Rossi 92 feeding problem

[Dales66Ford]

Just got my 92 357 stainless, love the way it looks and feels.  It doesn't want to feed 357's.  I have not tried 38's yet though.  The round gets picked up from the tube fine, but when the round start to go into the chamber, they get hung up after a third of the way in.  The round is still at an angle and seems like the rim needs to be higher for proper feeding.  If I angle the muzzle down about 45 degrees, it seems to feed fine.  Is this just something that needs to be worked out through firing/breaking in or something that can be an easy fix?

[temmi]

Call Steve
 
http://stevesgunz.com/
 
 
Snake

[stodolc]

I had the same problem. I took it to a gunsmith and he told me that the gun is designed to shoot round nose bullets only. I have not tried it yet but it does make sense.

[Mikey]

Stodic:  not the case at all.  The 92s today will cycle semi-wadcutters and rnfp just fine.  My Rossi 92 cycles 357s and 38s each as easily and they do not hang up.
Dale:  one cause of your hang-ups could be the particularload you are using.  The overall cartridge length on some of the 357 slugs may be just a hair too long and casue the cartridge to jam about midway into the chamber.  You did not say what 357 load it would not chamber or how many you tried.  Are these handloads or factory loads, jacketed or cast. 
I load and shoot 200 gn swc slugs in my 38s and 357s.  Unless I slightly crimp the case mouth over the leading band on the slugs, the 357s are a tad too long.  Nary a sweat in the 38s. 
I would look to your ammo first, then call Steve at Steve's Guns if you can't get things to work right.  HTH.

[yukondog]

Had the same problem with my 454 it's COL sensitive. 45 LC it shoots with no problem.

[Dales66Ford]

tried multiple brands in 158 gr JSP.  Also tried 38 RN.  No dice.  The problem seems to be that the rim of the round is not coming up high enough to have the round "level" with the chamber.  It gets jammed about a third of the way in at an angle.  Called Rossi and they are wanting me to send it back to them.  Oh well, hopefully it will be right when I get it back.  Thanks for the help.

[Jeff H]

Mine did this and after cycling many, many dummies through it and watching everything that was going on, I found that I had to clean up the grooves in the guide rails on each side of the receiver.  The grooves are what the rim rides in as the cartridge moves slightliy forward and then up/forward (diagonally) toward the chamber as  the bolt pushes it forward.
 
Prior to that, the drag of the rim on the very rough lifter (carrier?) was causing the cartridge to try to enter the chamber with the nose too low.  I polished the trough or top side of the lifter and that problem went away but then the rough grooves in the guide rails took precedence with their own probelms.
 
Where the grooves' horizontal portions meet the diagonal portions, there was a ridge of metal and a point left over from the machining which had to be "softened" a little.  As the rim hit that intersection, the nose of the cartridge would tip up because the rim was still too low at that point along its horizointal travel.  Putting a bit of a radius at the intersection (and polishing it) allowed the rim to start moving UP sooner as it was moving FORWARD and solved that problem.   There's not a lot of metal tp remove, so it's a fit/try, disassembly/reasse,bly process which can take some time.  The rails can be removed without complete disassembly though.  Makek sure you keep them even (symmetrical) to one another.  Mine werent from the start and still are a little off but not enough to casue problems - just try not to make it worse as you work.
 
At the top of the feed rails, these grooves are visible opposite one another, where the rim pops free of the guides.  Pushing the rear edge of the grooves at this point BACK, toward the rear of the receiver allowed a longer COAL.  I did not gain a lot in COAL, but I did at least get it to where it would feed correct COALs.  It still willl not feed anything unusually long but the nose shape of the bullet has a lot to do with that anyway so playing around with bullet shapes and COAL can help too.  This is where a LEE factory crimp (the RDO version will not re-re-size your bullets) comes in handy.  If you seat deeper, pay attention to powder charges.  You may have to bacjk off a smidge.

[mattmillerrx]

I did not have this issue.  However, I did an action job on mine and it is super slick now.  During my research for the action job I found this to be a common problem and it can be corrected with an action job.  It has been awhile, but I believe this issue is due to the ejector


I dug up some of the links I still had from doing this.  I enjoyed doing it and learned a few things....or you could just send to stevesgunz. 


http://www.leverguns.com/articles/taylor/field_strip.htm
http://marauder.homestead.com/files/Rossitune.htm
http://www.hobbygunsmith.com/Archives/Oct03/FeatureProject.htm
http://marauder.homestead.com/files/RossiDis.html
http://marauder.homestead.com/Rifles.html

[finisher]

Jeff H, is right on with his assessment I think. I bought one of these in 357 years back when they had the little puma medallions on the side. Got it for $230.00 back then. The store owner had purchased about a dozen and sold about four before customers started coming in with complaints.


Typically these complaints were rough action, and feed problems. Rossi did not have the customer service then that they do now so the shop owner took it upon himself to help his customers by breaking down the rifle and doing a fairly extensive amount of meticulous clean up work with a fine file.


Rossi is notorious for their rough finish work, but once such love has been applied to these lever rifles, they soon become the favorite of many as was mine. I was lucky in the fact that the shop owner had taken it upon himself to pre polish the rest of his stock and by the time I bought mine it was smooth and reliable with all the standard factory loads that I used. Always had problems with reloaded 38s with flat points (I do think think that OAL is the main issue though).


But with 357s, never a problem.


Also, do not attempt to disassemble your 92 if you are not already proficient with this model. It's reassembly is not for the novice.

[Dales66Ford]

To give an update, I ended up sending the rifle back to Rossi.  I figured I had not owned it even 3 days, I wasn't going to chance goofing it up.  I got the rifle back 3 weeks later and it feeds 38's like butter and 357's as long as I don't cycle it slow.  I appreciate the input none the less.  I just have to put a taller front site on it, which they just sent me yesterday.  I already have StevesGunz safety plug peep site on it.  Have to get back out to the range to see if the taller front site is needed now that I changed the rear.  It was hitting about a foot high with 357's at 50 yds.  Also have to see what I can do with the safety plug peep site, the base moves a bit more than I like.

[Cuts Crooked]

  I got the rifle back 3 weeks later and it feeds 38's like butter and 357's as long as I don't cycle it slow.

Dale,

I have two Rossi 92s One in .45 and one in .357. And I have handled and worked on a few others. I used to do the CAS thing a lot and learned to do action jobs on them for that sport. It's my opinion that they all prefer to have the action cycled with a bit of "authority". IE: fast!!!!

(Hmmm....just realized how old this thread is. If you stop back, let us know how the thing worked out fer ya)

[oldhunter]

I have owned my 92 for over a year but quickly discover that you can't baby the cycling when levering in a fresh cartridge.  This rifle as with many levers should be cycled firmly and briskly and unless there is a problem with gun, it should cycle just about all ammo.