1911 School

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John Travis

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1911 School: Troubleshooting an old Colt.

An old friend of mine came into possession of his grail gun in the form of a USGI 1918 "Black Army" Colt a couple months ago, and even though it was never his intent to use it for a beater, he did want to be sure that it was fully functional, and when he took it for a test run, an odd problem popped up.
About every other time that he pulled the trigger the hammer caught on the half cock. Concerned that he'd bought a pill instead of a pearl...he came to see me.

The usual culprit in this little malfunction is a weak, damaged, or out of spec sear spring...specifically the center leg not maintaining tension on the disconnect...with the result being that the disconnect is squirted down into the frame in the disconnected position as soon as the sear clears the hammer hooks. The sear resets and grabs the half cock notch and brings it all to a screeching halt.
When I removed the slide, I noticed that the top of the disconnect was worn down to a nubbin. Ah! A clue!

But this usually leads to hammer followdown when the gun fires...not stopping on half cock.
And there was another clue that I noticed when I tried to dry fire the gun to see the hitch in the gitalong. The trigger pull was off the scale, estimated at 10 pounds or more.

I broke it down, and there it was. The disconnect spade was tiny...much too short top to bottom to have enough overlap with the sear to keep it between the sear and the trigger when the pressure was on.

I replaced the disconnect and the sear spring and all was well with the old Colt.

But, I still wondered, and this was the only explanation I could come up with.

The worn disconnect was causing hammer followdown issues, and whoever had his hands in the gun previously understood why...but instead of simply replacing the disconnect, he decided to adjust the spade to get it away from the sear feet...which corrected the followdown problem and created another one...then he cranked up the tension on the sear spring to try to keep the disconnect in position and correct the new problem. The gun probably worked for the two or three test rounds he fired, so he called it good and sold or traded it to the dealer who then sold it to Gary.

And this is what it's like in my world, where I often have to follow a kitchen table tinkerer who "fixes" guns for fun and profit.
 
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Probably time to sell my kitchen table. :rolleyes:
 
Jeppo said:
Probably time to sell my kitchen table. :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

oops. I touch a nerve? :D

Sorry. I know there are a good many talented kitchen table gunsmiths. Hell, since my eyes got old...if there's somethin' that I can't handle at the kitchen table, I send'em to somebody else. I closed that shop several years ago.

I'm not talkin' about those guys. I'm talkin' about Dremel Dan and Bubba the buffing buffoon et al. Guys who create more problems than they solve. Guys like the one who tried to fix that old Colt because he was too cheap to spring for a disconnect. He doubtless understood the problem, but chose to jerry rig it and let it be somebody else's problem.

Guys like that have been a nightmare. I've followed too many like him and it's resulted in a little animosity toward his kind.

All in good fun.

Cheers.
 
Jeppo is goofin' with us... he installs spring replacement kits on his kitchen table... I doubt he owns a Dremel!

John Travis, could you explain hammer followdown?
 
MacEntyre said:
John Travis, could you explain hammer followdown?
Click to expand...

Followdown is just the hammer following the slide instead of staying at full cock. It comes in a couple varieties.

One is when the hammer never actually cocks and rides the slide all the way down and rarely results in a discharge. This one is almost always caused by either a disconnect malfunction or a complete failure of the sear to reset. It usually gives early warning signs that something is wrong.

Another is when the hammer follows and stops on the half cock. This one is usually caused by the hammer cocking and slipping off the sear because the sear doesn't fully reset and the hooks are barely perched on the sear crown. It's ugly first cousin isn't a followdown at all, but rather the hammer cocks, then jars off when the slide goes to battery. This one is where doubling and burst fire occur. Both can also be caused by worn or damaged hammer hooks/full cock notch.

