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November 19, 2006
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I know the general consensus is for traditional hammer-cock safety vs. the newer types. I’ve ready many opinions and watched several videos and the comments are overwhelmingly negative. I have almost never seen positive comments.
While I favor the vintage and traditional, I do see one major safety advantage: the unloading of the rifle. There is no way to unload the magazine of a traditional lever action rifle other than cycling each round through the action – and each time this occurs, the rifle is in full readiness to discharge. That is, the hammer is fully cocked and ready to fire through each cycle. There is great need to keep the rifle pointed in a safe direction when doing this.
This unloading process often carries some nuisance. You can’t catch the cartridges as they’re ejected. You typically eject them on to the ground, where they don’t fall all together in a neat little pile. Sometimes that ground you are ejecting them into is snow. Sometimes deep snow.
I’ve seen examples where hunters wait until they return to their car to do the unloading. They open their car door and eject them on to the car seat (or at least try to). When I’ve observed this, I’ve noted more concentration on getting the right angle for the cartridges to go where they want them to go vs. where they have the muzzle pointed. Hence, I can see great merit in a crossbolt of tang safety.
Thoughts, opinions, experiences?
April 15, 2005
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Steve,
Unless I am missing something, regardless of which safety type a Model 94 has, the loaded rounds still need to be cycled through the action to empty the magazine.
Bert
WACA Historian & Board of Director Member #6571L
November 19, 2006
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Bert H. said
Steve,
Unless I am missing something, regardless of which safety type a Model 94 has, the loaded rounds still need to be cycled through the action to empty the magazine.
Bert
Bert –
Indeed that is true. However, with the traditional lever rifle half-cock safety, every time you cycle the action, the gun is ready to fire (i.e. each time you close the action). It is not ready to fire with the modern style safeties – when those safeties are engaged.
The first repeating shotgun I became familiar with was my Dad’s model 1897. To empty the gun, one would also cycle the rounds through the action. However, a neat feature on the M1897 was the two little release buttons that allowed the user to empty the rounds in the magazine without going through the action.
On my Winchester model 62, I prefer to empty it by pulling the inner magazine tube and dumping the cartridges forward.
On my Remington Model 141 slide action, the only way to empty it is to cycle the rounds through the action. And they will fall wherever they may. But in this process, there is the pushbutton safety in the trigger guard that allows this to be done safely – that is – the gun is not ready to fire as the action closes on a new round – as it is with the ’94 Winchester.
On my Remington Model 08’s, the safety happens to lock the action. You can’t work the action with the safety on. You also can’t lock the action open if there are cartridges in the magazine.
With my Savage 99’s (rotary magazine versions), the safety locks the lever. You can’t work the lever unless you take the safety off. Hence, you have to cycle all the rounds through with the rifle ready to fire each time. However, with the Savage, you can sort of thumb the rounds out – which you couldn’t do on a Winchester or similar lever rifle.
Of course, with whatever you use, you can simply shoot all the cartridges in your rifle before you pack up.
November 7, 2015
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I generally unload my 1894 hunting rifles the same way I load them; through the loading port. Simply depress the cover and manipulate the cartridge case head to clear the stop and the magazine spring pushes the cartridge into your hand, not onto the ground. Saves wear and tear on the cartridge and they don’t get dirty or wet. Simplifies muzzle control, don’t forget to cycle the action a time or two after removing the cartridges from the magazine to ensure it is unloaded.
Mike
November 19, 2006
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TXGunNut said
I generally unload my 1894 hunting rifles the same way I load them; through the loading port. Simply depress the cover and manipulate the cartridge case head to clear the stop and the magazine spring pushes the cartridge into your hand, not onto the ground. Saves wear and tear on the cartridge and they don’t get dirty or wet. Simplifies muzzle control, don’t forget to cycle the action a time or two after removing the cartridges from the magazine to ensure it is unloaded.
Mike
Mike –
Interesting. I wonder how widespread this practice is?
Edit: I’ll have to try it – this might work on my Remington Model 141.
January 20, 2023
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We are discussing a subject near and dear to my heart – the efficacies of the manual safeties of hunting rifles.
