I bought a SIG P516, this has the most gritty trigger I have encountered in a while.
I want to lightly polish the some of the metal surfaces. Youtube says use 3000 or 5000 grit stone.
How do I go about polishing the metal surfaces, they are probably sintered.
Can I use the sharpening stones I have?
What are you trying to polish, chrome over brass or Stainless steel, with chrome you may polish it away & only have brass left, stailess steel, you can uses plenty of compounds such as, brasso, mothers polish, turtle wax, all with a soft light buff, have a read through the forum here, general procedures, maybe covered there, good luck cheers Don.
Go to, General questions & trouble shooters, Sandbar 33, 2011, read through that post, some good ideas there, cheers Don.
I had a set of small stones for trigger work but they are long gone. Be careful.
I use similar to these from fleabay:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Abrasive-Rubber-Polishing-Burr-Point-Grinding-Head-For-Metal-Dremel-Rotary-Tools/222761658128?hash=item33dda12710:m:muf7Ap4X5V_UAXLvd9LLFDQ
They are also useful for a 'jewelled' finish ;)
I am polishing a AR trigger sear just a hair to mirror finish.
Right now imagine a chalk board and run your nails through it, that is how I feel when I engage the 1st stage of this trigger. :o
How do I know the grit of the stone? here is my confusion, I have a few of those dremel stones that I can put on my drill but don't want to make rougher than it is now.
I will look for the Sandbar post.
Yeap, done a few trigger jobs, mostly single stage ones, my bench guns have 1oz to 2oz triggers, yeap nothing to sneeze about.
I would do it by hand, a Dremmel can take off too much and cup the contact surfaces.
wet & dry cloth should be okay, start with 600 then 1200 then 2000 then 3000, good luck, but that set that Chris rush posted, do a nice smooth job, with a drill or a dremel, cheers Don.
Quote from: Gobi King on April 12, 2020, 12:20:09 AM
I am polishing a AR trigger sear just a hair to mirror finish.
Right now imagine a chalk board and run your nails through it, that is how I feel when I engage the 1st stage of this trigger. :o
How do I know the grit of the stone? here is my confusion, I have a few of those dremel stones that I can put on my drill but don't want to make rougher than it is now.
I will look for the Sandbar post.
Yeap, done a few trigger jobs, mostly single stage ones, my bench guns have 1oz to 2oz triggers, yeap nothing to sneeze about.
Lacking regular tools for this job I would suggest Crocus Cloth laid on a piece of glass. You will first take a black marker across the sear to track your strokes on the Crocus Cloth. Or the best is to clamp assembly in vise at the right angle & using a flat glass peace with Crocus cloth on it like a file. You push to hard, removing to much material the glass breaks. This is the safest, easiest way with out proper tools I have found
Is this part cast ? Have you looked at the sear under magnification ? ... Jeff
Gentlemen,
Here is that I take from the input:
1. Look at the surface closely
2. First, I will buff/polish the engagement surfaces with a dremel and cloth buffing wheel and some buffing/polishing compound
3. If above fails to improve, and light wet polishing with 2000 grit cloth (meant for vehicle paint finish wet sanding) and then buff again with cloth wheel and buffing compound.
Again, I would avoid using a dremel or any other power tool on a trigger job. You are not removing material as much as polishing the contact surfaces.
gotcha, no dremel,
how do I go about just buffing the surfaces to polish them?
Quote from: Gobi King on April 17, 2020, 03:21:57 PM
gotcha, no dremel,
how do I go about just buffing the surfaces to polish them?
My GranDad called it Elbow Grease :)
I agree with the flat surface. I like moving the part over a large surface but the pros do it as Jeff describes.
Only thing I know, when you start rubbing and your arm gets tired and you haven't seen any progress, you haven't started even a warm up yet. To do this right takes lots of time and lots of sweat; I was taught in airframe and powerplant school by an old man named George. George did not believe in undersized parts and he'd give you hell if you made one.
The Man
Quote from: Gobi King on April 17, 2020, 03:21:57 PM
gotcha, no dremel,
how do I go about just buffing the surfaces to polish them?
