Help with Rossi 92 feeding problem

[Paladin357]

Hey all, new guy here from Nevada. I hope you're doing well in these crazy times. So I finally got around to polishing the action on my Rossi 92, and while the action is nice and smooth now, its suddenly having issues feeding. It appears that the cartridge stop is not engaging at the proper time and so the next round in the mag is following the first onto the lifter. Loading the mag seems to go fine, but once the bolt is opened the first round is fully on the lifter and the second round sticks out from the magazine as well. However, loading the mag with the bolt open allows the stop to engage and therefore the round in the mag stays put. Here are some pictures to showcase the issue: http://paladinforge.com/gallery.html


Pics 1 and 2 show the mag follower after opening the bolt. As you can see, the cartridge stop has not engaged and the follower is sticking out.

Pic 3 shows the view after pushing the mag follower back into place, so the cartridge stop is now engaged.

Pic 4 shows loading snap caps with the bolt open, you can see that the stop has engaged the rim of the first round while the second sits on the lifter, like it's supposed to.

Pic 5 shows the snap caps when loaded with the bolt closed and then opened to start chambering. The same happens when loaded with the bolt open and then closing it.

I've taken out the cartridge stop and made sure the spring was in correctly and it seems fine. The rifle was not having this issue before I polished parts of the action, namely the lugs, the sides of the bolt, and the top of the lever where it rests inside the bolt. It seems to me like the ejector is engaging the cartridge stop for too long, so it can't move into place before the rim of the cartridge is already out of the mag, but I didn't do anything to the ejector other than take it out and put it back in.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance,
Alan

[AJMD429]

Be patient and someone smarter than me will answer....

Welcome to the forum...!

[piller]

Welcome. Nate Kiowa Jones, Steve Young in his muggle diguise, should be along soon. We have others on here who probably can help, but Nate Kiowa Jones is a wizard with the model 92.

[fordwannabe]

What caliber? When I was having issues with my Puma(predoceesor of the Rossi) Steve told me these guns tend to be sensitive to overall length he suggested I load mine(38/357) to the overall length of the 38-40 cartridge. Worked a treat since.

[DocRock]

.38/.357?

I had one and it was finnicky. Liked 357 cases with short roundnose bullets. I didn't. Moved it on. My 45 Colt on the other will feed anything I put in it as long as I am assertive with the lever.

But if it was feeding well and post polishing does not, I suspect something will have been overpolished. Not sure why, but I can't see pics.

[Paladin357]

Thanks for the replies, I should have mentioned it's a .357. Also, I have an update. I disassembled and reassembled the gun again, still had the same problem, but after moving the bolt back and forth and observing the snap caps for several minutes, I realized that the snap caps are too short for the one on the carrier to keep the other inside the mag tube as the bolt disengages from the cartridge stop. I put some of my regular ammo in and it functioned flawlessly.

That said, is there a fix so it will work with shorter ammo?

Thanks again,
Alan

[COSteve]

Done

[Stevie]

There is a small spring behind the cartridge stop....if it is broken or gone would cause that type of feed issue

[AJMD429]

I am lucky enough to have a 16" 357 Rossi that feeds everything well. From 180 grain wide-meplat 'hunting' loads to 125 grain ones in 357 Mag cases, and many many rounds of 38 Special FMJ and LRN cheap plinking loads, and some 38 special truncated cone ones. So it IS possible to do.

COSteve 'splains it well though, and I think most of the time the guns will by nature of their design mostly feed longer or shorter rounds best. Pick the length (and cartridge case) you want, and tune for that (beyond my skill-set, but NKJ and others like COSteve can help), and load your ammo accordingly.

I would assume (and you know what '***'uming means) that it would be more flexible to set things up to feed longer rounds, as it is easier to seat out farther in a 38 Special case than try to deep-seat in a 357 Mag case.

[mickbr]

Highlighting this part of your post "worked fine before polishing parts of the action, namely the lugs, the sides of the bolt, and the top of the lever where it rests inside the bolt". I'm no smith and dont do work on my own guns but wouldnt have thought that would have causeed permanent changes in the guns COAL preference? Someone more skillfull may chime in.

Costeve is correct about COAL in general, for these actions its individual to the gun. I once tested a few Rossi92's before buying and found one that handled 1.42" 38 special through to longer 357, even jacketed bullets loaded backwards, so it got the nod.

[earlmck]

Stevie is the only one of your "helpers" to diagnose your particular problem. If two cartridges are trying to get onto the lifter at the same time you have a cartridge-stop problem. I wonder if you lost the little spring when you reassembled the rifle after slicking it up?

[Paladin357]

Hi Earl, Stevie, thanks for the replies, but as I said in the previous posts, the cartridge stop spring is in and installed correctly; that was the first thing I checked.

COSteve, now that I think about it, it makes sense that, because of the way the action works, there is a minimum length necessary to keep the following rounds in the mag tube while the stop is disengaged. I measured my snap caps and they come in at 1.399". I pretty much only shoot handloads and seat my 38spl to 1.49", so that's why I didn't have issues before.

Thanks again for the replies,
Alan

[NotDeadEd]

This may be a bit late, but I had feed issues, and the cartridge guides distance very much affects feeding.
Marauder.homestead has info on the fix.
http://marauder.homestead.com/files/Ros ... _guide.htm
That and once I got the burr off the bottom of the right hand guide it eats and feeds everything without struggling to work it. Also check for clearance between the lifter and side loading gate. If there is interference, then the lifter won’t bring the round up right, and a sharp edge there won’t kick the round to the center...

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[piller]

Thank you for the link.

[Paladin357]

Thanks for the tips, Ed. I'll take a look and see if I have those issues as well.