Cocking problem?
 

Situation; mismatched .30 Luger with rough, repro? sideplate. Commercial DWM, no date. Shoots right on the money to point of aim but will not **** when a round is fired. Only cocks when the toggles are pulled back by hand..Weird huh?

Jerry Burney

Jerry,

There's an easy fix for the problem you mention about cocking when hand operated and not cocking when fired. I have fixed a dozen of these.:thumbsup:

Hugh,

What's the fix? I have run into this problem with my .30 shooter on occaision.

Ron

Ron,

It's a trade secret, if I tell you I'll have to kill you:roflmao:

Polish the angled edge of the trigger lever as shown in the picture. Stone the top edge of the sear bar button to a rounded or angled profile as shown in the picture. I have shown for comparsion a before and after trigger lever and a normal sear bar on the left with several modified sear bars on the right.
http://forum.lugerforum.com/lfupload/luger_sears.jpg

Hugh, Thanks for the tip! The spring plunger on the sear bar rotates...How is the angle to stay in any one place? Thanks, Jerry Burney

Jerry,

It may move a little bit, but should not rotate very far. The pin holding it in should keep it from rotating very far as it fits in the slot pictured below. You just have to stone further around, like the one shown on the right end in my picture of the sear bars.
http://forum.lugerforum.com/lfupload/plunger.jpg

Hugh, Thanks! I was under the impression this plunger rotated but from your photo it is obvious it does not..It is one of the few parts on a Luger that I don't commonly take apart. Small pin.
I do appreciate this! I will give it a try. Jerry Burney

Made a sticky as a learning tool :)

Maybe I'm asking a completely obvious question, but would/could the unmodified parts (those pictured above) cause a trigger to not be reset? I posted a question about this (see below, with updated info) and before I go whittling on these pieces, I want to be sure I understand how they interact with each other.

1. Insert loaded mag
2. Work action, chambering round
3. Pull trigger
4. Gun fires
5. Gun ejects spent casing
6. Feeds next round
7. Pull trigger, but nothing happens. The trigger hasn't reset.

If I start again at step 2, it follows the sequence again. Since the trigger is rest during the first part of toggle motion and the gun does eject and feed properly, I'm lost as to what is wrong. Also, if I dry fire it and work the action with the trigger held back, it will replicate the reset problem. Any suggestions on what to replace/fix?

Many Thanks,
Matt

Matt,

Yes, the above modification should solve your problem. Before making the modifications, be sure that the small plunger in the front end of the sear bar is moving in & out freely, if this is true and the action is still not working properly, then make the modifications.

How it works
 

Hugh,

Thanks for the fix information. It's very helpful. My question is " How do these parts work together and what is the modification correcting?" I hate to sound technical, but if I know how a system works, I will know how to troubleshoot or repair it.

Dumb-founded

Jack Hiles
Mesa AZ

Get Gerard Henrotin's e-book on the Luger Mechanicals... it has very good explanations of the relationships between the parts and excellent graphic illustrations.

Jack,
What John said!!!:D

Actually, what the mod is doing is allowing the button to slide under the trigger lever.

Matt, i had the same problem as you [1 thru 7] . i took it to a gun show and talked to a luger dealer and told him of the problem. when he looked at the firing pin he told me some one had been messing with it and it had slight file marks on one side of the steps on the pin. he took a firing out of one of his luger,s to test it in my gun and dry fired it. and you could the firing pin click ea. time. where before it only click,d the 1st time. i bought a used firing pin from another dealer. took it home and replaced it. it work,s fine now. sorry diden,t mean to ramble on. new to luger,s

OK, what to do if the fix above, bevelling the edges of the trigger lever and disconnector, don't seem to fix the problem?

THANK YOU...made this much easier than I had imagined on my great uncles wwII 1917 trophy..although my dad get a little uneasy when I brought out the sandpaper...

Hugh,

Thank you so much for this sticky. I received my first Luger three days ago. I took it out today and experienced the exact same problems discussed here (no reset of the trigger when either dry firing or shooting). I polished the two parts you suggested, although I had to do so and re-install three times before the problem disappeared. I can also both hear and feel the firing pin drop with more authority now than it did previously. Two thumbs way up!

How common of a problem is this?

Thanks, Hugh. Your fix worked perfectly!

How do you get the trigger lever out of the side plate to polish it?

If your side plate is out, you rotate the lever pin to unlock it, then pull it out front to rear. Make sure you return the lever to the plate the same way it comes out.

I can't get it to rotate. I'm trying to use a jewelers screwdriver to pry it up but don't want to scratch it. Is there some kind of trick to make it move? Thanks......

Jim,
Use a brass screwdriver placed between the plate and bar, and tap it with a small hammer.

OK, got it out. What a pain if you don't have the right tools. What started this whole project is that my side plate won't sit flat against the side of the receiver. So I swapped it with one from another gun and it did but it wouldn't recock after first shot. So I followed this sticky to fix it. Anyone ever have to fix a sideplate that won't sit flat? It shoots OK but I don't like the 1/64th tapered gap from front to rear looking down on it. This is my shooter gun made from several.