Without stones a hard flat surface, glass works, and various grits of emery cloth. Take off the bumps if any, with courser cloth and work down to supper fine to polish the contact surfaces. Most likely you will only have to polish the contact surfaces. Don't take off too much metal, change the angle of contact or round of angles. If you mess up get new parts and start over, you do not want to make a unsafe trigger.
High quality AR triggers are not cheep but I have considered buying one for the lower I have the .243 WSSM barrel on, the lowers I have the 5.56 uppers on work well with the sears I polished. I wish I could get a better trigger for my AR-180.
Do you have any India stones? These are very important for maintaining surface angles and flatness. You want a 'crisp' trigger so the angles and engagement surface geometry are critical. Tow or three strokes with a stone then reassemble and try it. Remember that it will smooth out further with use. When removing metal from trigger surfaces; always remember that less is more. A very wise machinist once taught me that it's always easier to remove a little more metal than to put some back on.
-Mike
Quote from: PacRat on April 17, 2020, 04:31:11 PM
Do you have any India stones? These are very important for maintaining surface angles and flatness. When removing metal from trigger surfaces; always remember that less is more. A very wise machinist once taught me that it's always easier to remove a little more metal than to put some back on.
-Mike
Was his name George?
Lee & Ron with others have given you sound , safe advice. I will follow up with what Lee stated. It's best you have another trigger on hand before starting this. It is a rare thing that some one takes a trigger the first time & performs any polishing while keeping the the engagement surfaces true with no rounded off corners.
Also the biggest mistakes over the years regarding people, regular folks filing / stoning the parts on their guns is a simple one to correct. Your first attempt at this will be less than perfect. Find a comparably sized piece of steel to practice first !! This will make your work much better.
A sage, X Marrine, Gunny now a well known gun instructor told me of an incident where he went into the next town over for stuff, really nothing out of the ordinary to see folks practicing open carry in both localities. As he was checking out a young boy was admiring his 1911 residing in his holster. The young fella began to ask questions, he ended up inviting him & his mom out to his ranch to do some shooting. As he was walking to his truck the gal asks, while looking at his gun in holster, in Condition 1 .... Isnt that dangerous? Refferring to guns hammer cocked while in holster... Well mam, Hell ya it's dangerous !!
A bright, intelligent, young man comes home over joyed having made his final payment on an AR-10 in lay away. Tim ( Not Real Name ) first caught my attention when he was being berated for telling lies on a once notorious gun site.
At this time He was claiming to be having trouble with his "third" barrel in his Ruger Hawkeye 308 bolt action. Based on what he was describing, if true the barrels were acting like they were shot out.
Tim had a family history of hunting regularly. But when it came to what a well taken care of rifle is capable of he was a bit in the dark. It's no small chore to burn up a barrel in some rifle calibers with a couple thousand rounds or less. However Tim's shooting procedure unbeknownst to him was greatly extending the barrel life of his Hawkeye. So what I was hearing from Tim could possibly match with the ridiculous round count he was claiming.
I am convinced Tim had no idea the number of rounds he was putting through his Hawkeye was far from a regular occurrence. Ruger obviously thought the same as my self. Replacing his previous barrels at no charge while keeping & cross sectioning Tim's wore out barrels for further inspection . Knowing several who work there. I called, they verified everything Tim had told me to be nothing less than completely true.
We became fast friends with plans to meet up & have WW3 type shootfest. He was wanting a better trigger for his AR-10. I convinced him the one in his gun was more than sufficient with a little work. I gave instruction to him via email while I repeatedly said, be safe & defined the boundaries to do this. He had a full shooting bench set up outside on his back deck which set some 4'-5' above ground . Tim his brother & cousin were set up for few hours of fun.
The shooting I guess had been going on for a bit when Tim stood to retrieve his water inside . While inside his St. Bernard jumped up on to a near by table with his front paws, in an attempt to snag Tim's Burger, causing the table to lean & Tim's AR-10, that he had just completed stoning the trigger on, fell hitting the deck & fired a round that went through the skull of his cousin who was returning from down range to replace targets. killing him instantly. This Gun Should Not Have fired !
