Marlin 1894 Needs Gunsmith Help

[ar15barrels]

Excellent. I think I have a plan for an experiment. I want to re-assemble the lever, close the action into battery and try the tapping on the dowel as mentioned above. If the lever pops down, I want to remove the lever and hold the "locking bolt" (item 44 in Randall's exploded view, item 46 in the exploded view that came with my rifle) up into position in the bolt and tap again on the dowel.

If the bolt does not move I think I will be suspicious of the engagement of the lever to the bolt. I'll know more after I run these experiments.

Dan

14 should push 44 up into 2 when 14 is closed.

[bergmen]

That is PERFECT Randall, thank you!

I am planning on running my tests today (after farm chores). I will report.

Dan

[bergmen]

Okay, I just got through running some tests. I found a 1/4" diameter stainless steel rod in my material stack long enough to act as the "rammer". I put a plastic cap on it to go against the bolt face and cut a rubber grommet to protect the muzzle from the rod. I held the rifle vertical and rested the butt on a wooden stool. Here is a picture of the rod with protective parts, the hammer used and the stool on the floor at the very bottom of the photo:



I started by removing the lever and while holding the rifle vertical I was able to press in the "Locking Bolt" (item 44 in Randalls exploded view) to fully engage the slot in the bolt. I had to push the bolt home for this to occur but I was able to hold it with my left thumb while inserting the "rammer" down to contact the bolt face. I gave the "rammer" several sharp blows with the hammer and felt no movement of the Locking Bolt or any tendency to do so whatsoever.

I then mounted the lever, closed the action and ran the same test. Immediately, the lever popped open (slightly with light taps, more with more aggressive taps).

Prior to this I was able to observe the front tang of the lever and it's engagement with the slot in the bolt by looking through the slot for the "side gate" (called a "Loading Spring" in the exploded view). The front tang does not completely disengage from the bolt as Randall's video suggests, it stays in contact with the front of the slot.

Here is a picture of the front of the tang here. It is obvious some fitting was done at Marlin after this lever was blued. It looks rather crude to me but more noticeable is a small spot at the end that appears to be showing some impact damage.



My thought is the tang engagement in the bolt slot begins to not be influential to going into battery once the "Locking Bolt" begins to engage the rear slot in the bolt to lock it closed. It would seem that I might be able to slightly relieve this interference without disturbing the lockup but I am reluctant to try this without opinions by our resident experts here.

Any thoughts?

Also, thanks in advance for the great posts in here!

Dan

[ar15barrels]

I started by removing the lever and while holding the rifle vertical I was able to press in the "Locking Bolt" (item 44 in Randalls exploded view) to fully engage the slot in the bolt. I had to push the bolt home for this to occur but I was able to hold it with my left thumb while inserting the "rammer" down to contact the bolt face. I gave the "rammer" several sharp blows with the hammer and felt no movement of the Locking Bolt or any tendency to do so whatsoever.

I then mounted the lever, closed the action and ran the same test. Immediately, the lever popped open (slightly with light taps, more with more aggressive taps).

Prior to this I was able to observe the front tang of the lever and it's engagement with the slot in the bolt by looking through the slot for the "side gate" (called a "Loading Spring" in the exploded view). The front tang does not completely disengage from the bolt as Randall's video suggests, it stays in contact with the front of the slot.

Here is a picture of the front of the tang here. It is obvious some fitting was done at Marlin after this lever was blued. It looks rather crude to me but more noticeable is a small spot at the end that appears to be showing some impact damage.

https://www.calguns.net/calgunforum/attachment.php?attachmentid=1163242&d=1683051987

My thought is the tang engagement in the bolt slot begins to not be influential to going into battery once the "Locking Bolt" begins to engage the rear slot in the bolt to lock it closed. It would seem that I might be able to slightly relieve this interference without disturbing the lockup but I am reluctant to try this without opinions by our resident experts here.

Any thoughts?

Also, thanks in advance for the great posts in here!

Dan

Don't take the video as any sort of gospel as to how the action is supposed to work.
The video was made by a human who may not have known really well what they were modeling.

That said, the disconnect between the lever closing the bolt and the lever then opening the bolt has to be there for there to be clearance for the locking lug to engage and disengage before the bolt moves while the lever is being cycled.
I would call it a hand-off where the lever moves the bolt forward most of the way and then the tapered angle on the front of the locking lug finishes closing the bolt.
The bolt is "handed off" from the lever to the locking lug in this respect.
Then when you open the action, the locking lug has to withdraw before the bolt will move so you don't want the lever pulling the bolt open until AFTER the locking lug is clear of the bolt.
That't the hand-off going the other way.

So with that in mind, you can add or subtract metal from the two sides of the lever where it engages the bolt as well as to the lever where it operates the locking lug or to the locking lug where it touches the lever to affect the timing of the action.