I bought an early Springfield pistol several years ago that doubled the third or fourth time I pulled the trigger. A teardown and examination revealed hammer hooks that were angled to such a degree that they actually worked to squirt the sear out of engagement as the slide went home. I'd never seen hammer hooks worn that much, so I could only assume that somebody had stoned them that way deliberately in the attempt to create an escape angle for the sear and went too far. Years ago, it was standard practice to stone about half the hammer hook length to a negative engagement for a quick and dirty means to clean up the trigger action.

I replaced the hammer with one from an old Sistema and stoned a light escape angle on the secondary side of the sear crown. The trigger breaks clean at about 6 pounds and it hasn't missed a beat since.
 
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I am fortunate to have avoided potentially disastrous things like that, except with one STI that I sent back three times.

In that case, the gun would fire when the safety was engaged. I discovered it while demonstrating the manual of arms for the weapon to my sister. Fortunately, I was observing the rules, and it was pointed down range at an indoor facility.
 
MacEntyre said:
In that case, the gun would fire when the safety was engaged.
Click to expand...

Pulled the trigger with the safety engaged and the hammer fell?

The safety wasn't blocking the sear.

Chdamn said:
Hammer follow down will put a hole in your den floor. Ask me how I know.
Click to expand...

That probably wasn't a simple followdown. The hammer cocked and jarred off. Some call it a slam fire.
 
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John Travis said:
1911 School: Troubleshooting an old Colt.

An old friend of mine came into possession of his grail gun in the form of a USGI 1918 "Black Army" Colt a couple months ago, and even though it was never his intent to use it for a beater, he did want to be sure that it was fully functional, and when he took it for a test run, an odd problem popped up.
About every other time that he pulled the trigger the hammer caught on the half cock. Concerned that he'd bought a pill instead of a pearl...he came to see me.

The usual culprit in this little malfunction is a weak, damaged, or out of spec sear spring...specifically the center leg not maintaining tension on the disconnect...with the result being that the disconnect is squirted down into the frame in the disconnected position as soon as the sear clears the hammer hooks. The sear resets and grabs the half cock notch and brings it all to a screeching halt.
When I removed the slide, I noticed that the top of the disconnect was worn down to a nubbin. Ah! A clue!

But this usually leads to hammer followdown when the gun fires...not stopping on half cock.
And there was another clue that I noticed when I tried to dry fire the gun to see the hitch in the gitalong. The trigger pull was off the scale, estimated at 10 pounds or more.

I broke it down, and there it was. The disconnect spade was tiny...much too short top to bottom to have enough overlap with the sear to keep it between the sear and the trigger when the pressure was on.

I replaced the disconnect and the sear spring and all was well with the old Colt.

But, I still wondered, and this was the only explanation I could come up with.

The worn disconnect was causing hammer followdown issues, and whoever had his hands in the gun previously understood why...but instead of simply replacing the disconnect, he decided to adjust the spade to get it away from the sear feet...which corrected the followdown problem and created another one...then he cranked up the tension on the sear spring to try to keep the disconnect in position and correct the new problem. The gun probably worked for the two or three test rounds he fired, so he called it good and sold or traded it to the dealer who then sold it to Gary.

And this is what it's like in my world, where I often have to follow a kitchen table tinkerer who "fixes" guns for fun and profit.
Click to expand...

Another graduate of the WECSG!
 
John Travis said:
oops. I touch a nerve? :D

Sorry. I know there are a good many talented kitchen table gunsmiths. Hell, since my eyes got old...if there's somethin' that I can't handle at the kitchen table, I send'em to somebody else. I closed that shop several years ago.

I'm not talkin' about those guys. I'm talkin' about Dremel Dan and Bubba the buffing buffoon et al. Guys who create more problems than they solve. Guys like the one who tried to fix that old Colt because he was too cheap to spring for a disconnect. He doubtless understood the problem, but chose to jerry rig it and let it be somebody else's problem.

Guys like that have been a nightmare. I've followed too many like him and it's resulted in a little animosity toward his kind.

All in good fun.

Cheers.
Click to expand...
Would you polish some feedramps on a few old Colt's for me?:eek::D
 
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