Colt 1877

I recently had the opportunity to service an original Colt Model 1877, a double action .38 Long Colt revolver dubbed the "Lightning." This particular piece was manufactured in 1902 and arrived in fairly decent shape but wasn’t functioning properly. When the gun was cycled in double action the cylinder would start turning as it should with the hand but then the bolt would disappear or jump back, causing the cylinder to drop backwards.

Continuing with the double action cycling, the hand still pushed the cylinder up but the cylinder bolt would not lock into the cylinder lock notches as the hammer would fall. So, the gun was out of time. I also found that the trigger would not return after being pulled back either in double or single action. Finally, the hammer would not cock or stay cocked when pulling it back. I was well aware of other gunsmith’s reluctance to work on this particular revolver, mainly due to its intricate design.

Being Colt’s first double action gun, I wanted to see just what went wrong with it and decided to have a try. I began by going through my extensive library of service manuals, gun books, Colt literature, and my gunsmith school files from my days attending Trinidad State College. I happened across a service manual I purchased years ago entitled Troubleshooting the Colt Lightning—Model 1877 Double Action Revolver by Clifford W. Mills.

This ended up being the only source manual I could get my hands on to get me up to speed on the 1877 design. The manual provides an in-depth history of Colt’s first double action revolver as well as great detail about troubleshooting it. While it has lots of great information, however, have it did not answer a few of the problems this gun was experiencing. I began with a complete disassembly so as to inspect the inner workings for missing, damaged, worn parts.

The gun had been taken apart a number of times as evidenced by the burred screw heads all over the gun, something I hate to see on any gun let alone a classic like this old Colt. For disassembly instructions, the manual walks through the entire process. The M1877 breaks down like most single action revolvers. Remove the cylinder and cylinder pin first, remove the grips, back strap, mainspring, then the trigger guard, and you are in the gun. The revolver was very dirty and sticky and needed a deep cleaning.

I removed the sear, hammer, then the sear/bolt spring, trigger/hand assembly, and the trigger return spring to complete disassembly. It’s important to note which side the trigger return spring goes up. With the gun apart, I deep cleaned it, checked the roller bearing on the bottom of the trigger, lightly oiled the working parts, and reassembled it to get a test in a clean state. The trigger return spring had a fracture and was not reintroduced to the gun.

The gun was function tested and still had the same performance problems so replacement springs were ordered to see if that rectified the issues but the only thing new springs corrected immediately was trigger return functioning. The timing was still off and the hammer still would not stay cocked when pulling the hammer back single action.

I studied the gun to see how all of the internal parts worked together and found the cylinder bolt to be in good shape when using my The 1877 disassembles like many single action revolvers. finger as a spring. Anew cylinder bolt/sear spring was installed and I quickly found that by shortening the cylinder bolt leg on the spring about 1/16" caused the bolt to work correctly, fixing the double action timing and insuring positive lockup when pulling the trigger through.

This also was true of the lockup during single action, with the exception of the hammer not locking up with the sear. With the first two problems resolved, it was time to determine why the hammer would not lock during single action cocking. At first I thought that the hammer notches were worn down or the sear engagement was too short, but with the sear/ bolt spring removed I was able to get positive lockup using my finger as a spring against the sear spring notch.

The difference was that I was able to provide the added spring length needed to engage the sear with the hammer notches with my finger. So, I tried another cylinder bolt/sear spring with a longer sear leg and found that it helped, however, the spring was getting lodged in the sear notch. A little opening up of the sear spring

notch so that it would not bind during single action cocking remedied the issue. The sear was removed, cleaned up, burrs were removed, and the gun was reassembled. This took care of all of the revolver’s issues and it worked as new. It should be noted here that if you fit up anew sear, be cautious about the length of the sear leg that is supposed to engage with the trigger spur.

If the The spring leg on top is the leg that controls the cylinder bolt and the spring leg below it controls the sear and fits into the sear spring notch. A longer finger on this spring at the sear notch engagement can correct sear-to-hammer notch lockup if that is the issue. Be sure the notch does not pinch the spring leg during action functioning. leg is filed too short, the sear leg will go too far past the trigger spur and will lock the gun up during single action.

The sear leg relationship with the trigger spur is critical in insuring that the trigger can lift the leg of the sear to release the hammer when pulling the trigger during single action firing of the gun. One thing I learned on this particular gun is to first start with clean- Far Get the right bits for the job. Note these frame screws are not interchangeable with the trigger guard frame screws, so keep them from getting mixed up. One spring controls both moving parts.

A small amount of the bolt spring leg removed from the new spring allowed the gun to be in time again. ing the gun, then trying new springs. From this point, you can inspect the working parts for any further replacement. This will keep the costs down for the customer and will let them know how far they really want to go with a repair as you will have a better assessment of the work needed to make the gun operate correctly again. This is much better than ordering in parts that you ultimately don’t need.

For example, why order in anew sear when you might be able to repair the original with a spring adjustment? An incremental approach also helps contain overall costs and the customer knows up front before turning a minor repair charge into a major investment, thus saving your time and the customer’s money. I took pleasure in the fact that this old Colt was back in service again. I guess you never know until you open up a malfunctioning gun to see what is wrong.

I certainly could have passed on this repair by citing the well-known verse of "this gun is known to be too intricate and most gunsmiths won’t work on them." You just never know until you look. AG