Help needed with Win 94AE

[swhite0745]

Hey guys, first poster here. I'm currently in Central MT and use my rifles mostly for hunting, not any cowboy action or anything. Anyways, I just traded into a Win 94AE and have found a potential issue.
This thing doesn't have the normal floppy trigger that I am used to on older 94's but it has a real long travel. With the lever depressed completely I feel resistance and a significant click midway through the trigger pull, then it will travel another 1/8th of an inch or so before it hits the wall where the trigger breaks. I am probably doing a horrible job of explaining this, but if I was to fire the gun, there is some travel, a click, more travel then another click which would drop the hammer. SN is a 533---- number, somewhere in the mid 80's I am guessing. Rebounding hammer with no safety.

Is this normal? And if not does anyone know what the culprit would be and if it is just a normal parts swap or is some extra work involved? I know the new miroku rifles don't have the same issue and neither does my top eject built in the 70's. Is there anyway to make this trigger feel the same way as my old 70's top eject?
Thanks.

[J Miller]

swhite0745,

Welcome to the forum.

What you describe is not normal. It sounds to me like something in the lower tang is binding. I can't say what without having it in front of me so my suggestion would be to pull the lower tang out then disassemble it and polish everything that contacts anything, especially the mainspring strut edges. Those are normally sharp enough to cut you.
Make sure the spring(s) that control the lever block and the trigger return are not twisted and dragging on the side of mortise in the bottom of the tang.

By polishing everything that moves in the lower tang I was able to cut the trigger pull in half and smooth it up a lot on my mid 80s Trapper.

Joe

PS: The only way to make the action feel like the half cock action is to retro fit the rifle with a half cock action. It's easy to do, once you've got the parts on hand.
Hammer, trigger, sear, mainspring and strut are what is needed.
Then simply switch them out.

[Pete44ru]

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Welcome to the Leverguns Show !

In addition to the above, while it's apart you should inspect all the little pivot pins in the trigger mechanism for straightness.

Once upon a time, I had the same hard trigger pull & discovered a bent pin in there - which I replaced with the appropriate size drill bit shank, ground to length.


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[M. M. Wright]

Welcome to the fire. I have no great insights on your 94, just wanted to let you know we are here for you and there are some experts here.

[Nath]

I have experienced this too. In my cases (X3) it was the first stage spring binding. I swapped them out for a lighter and lesser diameter one and solved the issue.

[swhite0745]

Man, you guys are awesome. Thanks for the help, I will strip it down sometime this next week and take a look. Hopefully I can figure it out. I will post up my results when I can get it sorted out.
Weird question in regards to retrofitting old parts into a newer rifle. Is my top eject, post 64, leaf mainspring rifle's tang compatible with my 94AE? The older rifle is kind of a junker and I wouldn't mind sacrificing it.

Thanks

[Pete44ru]

Weird question in regards to retrofitting old parts into a newer rifle.

Is my top eject, post 64, leaf mainspring rifle's tang compatible with my 94AE ?

Since your 94AE is a rebounder, you'll also need the hammer, mainspring & MS strut from the 94TE

IIRC, there's a tutorial in our archives under "articles", still available on our old home page at https://www.leverguns.com/



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[swhite0745]

Lots of good stuff on that website. Added it to my favorites.

Don't know how the previous owner had it assembled, but a complete tear down and reassembly of the lower tang has solved the problem for the moment. The trigger doesn't even seem that bad now. I don't think the sear was seated correctly, I will look into new hammer springs just in case.

Thanks again.

[OldWin]

Welcome to the fire!
I just converted a 94AE 44 Trapper last year. What I found is that most of the parts that fit the stock AE lower tang are gone, or extremely hard to find.
What I did was use the entire lower tang and fire control group from the earliest post 64 version of 94.
The only thing you have to do is file off the tenons that slide into the cuts in the receiver on the earlier versions. On the angle eject, only the hammer screw and stock locate the lower tang.