If you missed my write up about this model, click here to see it.
The model 77 was introduced in 1955, the one above is a first year production gun.
The rifle was in definite need of some love, in it's current condition it has no collector value, in fact the guy I bought it from said he bought it just for a "wall hanger", believing it could never be beautiful again.....I'll show him... :)
One operational item noticed right away was the broken safety, it does not stay put
The gun has the original magazine, which is worth as much or more than I paid for the gun
The butt plate does not fit the stock, it could be from a different rifle, as the measurements provided for the reproduction one is larger than this one. I will buy a reproduction butt plate and fit it to the wood. The stock is also rounded at the butt plate, showing what happens when you sand a stock without the butt plate in place.
Some heathen drilled and tapped the receiver, and did a crappy job at that. I will sand them with the receiver, then glass bead blast the top of it to help them blend in
I had to wait a while after buying it to test fire it, once I did, the gun functioned just fine. Time to move forward with this project
Here are my plans
- Fix the safety
- Purchase a reproduction butt plate and fit it to the wood
- Add period correct sling swiverls
- Strip and refinish the wood in a satin oil finish
- Strip and polish the metal to a high shine
- Blast the top of the receiver with glass bead for a matte finish
- Reblue the metal parts
- Possibly install a scope
Here are the parts I rounded up for this project
A reproduction butt plate, it is slightly larger than the original, so we can grind it to fit
A vintage 1" leather sling
A set of 1" Williams (or Winchester?) sling swivels, they were rusty, so I cleaned them up and reblued them
A set of vintage Millet .22 rings
a generic 2-7 x 32mm scope
The first step I took was to remove the butt plate screws and restore, them. I know this seems like a weird first step, but I wanted to restore the stock before working on the metal and because I have to fit a new butt plate, it made sense to start with the screws
I used the wire wheel to remove the corrosion so I could see how bad they were
Then I wrapped the threads with tape and chucked them into my drill, starting with 100 grit and finishing with 600 grit
Stay tuned.....
It's always so satisfying to re-new screws that way.
ReplyDeleteMtnwkr