Tokarev recoil spring replacement

[Dr Rockso]

I got a new set of springs for my Romanian Tokarev, but after popping the recoil spring retainer off the old recoil spring I can't for the life of me get it to snap on to the new one. Any advice?

[Dr Rockso]

Perhaps a photo will clarify what I'm talking about. Any tricks for getting the spring in the groove in the spring retainer?

[Dr. Peter Venkman]

Wiggle it!

[BHP FAN]

leatherman pliers.

[Spiggy]

have you tried hitting it?

I have the same prob when the button falls off my T-54 so I just stopped taking it apart

[Dr Rockso]

Finally got it. Loosened the spring up a bit using a pencil as a mandrel and then just worked it with the leatherman pliers (which actually worked a lot better than the needle-nose pliers I had been using). Total time invested in this: ~2.5 hours. Stupid milsurps.

[RaceDay]

Wow, I had the same problem a while back and was ticked it took me about 30-45 minutes to fix. I forgot what I did or I would have given advice. I think I used needlenose pliers and kept wiggling until I got it to pop in. The moral of the story is to hope the spring never needs replacing.