the sights! Somewhere down the line, some dealer (I strongly suspect) chose to maximize his profits by selling the sights separately–it had none except garden variety sporting sights when I bought it many years ago. Those I replaced with a Beach front sight & something scarcer than a mid-range vernier (though no doubt less valuable in today’s collector market)–a very early Lyman #1 with the spiral flutes on the adjustment sleeve mounted on a thick-base Winchester base–which was the only way to mount a Lyman tang sight before he began manufacturing his own bases in (I believe) 1884. (I actually have one of the correct mid-range verniers I could place on it, but not an original wind-gauge front sight.)
I’m much obliged for this info.
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