I seem to have this cocking problem with my P08 too, a 1940 Mauser 9mm. Sometimes it doesn't fire when firing live ammo at the range, upon pulling the trigger several times it fired again.

Also, the gun seems to work fine when hand cocked, slowly. Sometimes, especially if I tilt the gun to the left, and c o c k it really fast, as in it being fired, it doesn't work. The firing pin is then in its forward position, not cocked.

- when the gun has this malfunction, is the firing pin in its forward position?
-if I c o c k it by hand, you hear it click, and it works...

Will try to clean it further and see if the plunger works freely in the sear bar first. Grateful for any answers!

sincerely, Daniel

Nobody..? =)

Daniel, did you try the fixes suggested above?

If thats not the issue, then start a new thread and folks should answer.


ed

Ed;

I tried the above fix a couple days ago. I think there's something else wrong with the sear bar, will try to get parts to try out soon. Thanks for your answer.

As has been noted, this is a common problem, particularly on lugers with replaced or mismatched parts. I receive at least 2 lugers a month requiring "trigger jobs". I consider Hugh's fix as an alternative, non-factory type repair, but it usually works in the cases where the FP will release on initial cocking (where the overlap of the FP & sear are not too great and the trigger is engaging the trigger lever OK). THe factory fix would be to install a trigger lever that has the correct angle to both push in the sear far enough to release the FP (striker), AND come back far enough, when the trigger is release, to allow the disconnector (plunger in the trigger bar) to push past it. As you can see, there are several parts (tigger, sear, FP, trigger bar & disconnector) that must be in balance to operate correctly. TH

JH, Getting the side plate to lay flat on the frame is a matter of judicious bending and perhaps a bit of interior filing. This should be done before even installing the trigger lever and attempting to get a decent FP release. TH

Thanks Tom for your advise. worked like a charm on my "parts master" luger. now off to the range to test it out!

Modifying Trigger lever and Sear Bar issues
 

Does modifying these parts affect the value of the gun itself? I realize if it does not function properly that is bad, but I dont want to alter anything to affect the value as I dont plan on shooting the gun too much anyway?

Thanks for any advice.

if you have a righteous example of a matching original luger its best to leave it alone. If its a shooter slight modification to make it fire is fine. Or you could use lugerdoc whos on this forum. Hes cool because he repairs/modifies lugers but is also a collector so he knows the can and cants and how far you can take it before something starts to compromise value.

Hey Hugh, you Sir are a certified firearms genius, my damn good looking, sort of mismatched, 1917 P 08 started giving me problems over two years ago, I couldn't figure it out, brought it to a gun smith no one could fix it.
Followed your instructions, polished and beveled the trigger bar as you showed so well in that very clear photo you posted, and it was back to working perfectly bang bang bang.....
Thank you Sir....
Myron thanks for your help too.

just a great big THANKS YOU! ( as in HUGH). I am a luger virgin and had the fire...no fire syndrome.
I did the dremel tool on the sear bar plunger and trigger lever and IT PERFORMS PERFECT!!
I really appreciate the help of the "all knowing" folks on this forum.:cheers:

Trying this fix on my 9mm. It is stated to stone the " top" of the sear button, but from the pics, it looks the bevel is applied to the left or right side of the button as related to frame? The button on mine is already somewhat beveled on the " bottom" of the button as related to frame? Just want to make sure I bevel the correct side.

In doing this fix myself, I bevel what I would call the "left" side of the sear button, left being described as the left side of the pistol as I hold it in normal sighting position as if to discharge it. As Hugh said in post #13, idea is to get the button to go under the trigger bar, or in my view trigger bar to ride up over the button as the receiver returns to firing position.

That said I was able to restore proper function mostly by beveling the trigger lever, with very little new bevel applied to the plunger ("button"). Hope this helps.

Got it. Thanks!

I have a similar problem, but
 

Hi. I was reading this thread with interest. Hoping to solve a problem I have with a 1916 Erfurt. In my case the gun will not **** at all, even by hand. The action seems to work, it will hold open with an empty mag, but doesn't seem to **** or dry fire no matter what. Internally the gun looks good. The only thing I see is some noticeable "peening" around the Breech Block where the Firing Pin Spring Guide locks in. That FPSG also doesn't seem to stay in very well and often pops out when field stripping. The spring itself is a little bent (possibly caused when the guide pops out). I plan on replacing the spring, but looking for advice to solve the cocking problem at the same time. Any advice is appreciated. Thanks. ChuckM

PS- also if the problem is the lever not slipping over the Trigger Bar, shouldn't you be able to release/dry fire it with the side plate off and by depressing the trigger bar? I don't think my problem is that its not releasing, it appears not to be cocking to start with. Thanks again. ChuckM

Why don't you start a new thread and post pictures of the related pieces?