Fun with Guns

I field stripped my Buck Mark on saturday for a little cleaning. However that didn't seem to do it so I detail stripped it yesterday. For those not into guns, field stripping is the process in the manual you use to give the gun a light cleaning without losing anything. Detail stripping is the part in the manual which is covered by a statement that looks like this:

Any further disassembly should be undertaken by a competent gunsmith or the gun should be returned to the dealer for service.

That aside detail stripping can be pretty easy. This is mostly because guns contain a lot parts under fairly strong spring tension. If you remove the wrong pin they tend to disassemble themselves, often violently as was the case yesterday. It is getting the gun back together without any supplied directions that is the tough part.

If you have perchance had your buckmark's firing group explode into its component pieces, clean them while you are at it and then use this diagram from Brownells to get things in the proper places. If you didn't disassemble the thing in the proper order (if parts were flung every which way then you probably didn't do it right) I suggest doing the following:

1. Put the mainspring and mainspring plunger in the frame. There is a little hole through the side of the frame near the grip screw holes. Compress the spring, a dowel would be a good thing to use here, and run a small pun punch through here to lock the mainspring down. This will keep you from fighting spring tension while you put the rest of the thing back together.
2. Now put the hammer and safety lever in and secure them with that pin with the spring on it (hopefully the spring is still on it). Keep in mind that weird little strut on the hammer needs to end up in the mainspring plunger's dished top.
3. Now put in the sear spring, it has a short and a long leg. The short leg goes against the frame, then put in the pin, and then take some needle-nose pliers and put the long leg down past the hammer and safety lever. The hammer should hold it roughly in place.
4. Now slip the sear into the middle and put the pin in. It will go in fairly easy.
5. Make sure the sear spring is in its notch on the sear. If not get it there with the pliers.
6. Now pull the pin to release the mainspring.

Put the rest of the parts in the obvious places and put the grips back on to hold everything together. If you can't get everything back together it is possible you have a pin turned around.

I suggest you check to make sure everything works at this point before you put the slide on. Hold down the hammer and make sure pulling the trigger releases the hammer properly. Make sure the trigger is returning, the slide release works, and magazine release works. These last few parts use little leaf springs that are easy to mess up or miss in assembly.

Some of you may be thinking, doesn't this void your warrantee on the gun? Well I bought it used so my warrantee on the gun doesn't count for much. Heh, since the warrantee on my car ran out this weekend, next week I will be giving instructions on how to detail strip a Mazda Protege. ;)