I need an 1887 expert - now I'm the, well, not quite expert

[7.62 Precision]

The Shotgun is new (CIA PW87) and does not have a drop-two modification.

A second shell, instead of stopping in the magazine, sometimes follows the first onto the carrier, jamming the action.

It is a totally new action for me, and I have not even had one apart yet, so I am completely uneducated on this shotgun.

I am pretty sure I can see exactly what is happening, but as I have often found, since I don't know the action the cause could be hard for me to figure out on my own, or may be very easy.

From what I see, the right side of the carrier acts as a shell stop, holding the shell in the magazine. As the action closes fully, the carrier drops slightly and releases the shell which slides back onto the carrier, but is stopped by the lever/bolt from moving fully back. When the action is opened, as the shell on the carrier moves backward, the lever hits the carrier from the bottom and pushes it up slightly, causing it to stop the next shell in the magazine. At the end of the lever travel, the carrier snaps up, lifting the shell. As the bolt is closed, the carrier snaps down, still holding the next shell in the magazine, and then as the bolt locks into battery, the carrier drops slightly and the next shell is pushed out of the mag onto the carrier.

On this shotgun, the carrier sometimes stays down too long while the action is opening, allowing the second shell to slide partially onto the carrier, jamming the action.

This problem can be caused or prevented by putting pressure on the lever in certain directions during the opening stroke.

I assume one of the following:

1. There is a part on the carrier or lever that needs to be built up to positively lift the carrier that first bit to act as a shell stop.

2. The lever pin hole is incorrect and allows the lever to align incorrectly to move the carrier.

3. The shape of the lever internally is wrong and allows the first shell to move back too far too soon.

4. There is spring pressure that is off somewhere.

You can see a video of the same problem that someone made here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVpeKdiASSQ

I was surprised, this shotgun does not show the issues that most of these do, and was fairly polished internally from the factory. It may be they are trying to improve them a bit.

[Bill in Oregon]

Wish I could help, 7.62. I have been looking at this particular shotgun very closely as well, and know many if not most have one issue or another out of the box. One thread I read somewhere recommend disassembling, cleaning, polishing, lubing, reassembling and then just shooting the thing. I believe two well-known 87 smiths, Lassiter and Coyote Cap, radius the lower edge of the breech bolt to give the shells a smidge more clearance on extraction.
Please post as you work with this gun.

[7.62 Precision]

I will.

So far, this shotgun has shown none of the function issues that seem to be common with these copies, except the one issue I posted. From what I understand, from the cheapest chinese copy to the nicest Italian clone, all should be considered a potential project.

This particular shotgun has been polished internally at the factory, which does not seem like something that was done in the past. The polishing isn't perfect by any measure, but there are parts that were clearly smoothed. The action did feel smooth out of the box, but heavily over-springed. The trigger is probably 12 lbs and the lever latch spring and the spring in the lever are so heavy that it is actually painful to release the lever. manually cocking the hammer is no problem until it needs to push the trigger to engage the sear and then it takes two thumbs.

Then as is common with Century, they are so proud of their name they have to advertise with great bloody billboards of tasteless dot-matrix electro-penciling all over the weapon.

Neatly tucked away under the barrel in small text is:

ZHONG ZHOU MACHINE WORKS CHINA
C. A. I. GEORGIA VT 12 GA

That takes care of the manufacturer, importer, and caliber. Now all that is left is to mark the caliber on the barrel maybe, put the model number and serial number on the lower tang, under the lever, or put the serial number on the bottom of the receiver where it was on the originals.

But can Century do that? No way. The butchers at Century in typical Mengele fashion wielded their instruments of disfigurement and attacked the left side of the receiver, scrawling in huge, ugly text:

PW87-0049XX
PW87
CAI GEORGIA VT

Then they brutalized the right side of the receiver with slightly smaller but no less tasteless graffiti:

ZHONG ZHOU MACHINE WORKS CHINA
SER: PW87-0049XX MDL: PW87

Left side of the barrel says:
12 GA 2 3/4" CHAMBER LEAD SHOT ONLY, READ OWNERS MANUAL BEFORE USE

Wood is plain straight-grain, fairly darkly finished stuff. The buttstock fits loose enough that you can feel it move when held and there is a small gap between it and the rear of the receiver. Buttplate is soft plastic and a good fit. Metal has some sharp edges, even externally. Bead seems to be just off center.

In all, it seems a decent base to work from, if someone wanted one of these shotguns, and the Chinese may to be working to fix some of their previous issues, though their fixes are not always the right fix, from my experience with Chinese firearms.

