cutting the tail off an AR Hammer

[norcal-ar]

wanted to get into doing a little trigger work and have been thinking about cutting the tail off of my AR hammer. my question is if using a cutoff wheel will the amount of heat made mess with the temper or hardness of the the hammer? i have access to a band saw so i could always go that route.

[Noobert]

Your hammer doesn't look like the one circled in red, right?


If not then I'd worry about whether the reduced hammer has enough mass to be 100% reliable with all types of primers. I don't think it will affect the hardness if you go slow with your cuts. AR hammers are still cheap if you screw them up

[bohoki]

a belt sander would work better just grind it down dipping it in water when it gets hot in your hand

[jamesob]

and what benefit are you expecting?

[Noobert]

Shorter lock time probably

[norcal-ar]

Shorter lock time probably

exactly! I noticed the hammer in my V-tac has been seriously re-worked and thought Why cant I do something similar. wanted to swap my springs re-work the hammer and polish the sear surfaces.
this is what i want the end result to look like:

http://www.jprifles.com/buy.php?item=JPSH-1A

[1911su16b870]

Don't mess with your disconnector!

[norcal-ar]

^^^ yeah I know I can go out and buy a trigger and i have the money to. but sometimes why not see what you can accomplish? when polishing the sear no power tools will be used. ive heard of people using a little polishing compound and doing it by hand OR putting a dab of compound on both surfaces and actuating the trigger a number of times and let the compound do the work.

[DREADNOUGHT78]

^^^ yeah I know I can go out and buy a trigger and i have the money to. but sometimes why not see what you can accomplish? when polishing the sear no power tools will be used. ive heard of people using a little polishing compound and doing it by hand OR putting a dab of compound on both surfaces and actuating the trigger a number of times and let the compound do the work.

I think he meant if you mess with the disconnector you can end up with a FA rifle.

[norcal-ar]

yeah dont worry guys im not going to mess with any thing (re-shaping wise) other then cutting the top tail piece off.

[xbobby]

I have a DPMS trigger kit with the hammer tail ground off. i clamped a angle grinder to my bench and used a cutoff wheel to chop off the tail. Hammer was held by vice grips. I then sanded and polished the cut on a disk sander/ polisher.

Using a stock hammer spring with the 15minute mod I get no lite strikes with wolf 223primers/Winchester small rifle primers. With a stock hammer spring with one leg cutoff I get 1of10lite strike on wolf 223 primers and perfect operation on Winchester small rifle primers.

I've shot around 1000 rounds with these setups and have see no noticeable difference