... in .22LR. In a nostalgic mood of late .... I had been browsing the H&R dealers websites for traces of what seemed to be"a rare bird". Having grown up with single-shot break-barreled shotguns and rat-rifles, I thought it would be fun to turn back the clock some 75 years or so ... and maybe the kids and grandkids might enjoy it on their irregular visits.
Several dealers had the larger calibre Handi-Rifles in stock, but both the adult-and youth-sized Sportsters in .22LR remained elusive. I did find quite a few of the newer designed Rossi ... but all were in a mini-youth size ... not overly practical for any of our adult tribe - lol
Then, taking a closer look at the H&R dealer listings I noticed one in the next little town that had totally escaped me ... a mere 20 miles away, I have driven past it a hundred times and never even noticed its' existence due to the more eye-catching business on the opposite side of the road - a marina full of interesting boats - lol !
A quick phone call .. got the owner himself ... ! No ! ... he didn't have such a thing, although he had a good inventory of Handi-Rifles and shotguns ... wasn't even sure that they were still made, based upon current Internet scuttlebutt ... BUT ... he'd phone his distributor and call me back !
Barely the time of a quick potty-stop later, the phone rang ... "Yes ! ... there were three in the warehouse... did I want to order oine ?"
Now, less tha a few days later, there's one in my safe ... BUT ... it's spent most of the in-house time here out on my range. Right off it felt pretty good in my hands although I found the plastic stock without enough Cast-Off to ccomodate my fat face, so that I could get my eye behind the mini-sized open sights. Ah Well .. a few degrees of corrective cant on a plinker rifle ... guess we can get used to tthat.
Oh Oh ! The first real setback ... I couldn't open the breech ... the locking push button totally defied my attempts to depress it with my right thumb ... added more pressure with my left thumb ... still no success ! Obviously a manufacturing defect ... no way could I have grown that weak and ineffectual in my 80-odd years ! So back to the workshop ... rested the button against my bench and pushed with all my might on the whole rifle ... Golly ... it finally moved and I could open the breech. Tried this act a few more times, adding a litle lubricant to the lock, and a quick rub with a stone on a possibly ultra-sharp lock edge ... slowly it got loosened up enough to manage it with two thumbs and NO bench ! I threw out my chest ... flexed my biceps ... obviously a manufacturing defect !
So ... on to more serious tasks ... cocking the hammer and pulling the trigger ... obviously another major flaw in manufacturing ! No way my thumb and forefinger could be that weak ! Heavens ! ... I pull heavy target rifle triggers just about every day, sometimes more than a hundred times ... some are a hefty 2 to 2-12# in pull weight ! A I said ... another defect !
Pause while I scoured this Forum and every other Internet site I could find looking for trigger tuning solutions ... little on RFC, but Old Greybeard and several 'smiths had a few words of wisdom to scan. Most involved beating a host of splined pins out of the receiver in order to get down to the links, levers and spring hidden in its' depth. Then fabricating slave pins, and jigs, before getting down to the real crux of the matter ... careful stoning of key surfaces with lots of test re-assembly and firing in between.
Oh Oh ... what's this ... more notes in one forum ... several owners were lucky enough to have gotten triggers NIB with pulls of 3# or even less ... others found that if they flushed out the action with liquids varying from Kroil, or Break-Free, possibly even strong English Breakfast Tea - (without the Milk and Sugar of course - there's a limit to sacrilege eben in the USA) - and then puffed in a few squirts from a Powdered Graphite tube, and worked the trigger and lock buttons, but without letting the hammer fall completely, sometimes ... YES ... I said sometimes .... the trigger would smooth out to a respectable level and all that dismantling and stoning could be bypassed. (NOTE: I would be hesitant to use Break-Free or similar solvents around an action partially encased in a PLASTIC stock ! )
Nothing venture ... I gave it a try ... flushed out the action with a Rem-Oil spray ... let it drain off, before blowing out much of the remainder with my computer "Duster" can gas. finished up with the Powdered Graphite before doing the hammer cocking / trigger pulling routine a few dozen times. A final blowing out of the excess graphite ... do a few test pulls ... I put a folded Q-Tip over the safety bar to stop any damage in case my ageing thumbs slipped on the hammer.
Wow ! A whole new trigger and barrel lock ! I had been one of the "lucky ones" ! Being my usual scientific-minded self, I grabbed my 3# trigger dead-weight ... it wouldn't break the trigger. Hmmm ... so added the 1-1/2# CMP/JROTC test weight ... BANG ! So less than 4-1/2# pull. It had been almost 9# when I started.
Next I juggled a few more "known" weights to the load .... best estimate or the completed trigger job is around 3# 3 oz. Lucked out once again !
Now ... if my eyesight were only good enough to see those dinky li'l open sights ... sigh ! Mind you, with left knuckles resting on a Bull Bag ... a piece of SWMBO's Vinyl door decorations with a 1/8" hole punched in it, pasted over the right hand lens of my tri-focals ... a handy tack hammer and pin punch nearby ready to "adjust" azimuth ... we had at it ! I can report that 1' groups with Mini-Mags at 25 yards are definitely feasible ... the yougsters should beat that handily ! Choot !
