Newbie Question

Rober McLemore · 01-01-2010, 09:40 PM

OK - After decades of dreaming, I'm now the proud new owner of a 16 ga. Parker. Well, it's new to me, it was new perhaps a century ago.

Anyway, I'm having a Dickens of a time trying to remove the barrels from the receiver. I can easily remove the forearm, but when I try to remove the barrels - no such luck. I'm sure that there's some trick to it, but my general mechanical ability has decided to make me look the fool. I tried depressing the "barrel latch lever" the "pin at the ankle"? when the forearm is removed. No such luck.

Oh, BTW - it's a Trojan. Doing Google searches I see where others have trouble with the forearm. Being an LC Smith owner - that wasn't an issue.

Thanks in advance for any responses and everyone have a safe New Year.

- Robert

Labowner · 01-01-2010, 09:58 PM

Robert, there no trick it's the cocking hook, may be a little gummed up, try putting gun back together and dry fire it, OK to dry fire Parker, then see if you can remove barrels. If you get barrels off clean cocking hook so it freely moves, it is spring loaded. Some have had to take a different approach, get to that latter if you are not successful.

Rober McLemore · 01-01-2010, 10:47 PM

I'll describe (as best I can) what I've done and maybe I might need to get professional help (on a lot of different fronts).

I closed everything up. Then I dry fired. Opened the chambers again. Pressed the pin on the right side "ankle". Then I tried to push the barrels back towards the receiver while it was open. Tried to open it as wide as possible with the barrels pointing down (while the shotgun is in the "normal" position). With it as wide open as possible, tried to move barrels back towards chamber.

Still can't get the barrels off.

Thanks for any suggestions.

Dean Romig · 01-01-2010, 10:58 PM

I hope I'm not taking anything for granted here and I hope this isn't oversimplifying anything but . . . do you know that the foernd must be removed in order to remove the barrels and that no "pin on the right side of the "ankle"" needs to be pressed . . . you just remove the forend while the gun is closed and a when you open the action the barrels will literally fall off.

Rober McLemore · 01-01-2010, 11:15 PM

Thanks, Dean. With me, never take anything for granted<g>. However, I have removed the forearm. I guess what I'm talking about is a pin that is (imagine holding the gun and shooting a double) on the right hand side to the front that is normally hidden by the forearm. It goes straight forward like the shot would fire. It seems to be spring activated. It would generally be covered by the fore end. I thought it should be depressed to drop the barrels. Either pushing it in or not appears to do nothing.

Thanks again for bearing with me on this.

- Cheers,
Robert

Brush Buster · 01-02-2010, 12:00 AM

Robert ,If you opened the gun again ,you recocked the gun ,Close the gun back up ,dry fire the gun ,don't open the gun ,pop the foreend off ,once the foreend is off then open the gun ,but hold onto the barrels ,as Dean said ,they will literally fall off the gun !

TARNATION !!! · 01-02-2010, 12:49 AM

Robert: I think you are referring to the "unhooking pin and spring" which will be depressed when the forend is in place. It is under spring tension and has a limited length of travel. See part 27 under the "Technical Information" tab on the left side of the home page.

The first point is that barrel removal is supposed to be an easy process.

With forend off, push the top lever fully to the right with your right thumb while holding the barrels with your left hand. This should open the gun as if you were to load it.

With the top lever still pushed fully to the right, push the barrels in an upward direction with your left hand.

Normally, that's it.

If you don't achieve separation, look into the open action and work the lever a bit left and right. You should see a square bolt (Part 15) moving in and out of the frame. If that bolt is not fully retracted into the frame, you can have difficulty removing the barrels. When the top lever is fully to the right, that bolt should be completely inside the frame.

Grunge in the action can interfere with gaining the necessary clearances to drop the barrels. If it is quite dirty, try cleaning the area and then try barrel removal.

Good luck.

I think this is the pin you speak of (on left front when viewed from below so right front from your description)

Jack

VH20 · 01-02-2010, 03:22 AM

Robert, you have it backwards. The pin that you see protruding from the action knuckle (you meant "knuckle", not "ankle", right?) is normally depressed when the forend is in place. It must be FULLY PROTRUDING for the barrels to come off. The forend depresses it, which causes the cocking linkage to engage the barrels so that the gun will cock when opened. The engagement of the cocking linkage to the barrels is also what keeps the barrels from falling off when the gun is opened. Now, to remove the barrels - under normal circumstances when you remove the forend, the pin springs forth from the knuckle. Internally, what has happened is that the cocking linkage has disengaged from the barrels, so now when you open the gun the barrels rotate much farther down than normal and just fall off the gun. The situation you are having is most likely that the cocking linkage is not fully disengaging the barrels. You can verify this by the following: Dry fire the gun, remove the forend. Open the gun up fully. If the barrels come to a stop and don't come off, close it up again and dry fire it again. If the gun fires, that means it re-cocked and the cocking linkage didn't disengage as it should have when the forend was removed, savvy?

The most likely cause for not disengaging is gummed up oil and grime. With the forend removed you can try spraying something like Remington Action Cleaner down into the action, and down the tunnel in the knuckle that the pin rides in. Soak it real good and set it aside with the gun resting vertically on the muzzles (stock up, so that all the crud drains out of the action and away from the wood). After a while, spray it good again and tap all around the action on the floor plate and knuckle with a plastic or rubber mallet. You are trying to jar the linkage free from the gunk so that the spring tension can fully disengage it. Give it a few solid whacks (within reason, of course). You can also try "flicking" the pin by depressing it and releasing it suddenly so that it snaps briskly when released. This should get your linkage freed up and disengaged. If not, repeat the whole procedure a few times (spray, soak, whack, flick, etc.). If it still won't come apart, the floor plate will have to come off, but that's something to avoid right now.

Jim

TARNATION !!! · 01-02-2010, 09:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jim Williams

...With the forend removed you can try spraying something like Remington Action Cleaner down into the action, and down the tunnel in the knuckle that the pin rides in. Soak it real good and set it aside with the gun resting vertically on the muzzles (stock up, so that all the crud drains out of the action and away from the wood).
Jim

This is wise counsel. Many stock heads have "rotted" over the decades due to becoming oil soaked. A thin film of oil on metal during reassembly after tear-down is not an issue but a few drops into the action every once in a while will flow under gravity and end up in the stock head when stored vertically butt down.
Jack

Rober McLemore · 01-02-2010, 05:41 PM

Jim - Thanks for all the advice. I did most of the first paragraph and after receiving your post did the rest. I thought something had gummed up and now I'm convinced. I'll try your paragraph 2 in the a.m. Hat's off to you for the great post.

Jack - Yeah, know what you mean. Many years ago I had an Ithaca which had a lot of weak wood behind the receiver due because of too much oil over the years. Eventually, I couldn't shoot it any more.

Thanks for all the great advice. I'll post follow ups as I try to "de gunk" it tomorrow.

Cheers,
Robert