Savage Stevens 87a trigger flop

[DB30]

Rescued a neglected 'gill gun'... seems to be a pretty cool rifle. Cleaned up nicely but the trigger has excessive side to side movement. Doesn't look like the assembly is meant to be removed as the screws are staked and the various pins are peened over on both sides. Any suggestions or is this typical?
Thanks,
DB

[Catt57]

I have several of these rifles. Some have fairly tight triggers, others flop side to side more than a beached whale. I did manage to remove the side to side motion on one by removing the pivot pin holding the trigger and shimming it with an extremely thin brass washer. It seemed to work, but it has not been shot enough to know if it will last long term.

Don't know if this helps.

[FredT]

DB - "Catt" is exactly right with his recommendation to shim the trigger. However, it may be that the "legs" on either side of the trigger are splayed out somewhat. If so, THEN what do you do? As a retired machinist I can only see one fix for that. IF you are determined to eliminate as much play as possible, and IF you have a friend who is a machinist (with a milling machine), then certainly it is possible to make both legs almost perfectly parallel, which is the optimum condition. It will be necessary to remove the trigger & take a "skim cut" on the inside of the "legs" which hold the trigger pivot pin. A couple of thousandths will probably be all you will need to remove. After this cut (and after checking the sides or the trigger to be sure they are parallel) then you should easily be able to shim the trigger leaving only a 0.001 - 0.002 inch gap. This should NOT bind and should practically eliminate your side-to-side play..... FredT