I would consider these shotguns to be similar to buying a cap-and-ball pistol kit (and in the same price range). If you buy one, it should be with the intent to have some fun doing some work on it.

[Nate Kiowa Jones]

I have one coming in tomorrow. It's an interState import. I'll give it a look to see if it's the same chinese maker. .

[7.62 Precision]

From what I understand, the IAC '87s were made by Norinco and are better quality than the CAI version. Also, IAC sent over US walnut stocks or at least the wood for the stocks, as well as other US-made parts, and Coyote Caps was involved in helping Norinco perfect them, so they should generally be slightly nicer. The wood is definitely nicer and the sides of the receivers are not marred with awful dot-matrix text.

Norinco originally was making these for IAC working with Coyote Caps, but the Chinese found an unexpected market in Oz when it was discovered that the Aussie laws banning repeating shotguns did so by naming the actions, and they neglected to include lever-actions, so this is probably why Zhong Zhou started building them.

[Hagler]

Gents,

GunBlast just did a review of this shotgun:

http://youtu.be/mJ7B7FHCaFU

Jeff's gun kept having trouble with complete ejection.

Shawn

[7.62 Precision]

Looks like I fixed the issue.

I took the shotgun apart, cleaned all the sticky black junk out of it, and assembled the action on the outside of the receiver. This showed me what caused the carrier to rise initially to act as a shell stop - the front of the lever had an angle that pushed upward on the back angle on the bottom of the carrier during the initial opening of the lever. One side made contact slightly, the other side did not at all.

I put a weld on the contact point on the carrier, then filed it down fairly smooth.

I spent 20 minutes with fine needle files and 600 grit sandpaper smoothing everything up. The inside of the receiver was really rough.

I cut two coils off of the lever spring, narrowed the lever latch spring drastically (side to side, not thinning the thickness) and cut a coil off the trigger spring. The trigger spring was so strong that the trigger noticeably flexed when squeezed. The lever spring was so long that it was basically almost fully compressed when installed and the top coils were smeared sideways in order to make room for the lever to operate.

I filed the lever latch hook back quite a bit - it was too long and the lever did not actually unlatch, but had to be forced off of the hook.

I reassembled the shotgun and everything was noticeably smoother going it. Tried to work the action and the lever would not open.

It took all my strength to force it open, thumb hooked in the lever and holding onto the stock. Tried several times, no luck. Each time I closed it, it would not open. The lever moved at its hinge, but the latch would not unlatch. So I wanted to see how far the latch had to move to unlock, so I could see if I needed to remove more material. I slid a dental tool in and pulled the latch forward until it unlatched with the lever held in the unlatch position. It unlatched. I pushed it closed again and lifted against the lever to do the same again and the action flew open. I cycled the action again and it unlatched easily and perfectly.

So now the latch worked right so I cycled the action and the carrier would not come up. If I really hit the end of the lever stroke it sometimes snapped up, but not usually. I could push it up from the bottom, or if I pushed the follower in, it would pop past. I worked it and worked it, no change. Now what did I do to it?!

So I loaded the magazine to see if it would snap past a shell. (The shells now slid in super smooth with the smoothing I did) It cycled easily and perfectly. So obviously, it just won't go past the follower now. Except on the last round, it did. And very time since then. I can cycle the action very gently, and it still functions great.

If I press down on the lever just enough to unlock it with my thumb, the action snaps open fully and lifts a shell into position. If I cycle the action slowly and with little force, it still works smoothly and perfectly.

So, with a small weld on the bottom of the carrier, 20 minutes of polishing, and 10 minutes of total panic when nothing worked until . . . it just did, this thing functions right and the action is slicker'n deer guts on a doorknob.

[7.62 Precision]

Jeff's gun kept having trouble with complete ejection.

That is known to happen with these sometimes. Generally not as much with slugs, but with crimped shells that end up longer when fired.

What needs to be done to his is the bolt needs a radius on the bottom edge to allow it to rotate against the shell and his extractors need to be polished so they move freely, maybe adjusted a bit. The issue with his last shell not ejecting can be because the left side of the carrier is not camping in toward the center like is should, or it could possibly be short. Also, smoothing the action allows everything to move more freely and election is better.

It should not be a hard to fix.

