Going Beyond the Owner’s Manual With the Centurion Coach Gun

In retrospect, the error was understandable. From three feet away, this 12-gauge double with twin triggers, 20-inch cylinder-bore barrels, and exposed hammers might have misled anyone. It looked like it would be right at home in the arms of an old grizzler riding shotgun on an overland stage heading out from Dodge City behind a hard-working team of six horses. But those coach guns didn’t have rebounding hammers. This one does. And those coach guns used blackpowder cartridges.

This one can, too, but this one can also function just as well on modern smokeless loads. A cowboy-action prospect? Yes, that’s the primary shooting discipline for which the Centurion Coach Gun, imported s International, Inc. was designed. Other uld be home-defense and short-range hunting, where its 3inch chambers could provide extra assurance for meat on the table after along, cold hike in the woods. You may have noticed already that no schematic accompanies this writeup. The reason why is that none exists.

What appears in the owner’s manual is a blurry photo of individual parts with not all parts included. In many cases, this lack of quality graphics has eliminated a gun from coverage here. This gun is the rare exception. First, it is a simple Anson & Deeley-style side lock. I felt it could be approached with additional descriptive photos supported by expanded and an equally descriptive text.

In fact, I believe in this case that this approach will serve to inform you as well as our normal procedure of going through disassembly/reassembly by part number on a clearly reproduced exploded drawing. Field Stripping Push in the lock button on the Centurion’s forend. Pull the forend down and away from the receiver. Grasp the comb of the butt stock, and push the locking lever to the right. Open the action by tipping the barrels down.

Unhook the barrel lugs from their cross pin, being careful not to damage the lugs. In this state, the gun can be generally cleaned and lightly lubricated. Before going further, gather up the following tools: a 1/8-inch drift punch with parallel sides, two needle-nose vise-grips with duct tape attached to their jaws, a #300-2 and #210-2 Mag- Na Tip Slim Bit (from Brownells), and your roll-pin punches. Now measure the slot in the firing-pin bushings (see photo) and cut a notch in a spare, flatblade screwdriver.

You’ll be using it

as a spanner to undo the bushings, so make sure the notch is deep and wide enough to fit over the visible portion of the firing pins. How exactly you cut the notch is up to you. We do recommend you harden the finished product with Kasenit, however. Those bushings can be set in pretty tight. Detailed Disassembly As you go though this, keep in mind that certain components here are not interchangeable. For example, the firing pins; you can’t switch the right one with the left one.

The same is true of the hammer-spring struts, the sideplate assemblies, and the hammers. Your starting position is looking down on the shotgun, and you begin with the right sideplate. You can’t miss that big-headed screw staring back at you. (I have no idea why these star-slotted screw heads show up as often as they do on imports.) All but one of the slots is too narrow and shallow for a screwdriver to grab, and that one calls for a 300-2 bit like the one mentioned earlier.

You’ll be using that bit more than once with the Centurian Coachgun. Read through "Reassembly Tips" before disassembling the locks for a trouble-saving shortcut and study the interfaces of the tumblers (A) and sear (B). The arrows indicate the tumbler screws. A B The screw I’ve been telling you about runs clear through to hold both sideplates on the receiver. There are two ways to get those sideplates off.

The first is to completely back out the screw, then tap the front of the receiver with a hammer handle or a rawhide or wooden mallet to loosen the plates’t he same way you would with an S&W revolver. The second is to use the Civil-War soldier’s approach. Partially undo the screw, strike it lightly to jar loose the opposite plate, back the screw all the way out, and then tap the receiver to free up the right-hand plate.

Whichever way you loosen them, both plates are lifted at the rear and pulled out toward the butt end of the shotgun. (Where the sideplates are joined to the receiver, by the way, can have very sharp edges. Be careful you don’t slash a fingertip or two when working with them.) Now turn the gun upside down. A Phillips-head screw secures the trigger guard. Back it out and give the guard a 90-degree turn. Presto…the rear tang screw is now revealed. Remove it and look forward of the trigger.

You’ll spot two more of those star-crossed screws. The #300-2 bit fits them; take them out. Position the gun on its side. Just under the top lever where the sideplates once lived there’s a 1/8-inchdiameter pin. Drift it out all the way, grasp the buttstock, and wiggle the trigger plate free. The plate’s a press fit in the receiver. A certain amount of controlled tugging may be necessary to free it. And a small amount of grease applied to the plate edges can ease future disassemblies.

The receiver’t op lever still attached’is about to be denuded. To the left rear of the receiver, under the tang, is what appears to be a large slotted pin (.310-inch diameter). It’s really a screw. Under it is the toplever plunger and return spring. Keep the latter two in mind when you remove the screw or you’ll face searching your shop for an escaped spring and plunger.

