I was looking at a friend's rifle. He wants to sell it.

Here's the story. He went to shoot his 30-06 A Bolt at the "biggest deer " he has ever seen and had a hang fire. Then he worked to bolt vigorously to attempt a second shot and when he worked the bolt home the rifle fired.

Tonight, I pulled the action, cleaned the action and bolt with Gun Scrubber and a lite, quick spray with some RemOil.

Now, about 1 out of 20 times, the bolt won't cock. When you rotate the bolt handle down, the hammer falls with it.

Ideas?

quote:

Originally posted by Duckear:
I was looking at a friend's rifle. He wants to sell it.

Here's the story. He went to shoot his 30-06 A Bolt at the "biggest deer " he has ever seen and had a hang fire. Then he worked to bolt vigorously to attempt a second shot and when he worked the bolt home the rifle fired.

Tonight, I pulled the action, cleaned the action and bolt with Gun Scrubber and a lite, quick spray with some RemOil.

Now, about 1 out of 20 times, the bolt won't cock. When you rotate the bolt handle down, the hammer falls with it.

Ideas?

First I would completely strip the action and bolt and clean all the Rem-Oil and all other gunk off. Then I would start looking/checking the trigger/sear and see what’s going on...or not going on. If the sear isn’t fully up and held solidly in place it will allow the firing pin (not the hammer) to override it when the bolt is closed.

Sounds like somebody's been tinkering with the trigger! There isn't a sear engagement screw but there is a trigger spring and over travel screw. You might look to see if there is enough tension to allow the sear to reconnect. Back the little screw behind the trigger lever out to increase the pull.

Sometimes folks will pull these triggers off the action and in an attempt to lighten it up, accidentally (unconsciously) turn the sear reset screw too far in which will, as Rick mentioned, prevent the sear from coming up high enough to reset and connect. You might look there as well.

Duckear,go buy yourself a new rifle and read the instruction manual.

Great shootaway, It isn't even his rifle!

quote:

Originally posted by James C Scott:
Great shootaway, It isn't even his rifle!

Contact Browning:
http://www.browning.com/faq/detail.asp?ID=87

I own several A-Bolts and have had great results so far. I can't remember what I needed; but Brownings service department shipped the part to me free of charge for a Browning gun I was working on. Good Luck.
Woody
PS: Browning A-Bolt manuals are available online also.

Woody

The trigger mechanism on an A-bolt is simple, very simple. The only thing I can think of that is more simple would be the factory trigger on an old Mauser. As mentioned above, the only screw on them is the weight of pull screw (and overtravel). Take it apart any figure out the problem. It'll take you all of 10 minutes to pull the trigger out of that thing. The last one I took apart had a little chromed piece on top of the trigger with a phillips screw holding it in place. If for some reason that screw was loose and sticking up too far or the chrome top on the trigger were loose and moving around that might make things a little twitchy.

Something else you mentioned in your description confuses me, but I think it's only because you didn't word it right.

You said "Now, about 1 out of 20 times, the bold won't cock. When you rotate the bolt handle down, the hammer falls with it." If the hammer falls, then the trigger IS cocking/resetting... unless I'm missing something, which could definitely be the case, it's been one of those weeks already. Anyway, I stand by my previous recommendation. Take it apart and figure it out.

quote:

He wants to sell it.

What does he want for that "broken rifle"
If the price is right I might be interested.

Honestly, there just are not that many moving parts in it. Take it to a gunsmith or send it back to Browning. I'm sure Browning does not want oto have a gun out in the field that fires on closing.

I've been wanting to adjust the overtravel on my A-Bolt. I notice a few people mentioning an overtravel screw. Where is that located? Does the trigger have to be removed to get to it? That's the only thing I haven't done yet. I've adjusted the pull weight but that does noting for the overtravel, it's still got quite a bit. Any help is appreciated.

It's been years since I had an Abolt apart. But, I thought it only had pull weight adjustment. I don't remember overtravel. Looking at the parts diagram I don't see a screw.

Thanks for the help, the pull weight is the only one I can readily see. I have just viewed a few posts mentioning an overtravel screw adjustment and was hoping I was overlooking something.

I don't think so. You can with a Moyer's trigger though.

Browningwgm, technically there is only a weight of pull screw. It's on the back side of the trigger accessible by removing the trigger guard. It also functions as a psuedo trigger stop. Jon A has a good point. You could also switch to the Moyer's. I did that swap a while back and it was a nice setup. The Moyer's gives you a lot more adjustment. Not only does it have a lighter trigger spring, but it's drilled for a true overtravel screw and has adjustable sear engagement. However if your friend is serious about selling it, he probably wont want to drop the $100 or so to swap out the trigger. I'm still confident you can fix the problem without all of that though.