[Nate Kiowa Jones]

Norinco doesn't make anything. They are/were the government clearing office for exports. Sort of like the US Customs. It is beginning to sound like your 87 was made at a different factory than the InterState made guns that cap was involved with.
This was a problem for the 97 pumps, too. The interState version was the first and they were rough, too. But, that was Caps first trip over there for InterState. After he spent some time at the factory the resulting 97's were much better.
But a few year in Century was getting Chinese 97 clones from a different factory. They were pretty rough compared to the Cap/InterState guns.
Also, during those years (Bush II years) there was a US ban on Norinco because they were selling missile part/tech to Iran. So, to get around that the exports were somehow routed around Norinco. Or, maybe the name has changed. I don't see any marked as Norinco anymore.

BTW, extraction/ejection has always been a problem with the 87. Even the winchesters. The history I read on it was John Browning wanted Winchester to make his pump shotgun ( he already had the 93/97 designed ready for production) but Winchester wanted to continue as a levergun company. He basically cobbled under protest this 87 up in less than 2 week. Not one of his better designs.
That all changed when the bannerman Spencer pump became popular.

[7.62 Precision]

Yeah, the stuff gets murky sometimes with the Chinese factories, and I think the Chinese government gets involved, too, with pushing new factories to produce successful products. It is a totally different culture and different views on intellectual property rights.

I remember when the first CAI-import Chinese-made 97s were coming in and there were some bad failures, while the IAC 97s it seems were good to go at the same time. Also, I knew a couple guys around the same time that bought the CAI import 870 clones and in both cases the bolts blew apart first shot. Not sure what one guy did, but the other send his back and got a replacement that worked, last I heard.

The '87 design is pretty brilliant as far as getting the huge shot shells through an action that is not too huge. You can see what he was thinking when he looked at the problem of how to keep the receiver short and the lever throw fairly small, basically sort of blending a rolling block and a lever action, with some things sort of borrowed from a falling block, with an amazing efficiency of parts. Could you imagine what the 1886 design would be like scaled to handle shot shells?

When you look at the design, I would say it is a very good example of JMB's genius and a good example of one of the times when Winchester totally missed the boat by passing over a good design in the pump shotgun. I think these lever shotguns are super cool, but there is definitely a reason they were eclipsed by pumps and later autos (another case where Winchester totally lost the plot).

[Nate Kiowa Jones]

Yep, big time dropped the ball on the A-5's.

I got that 87 today and it is an InterState marked "MADE IN CHINA" but no mention of which factory. It's one of the guns Cap worked so it has the drop 2 mod. The Magazine cutoff is the front end of the carrier but this one is so loose it won't stay up consistently for loading more than two. Like yours, with the mag loaded it works about half the time. If the front to back, up and down movement of the carrier was more positive it would probably do just fine.

[7.62 Precision]

It sounds like there was a lot of drama with these shotguns. Having been involved in some manufacturing in China (and opposed to it at the time, I might add) I can say there will almost always be drama. I guess a lot of the IAC shotguns had the drop-two mod done in the factory in China, and then the Chinese workers, not understanding why the carrier did not drop easily, ground it down and wrecked the mod before they left the factory.

This one I have here is working beautifully now, with the exception of not quite releasing the last empty shell from the extractors sometimes. This I know how to fix with a little work to the left extractor. Or it could be left as is and the last shell gets knocked off with the hand when reloading, but I would rather make it right.

I just need to clean up my weld a bit cosmetically, take another coil off of the trigger spring - any more than that I will need to find a lighter replacement spring I think, or it might get too short, and do something about the graffiti. Oh, and bed the stock at the tang, or it will crack under recoil eventually, being that loose.

[Nate Kiowa Jones]

Cap told me the Drop 2 mod wasn't really done over there but Cap had them make some changes so it could be done more readily here.

Have you been to Cap's site?

www.coyotecap.com/gunsmithingsimplified

He is good about fixes for some of these issues. About half way down he covers some of these extraction problems.

[7.62 Precision]

I have been to Cap's site - good info.

Now for the refinish. I have a 94 Winchester that just arrived from a forum member here, so I am going to work on the two at the same time. I'll be doing something a little extra on the 94 for him.

On the magazine cutoff, what worked on this one was a weld on the bottom of the carrier where the lever rotates against it, but that does not mean it would work on the one you have - I may have just gotten lucky. It does not move around now as much as it did before. Like I said, I am not quite an expert.

[Bill in Oregon]

Refinished it yet? Do share photos when you do!

[7.62 Precision]

Working on it now. I first have to bed the loose buttstock, or it will crack later.

[Bill in Oregon]

Following closely. Have a new CAI PW-87 inbound. Hoping there's enough meat at the muzzle to be threaded for a rifled choke tube.