Assuming that is not your fate, lift out the top lever, tilt the receiver up, and push the locking bolt to the rear (if it has failed to slide out on its own). Grab the spanner you made and remove the firing-pin bushings, firing pins, and springs. Remember, the pins are not interchangeable. Whence they came out is whence they have to go back in. Both sideplates are disassembled in the same manner. Before going ahead with them, memorize the interfaces between the sear, tumblers, and

Use nothing except a rollpin punch to remove it. hammer. If you have a short memory, study the photos. Okay, here we go. Cock the hammer. This causes the hammer spring to compress and the tail of hammerspring strut to protrude from its hole in the strut stud. Lock onto the tail with a set of vise grips. Notice how there are no leaf springs to deal with here? Well, coil springs can be just as pesky, but I’ve come up with away of handling them. I’ll get into it later on. Meanwhile, the hammer remains cocked.

There are three small screws associated with the tumbler/sear assembly. The two identified in the accompanying photo secure the tumblers. The third is the sear pivot. The tumbler screws come out first. When you remove the sear pivot, beware of the sear spring. There’s nothing holding it in and it can easily join the lever plunger and return spring among the lost. For the hammer screw, use bit #300-2 again, and the hammer comes off next.

A little encouragement maybe required to separate the tumblers from the hammer boss. This can be provided by inserting your 1/8-inch punch from the hammer side of the plate, positioning it against the tumblers, and tapping them off the boss. So much for the receiver and sideplates. The triggers are retained by a roll pin that drifts in either direction. The extractor is held in by a small screw located between the barrel lugs. Remove the screw and you can remove the extractor.

The forend iron is fastened to the wood by two screws. One is slotted (#210-2 bit); the other is Phillips head. Once they’re out, the iron can be lifted off. With it will come the forend latch and push rod, both retained by nice, normal, deeply slotted screws. The loose block at the rear of the forend is held in place by a roll pin. There’s no need to remove it unless it must be replaced. Reassembly Tips: Only One Real Surprise The surprise can come during the reinstallation of the top-lever spring screw.

Don’t over tighten it; you’ll restrict movement of the lever and the gun won’t open. As for the rest of the job, lock a sideplate bottom-side up between padded vise jaws. The crescent end of the hammer-spring strut wears a "dimple," and the dimple faces outward from the plate. If it doesn’t, you’re working with a strut from the wrong side of the lock It must not be overly tightened during reassembly. works.

Slide the very strong spring on the guide, capture the crescent end in needle-nose vise grips, and push the tail of the strut through its hole in the strut boss. Compressing the spring will be difficult. As soon as you see the tail emerge enough from the hole, latch onto it with the second pair of vise grips, and release the pair doing the pushing from the crescent end.

A factory technician told me he avoids all the struggles with spring compression during reassembly by leaving a pair of vise grips attached to the tail during disassembly. Knowing this ahead of time and having no great desire to get into the twin-pliers ambi-

dextrous exercise, I opted to dodge the issue entirely. I drilled a #55 hole in the tail of the strut, after cocking the hammer early on in disassembly. I inserted a .05 hex key in the hole, and released the hammer. The spring remains compressed, the strut remains AGA Corner American Gunsmithing Association News 2004 ESPN Great Outdoor Games Head to Madison.

The 2004 ESPN Great Outdoor Games presented by Dodge head to the Midwest this month, with ESPN announcing that Madison, Wisconsin, will host the outdoor challenge for the first time. The Wisconsin Sports Development Corporation, a non-profit organization that helps develop sports tourism in the state, courted the Games for three years. At last year’s Games, Wisconsin had the most competitors, with 20 athletes in Reno.

The fifth annual Great Outdoor Games will again feature the nation’s best shooting-sports athletes matching up in 16 events across four sport disciplines, including action-oriented and colorful rifle and shotgun competitions developed by the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF). Since the games first began, NSSF has developed attached to the sideplate, and disassembly proceeds without concern for future angst. The tumblers and their screws are next to go back in.

These are followed by the sear, and you’ll want to apply a dab of grease on the end of the sear and managed the rifle and shotgun events. NSSF helps select competitors, design courses of fire, and supervises the range and competition to ensure safety. The shooting events, created with television audiences in mind, area demanding mix of physical and psychological challenge.

The event, which runs from July 8th to 10th, includes one-of-a-kind, head-to-head competition in timber and target events, sporting dog, and fishing. While the free event entertains large crowds on site, the ESPN Great Outdoor Games also draws a worldwide tel tion can be found at The eat Outdoor Games held in Reno-Tahoe attracted an on-site audience of more than 60,000. Last year’s Games were broadcast into 80 million homes around the world on ESPN, ESPN2, and ABC.

Left top: The forend iron, shown here, is held to the wood by two screws. One is a slotted head requiring a thin bit. The other is a Phillips head. Left bottom: The locking bolt (arrow) can be seen here in the receiver. When the top lever is removed, the bolt will slide out to the rear. spring. It helps it stay put. When replacing an assembled sideplate in the receiver, the end away from the sear goes in first. The other end is lowered to its cutout in the wood, and the unit is gently tapped down to be flush.

Don’t get your lock-plate screw and tang screw mixed up. They look very similar, but the head of the lockplate screw is flat underneath, and the under side of the tang screw is conical. A final note: When you reunite the receiver to the stock, cock the hammers. You know, I like that idea of drilling a hole in the hammer-spring strut so much I think it should be done during manufacturing. I’d like to pass the idea along to Turkey’for a nice fee.

But, of course, Marlin, S&W, Ruger, and many others have been doing it for years. I