Think about the hand-off and the function of the locking lug and you will see that you might need to extend the travel of the locking lug to get the bolt to solidly lock.
This could possibly be done at the detent on the lever IF the detent is not keeping the lever all the way closed as it should.
If the lever is closing all the way and the locking lug is not snug up into the bolt to lock it properly, you need to increase that engagement.

Do you weld?

[bergmen]

Do you weld?

I don't weld. That being said I want to carefully study the lever tang and it's interaction with the bolt by looking through the opening in the "side gate". Easy to see.

I don't want to make any rash decisions on this, I want to proceed carefully.

Let me study this a bit and I will respond with what I'm thinking.

Dan

[sargenv]

It's a bit of a stretch for you but there is a pretty good gunsmith at 29 Outdoor gear in American Canyon (South of Napa, North of Vallejo). I've seen his work and he does a very good job on Lever action rifles and single/double action revolvers. I'd bet he could make it work. His prices are reasonable and if he can get the parts needed, I'm sure he'd work on it.

[ar15barrels]

I want to carefully study the lever tang and it's interaction with the bolt by looking through the opening in the "side gate".

Degrease the locking lug and oil the locking notch in the bolt.
Stick a rice kernel's amount of modeling clay on top of the locking lug and reassemble the rifle so that operating the lever will cause the locking lug to push up into the bolt.
Then carefully disassemble the gun and pull the locking lug back out.
Slice through the modeling clay to see how thick the cross section is where it was squished.

Now re-do the test but this time, don't use the lever, just push the locking lug fully up into the bolt.
Measure again and compare the two different measurements.
Thie difference between the two measurements is how much higher you want the locking lug to travel via the lever MORE than it is now.

[bergmen]

It's a bit of a stretch for you but there is a pretty good gunsmith at 29 Outdoor gear in American Canyon (South of Napa, North of Vallejo). I've seen his work and he does a very good job on Lever action rifles and single/double action revolvers. I'd bet he could make it work. His prices are reasonable and if he can get the parts needed, I'm sure he'd work on it.

Thanks for this referral, I may contact him.

I did a little relief grinding, not much, in the area of the end of the tang that appeared to have a little impact damage (as shown in photo above). I want to do a range test now and see if this has had any effect.

I'm reluctant to do any more, not really qualified to take this any further myself. I'll see how it works at the range tomorrow.

Dan

[bergmen]

SUCCESS! I went to the range this morning and tested the rifle with my three favorite loads. All went perfect, absolutely no tendency whatsoever for the lever to pop open at all. I started with the 7.0 grain W231 load (using Berry's Plated) and went up to the 9.0 grain load and finished with the 20.0 grain W296 load with the Hornady XTP.

Here are the loads I tried:



Thanks EVERYONE for their excellent help with this issue!

Dan

[ar15barrels]

SUCCESS! I went to the range this morning and tested the rifle with my three favorite loads.
All went perfect, absolutely no tendency whatsoever for the lever to pop open at all.

Was the lever bearing on the bolt in such a way that firing the gun was pushing the bolt against the lever to make the lever pop open?

So you clearanced the tail of the lever so it's NOT touching the bolt while in battery?
Doing that should let the bolt properly seat against the locking lug instead of the lever.

[bergmen]

Was the lever bearing on the bolt in such a way that firing the gun was pushing the bolt against the lever to make the lever pop open?

So you clearanced the tail of the lever so it's NOT touching the bolt while in battery?
Doing that should let the bolt properly seat against the locking lug instead of the lever.

Yes, that is exactly what the situation was. I took my time and studied this very carefully. I was able to prop open the "Loading Spring" (called a side gate by Henry) and look up at the lever/bolt relationship with a bright LED flashlight as I slowly worked the action.

Also, in one of my photos above, there is evidence of impact on the edge of the tang. Closely inspecting the bolt I saw a corresponding shiny spot on the top surface of the groove in the bolt where the tang rides.

After thinking about this for a bit (I hate to rush into things) I carefully ground away the impact edge on the tang (I should have taken a photo but didn't) with my bench grinder. I only removed a very slight amount and was very careful not to disturb the rounded leading and trailing edges of the tang (which actually opens the bolt and then closes it into battery).

Now I want to go out and have fun with this rifle! I haven't shot it in probably more than a year because of the lever popping open issue. I'm going to shoot the 20 grain loads (several magazine loads) to be absolutely certain all is well. I don't expect any issues since if my relief grinding didn't work, it would have been obvious on my first test shot. I fired 3-4 rounds of each load yesterday with zero issues which convinced me all was well.

Thanks again for your valuable advice, it really helped me understand the inner workings of this rifle!

Dan