Mick - The Fuzzy Limey
Several dealers had the larger calibre Handi-Rifles in stock, but both the adult-and youth-sized Sportsters in .22LR remained elusive. I did find quite a few of the newer designed Rossi ... but all were in a mini-youth size ... not overly practical for any of our adult tribe - lol
Then, taking a closer look at the H&R dealer listings I noticed one in the next little town that had totally escaped me ... a mere 20 miles away, I have driven past it a hundred times and never even noticed its' existence due to the more eye-catching business on the opposite side of the road - a marina full of interesting boats - lol !
A quick phone call .. got the owner himself ... ! No ! ... he didn't have such a thing, although he had a good inventory of Handi-Rifles and shotguns ... wasn't even sure that they were still made, based upon current Internet scuttlebutt ... BUT ... he'd phone his distributor and call me back !
Barely the time of a quick potty-stop later, the phone rang ... "Yes ! ... there were three in the warehouse... did I want to order oine ?"
Now, less tha a few days later, there's one in my safe ... BUT ... it's spent most of the in-house time here out on my range. Right off it felt pretty good in my hands although I found the plastic stock without enough Cast-Off to ccomodate my fat face, so that I could get my eye behind the mini-sized open sights. Ah Well .. a few degrees of corrective cant on a plinker rifle ... guess we can get used to tthat.
Oh Oh ! The first real setback ... I couldn't open the breech ... the locking push button totally defied my attempts to depress it with my right thumb ... added more pressure with my left thumb ... still no success ! Obviously a manufacturing defect ... no way could I have grown that weak and ineffectual in my 80-odd years ! So back to the workshop ... rested the button against my bench and pushed with all my might on the whole rifle ... Golly ... it finally moved and I could open the breech. Tried this act a few more times, adding a litle lubricant to the lock, and a quick rub with a stone on a possibly ultra-sharp lock edge ... slowly it got loosened up enough to manage it with two thumbs and NO bench ! I threw out my chest ... flexed my biceps ... obviously a manufacturing defect !
So ... on to more serious tasks ... cocking the hammer and pulling the trigger ... obviously another major flaw in manufacturing ! No way my thumb and forefinger could be that weak ! Heavens ! ... I pull heavy target rifle triggers just about every day, sometimes more than a hundred times ... some are a hefty 2 to 2-12# in pull weight ! A I said ... another defect !
Pause while I scoured this Forum and every other Internet site I could find looking for trigger tuning solutions ... little on RFC, but Old Greybeard and several 'smiths had a few words of wisdom to scan. Most involved beating a host of splined pins out of the receiver in order to get down to the links, levers and spring hidden in its' depth. Then fabricating slave pins, and jigs, before getting down to the real crux of the matter ... careful stoning of key surfaces with lots of test re-assembly and firing in between.
Oh Oh ... what's this ... more notes in one forum ... several owners were lucky enough to have gotten triggers NIB with pulls of 3# or even less ... others found that if they flushed out the action with liquids varying from Kroil, or Break-Free, possibly even strong English Breakfast Tea - (without the Milk and Sugar of course - there's a limit to sacrilege eben in the USA) - and then puffed in a few squirts from a Powdered Graphite tube, and worked the trigger and lock buttons, but without letting the hammer fall completely, sometimes ... YES ... I said sometimes .... the trigger would smooth out to a respectable level and all that dismantling and stoning could be bypassed. (NOTE: I would be hesitant to use Break-Free or similar solvents around an action partially encased in a PLASTIC stock ! )
Nothing venture ... I gave it a try ... flushed out the action with a Rem-Oil spray ... let it drain off, before blowing out much of the remainder with my computer "Duster" can gas. finished up with the Powdered Graphite before doing the hammer cocking / trigger pulling routine a few dozen times. A final blowing out of the excess graphite ... do a few test pulls ... I put a folded Q-Tip over the safety bar to stop any damage in case my ageing thumbs slipped on the hammer.
Wow ! A whole new trigger and barrel lock ! I had been one of the "lucky ones" ! Being my usual scientific-minded self, I grabbed my 3# trigger dead-weight ... it wouldn't break the trigger. Hmmm ... so added the 1-1/2# CMP/JROTC test weight ... BANG ! So less than 4-1/2# pull. It had been almost 9# when I started.
Next I juggled a few more "known" weights to the load .... best estimate or the completed trigger job is around 3# 3 oz. Lucked out once again !
Now ... if my eyesight were only good enough to see those dinky li'l open sights ... sigh ! Mind you, with left knuckles resting on a Bull Bag ... a piece of SWMBO's Vinyl door decorations with a 1/8" hole punched in it, pasted over the right hand lens of my tri-focals ... a handy tack hammer and pin punch nearby ready to "adjust" azimuth ... we had at it ! I can report that 1' groups with Mini-Mags at 25 yards are definitely feasible ... the yougsters should beat that handily ! Choot !
Mick - The Fuzzy Limey