This is the first time I've publicly mentioned this. The pain still resides some place inside of me. Since this time I no longer give detailed advice on gun work of any kind, to any one who is not sitting beside me or without me looking over their shoulder. I am now at a point, as much as possible of having come to terms with this. This was & is a humbling thing. I say humbling because I know with Complacency & a lack of maintained Awareness the same can happen to me. To believe any thing else is not being honest.
We make many decisions on any given day. Some good, Some dont work out. Most decisions regardless can be filed in the No Harm No Foul file. Decisions regarding our guns can never be taken back. There are no mulligans with guns... Jeff
https://f1.media.brightcove.com/4/1275380506001/1275380506001_1430002157001_0040-08A.mp4?pubId=1275380506001&videoId=1429971773001
"https://www.youtube.com/embed/xh2FjzVVIZY"
I had a M-77R that had a 1000# lawyer approved trigger that could not be adjusted, my older ones had good triggers. I installed a Wolf spring in it, still 1000#s I took the spring out and still 1000#s. Looking at it I saw the Ruger law department forced engineering dept. to design the trigger so metal had to bend to get the sear to disengage. I removed metal and put the Wolf spring back in....well the rifle had a .0001 ounce trigger pull now even when the adjustment screw was tightened all the way and would fire when the bolt was closed. The factory spring gave me a 1 pound pull but would fire if I slammed the butt on the ground, not acceptable. I had to argue with Ruger for several months before they sent me the parts to put my 300 win back together, the new sear was not the 1000# model and I got the trigger weight I wanted with the Ruger spring.
Good on you Lee. Ruger for the most part is great to deal with. However with certain parts one may have to go used as some parts just are not released to the public or Armorers. You will also come across the occasional Ruger revolver that is terrible. With barrel not true with frame & rear sight body not aligned with frame. It is what it is. I've yet to see a case they didnt take care of... Jeff
Quote from: Rivverrat on April 17, 2020, 08:39:15 PM
Good on you Lee. Ruger for the most part is great to deal with. However with certain parts one may have to go used as some parts just are not released to the public or Armorers... Jeff
Their legal department had too much say but they need to protect the company from law suits too. When I had my #1 rebarreled for the second time, it started out a 243, then a 7mm-08 and now is 17 Hornady Hornet, they were more than helpful and sent 3 ejectors. I am happy with the factory trigger but might spend some $ and get a better one to go with the lapped match grade barrel.
You hand lap the barrel your self Lee ?
Not on this one, I had a gunsmith in Brookings, Oregon do all of the work.
Lee, the 17 Hornet is a wonderful round. One I would like to have. Friend of mine destroyed 10 of my steel plates with his 17 Hornet before us dummies took notice that his shots were passing through the steel plates. Plates were fine with 38 / 357 mag... Jeff
It does the job on sage rats too, this one was at 260 paces. 20gr bullet going 3600fps.
(https://alantani.com/gallery/32/1583_15_04_20_1_21_07.jpeg)
Good info guys,
Reading all the input and watching a bunch of videos,
A good buffing wheel and buffing compound is the way to go and go light.
I found this, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37B7yGWPAi8
Definitely one needs to test if firearm will fire if bumped. I do that with any new firearm and after I adjust the trigger pull.
At the ranges I belong to, we cannot leave a firearm loaded, if you are not shooting it, we have to unload it and call it. When we call cease fire for target pulling, ALL firearms needs to be safety flagged.
Unfortunate what happened with Tim's gun.
My buddies adult son came along to shoot his AR10 once, he kept firing a few rounds and taking breaks with a round in the chamber and the muzzle pointing at angle that would cause the round to leave the range. it was a WTF moment and after a few please don't do it, I called we are done.
The rules at my "range" are like the rule here, simple. Don't shoot the irrigation gear and the farm hands. I (we at times) also use gun safety rules. When Alan was up last year they were planting this field and we were shooting the one to the south, we knew where the farm hands were and they knew were we were and it worked well. The last few days I have been the only one on over a thousand acres and have several fields to shoot. Today will be the last good day to shoot, the alfalfa is almost a squirrel high and I am shooting at eyes on the pups.
(https://alantani.com/gallery/32/1583_10_04_20_3_36_43.jpeg)