New 1851 Navy
- Thread starter 686 Shooter
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Then download and thoroughly read through these two articles before you think about taking a slip stone or anything else to the internals. These old Colt style actions are what we could consider as a "train of fits" where each part's fit affects all the other parts down the line. Timing these guns to obtain the correct action and proper cylinder lockup and positioning at full #### and during the hammer drop is quite critical. Very minor poslishing of some of the parts is OK but even dressing the hammer and trigger hooks to lighten the pressure needed can result in producing a lose lockup. It's all THAT critical.
I'm not saying don't do anything but read these through and get a feel for which is important and how much you can do without affecting things.
When I went through my buddy's Pietta cartridge guns recently the only work on things were a light topping off of the cam with an abrasive rubber polishing wheel running at lower RPM to just "top off" the roughness. I literally just put shiny plateaus on the fairly rough lines of the small round "wedge" that sits on the side of the hammer. Any more and I'd have affected the timing in a bad way. What it did was noticeably smooth and lighten up how the hammer cocked for him. The only other thing was to stone a very slight angle on the hammer and trigger hooks so as to slightly reduce the creep. This isn't on the faces of the hooks but on the sharp corners at the edges of the hook faces. And I mean only enough that it produced a very slight shiny line that looks like a knife edge that needs some sharpening because it's not cutting as well as it used to. I didn't want to stone the actual pressure faces at all since removing anything there affects the cylinder lockup. And we can expect the pressure and rubbing of those faces to burnish themselves in over a bit of shooting anyway.
In these old style Colt actions a little goes a long way and a little more than a little is often a recipe for disaster and a new parts order. The results on the trigger of this slight angling to just barely break the sharpness of the edge turned out to be a trigger that is still up around 8 lbs since it's new but almost no creep at all. It just simply does not move at all and then suddenly lets go like the classic idea of breaking a small glass stick.
He's been shooting it for a few meets now and the trigger hook faces are burninshing themselves in and he tells me it's down to more like a 5 or 6 lb pull now which he's finding is near perfect for avoiding the guns shooting before he's actually quite ready. This being for cowboy action shooting.
Here's the links for the articles. And enjoy that new toy! ! ! !
http://www.theopenrange.net/articles/Tuning_the_Pietta_Part_One.pdf
http://www.theopenrange.net/articles/Tuning_the_Pietta_Part_Two.pdf
Yes,the stoning would only be I more inert places like the hammer channel just to smooth out any burrs that may be
Left behind! As you said, any of the working parts would (if anything) be polished without removing metal!
Thanks again for the info!
Edit, I just looked at the videos and have already watched/read both of those and a bunch more, when ready to strip it down, I will be going over the videos and writeups again!
Left behind! As you said, any of the working parts would (if anything) be polished without removing metal!
Thanks again for the info!
Edit, I just looked at the videos and have already watched/read both of those and a bunch more, when ready to strip it down, I will be going over the videos and writeups again!
