I was busy yesterday giving my shooter a spring refurbishing using the Wolff assortment, all was well until I finally got to fitting the new mainspring.
The old one came out easily, and I turned to the tutorial on this site to put the new one back in. Using the drift pin and pliers technique to compress the spring such that the end was hooked by the guide pin hook was tough, even when shouting PAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRAAAAAAABELLUUUUUUM, as recommended by the tutorial
This was a new standard spring, who knows what it would be like for the extra strength one
There must be an easier way says I.....need more mechanical advantage..... Then I lay eyes on my turret reloading press, aye, that big lever and ram there give a nice mechanical advantage, could it work?
So I put the head of the spring guide and spring up into the seating die (45ACP) that happened to be on the press and rested the other end of the spring on the ram, with the edges just around the primer chute, which is incidently wider than the guide pin stem. Levering up the ram slowly with one hand, and keeping the spring in line with the other hand compresses the spring up just beyond the hook of the guide pin with no sweat and no bad words
Then keeping everything compressed you just angle the guide pin so its hook catches the end of the spring, and there you have it.