BOLT ACTION RIFLES:
Top prize must go to the Weatherby Mark V safety. When the tab is rotated to vertical, the firing pin and sear are blocked and the striker/pin assembly is lifted out of concentricity with the primer. You can drop it from 50 feet, butt or muzzle first, onto a steel deck or reinforced concrete – nothing happens. Unload the magazine by tripping the baseplate release.
Runner Up is the Model 70 safety and the Ruger 77 semi-clone. Same as above but the firing pin remains concentric with the primer. In the middle position, the pin is not locked. Dropping from a tree stand in that condition theoretically can result in an inertial discharge. I don’t climb trees or ladders anymore and any Model 70 suits me fine.
The vintage Winchester bolt action rimfires just have sear blockers but the box magazine versions are my favorites.
PUMPS:
Has anybody else almost been fooled by what appeared to be the follower tip of a tube fed .22 — but wasn’t? As much as I love my Model 61,the acrobatics the next round up performs to get inline with the chamber before the closing stroke of the bolt can confuse a novice staring into the ejection port to see if he’s fired the last round. I may be biased because Dad owned a Model 90 in his youth but my reblued, shooter grade Model 62 is the very last rifle I’ll give away. It comforts me that the whole top of the receiver opens up. Half cock vs. Trigger blocking push button are both the bare minimum.
LEVER ACTION RIFLES:
A Browning BLR Gen 1 requires the shooter to lower the hammer and rotate the hammer face out of reach of the inertial firing pin. Browning “otherness”. What sells me is the removable box magazine. No dumping of cartridges required. Ever.
The inconspicuous tang safeties of the reissued Winchester 1886, 1892, 1894, and 1895 models are very useful when climbing down from a tree stand and cycling live rounds through the action. I can do what Mike suggests with a 25/20 Model 92 but it doesn’t work for me with big guns. Aged fingers, perhaps, but torpedo length. 45 caliber rounds aren’t happy making sharp turns in confined spaces. Test dummies are indicated.
The new Model 73 rifles have no tang safety and it’s the half-cock sear notch or nothing. I’m going to try Mike’s unloading method with these bigger pistol cartridges because it would be a comfort to do it that way.
My problem with a half-cock safety is not what I do with it. It’s what the other guy does with his while within rifle range of me. Like the cretin who put a .32 Special round between my feet after loading up his (borrowed) vintage Marlin 336 Sporting Rifle. At 4:30 AM in the Moonless dark. Nice rifle. I had to be restrained from giving him a proctoscopy with it. It didn’t have a full length magazine.
- Bill
WACA # 65205; life member, NRA; member, TGCA; member, TSRA; amateur preservationist
"I have seen wicked men and fools, a great many of both, and I believe they both get paid in the end, but the fools first." -- David Balfour, narrator and protagonist of the novel, Kidnapped, by Robert Louis Stevenson.
December 9, 2002
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TXGunNut said
I generally unload my 1894 hunting rifles the same way I load them; through the loading port. Simply depress the cover and manipulate the cartridge case head to clear the stop and the magazine spring pushes the cartridge into your hand, not onto the ground. Saves wear and tear on the cartridge and they don’t get dirty or wet. Simplifies muzzle control, don’t forget to cycle the action a time or two after removing the cartridges from the magazine to ensure it is unloaded.
Mike
Mike,
I found this interesting as I’ve also done this in the past, mainly not to spook game in a heavy brush area we hunt in PA, on our family property, and to keep the noise of racking the action down, as we have to unload our firearms at the end of shooting times. It’s been a few years but I’ve done it, as I’ve also unloaded the conventional way that Steve mentioned also.
Tony
January 20, 2023
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Tony,
Your Shiloh saddle gun is beautiful in that way as well. Only the truly mentally impaired have to guess whether a Sharps is loaded and what to do about it.
- Bill
WACA # 65205; life member, NRA; member, TGCA; member, TSRA; amateur preservationist
"I have seen wicked men and fools, a great many of both, and I believe they both get paid in the end, but the fools first." -- David Balfour, narrator and protagonist of the novel, Kidnapped, by Robert Louis Stevenson.
December 9, 2002
Online
Zebulon said
Tony,
Your Shiloh saddle gun is beautiful in that way as well. Only the truly mentally impaired have to guess whether a Sharps is loaded and what to do about it.
Bill,
I concur! 
Tony
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