i recently bought a pretty beat up but straight shooting jc higgins model 20. did some research on it and found out it was made in 1948.
the wood was pretty rough so i disassembled it so i could sand the wood down and make it pretty again. i ran into a problem though, while trying to take the action off it felt like there was spring tension on it somewhere. i watched a video of a kid taking his apart and his action slid right off of the magazine tube. so i used a little more force and now the action is stuck on the mag tube. the arm coming off of the action is not stuck on anything i can still move that a little i think the problem is on the mag tube. ive soaked it in pb blaster for half a day and even hit it with some heat and nothing i do will make it move very easy. i got the forward stock off and redone, everything is ready to go back in but cant to anything till i free up the action. i used a strap wrench to try and unscrew the mag tube and it will not budge. im out of ideas. from what i can see there shouldnt be anything holding it in there and im about ready to give and take it to a gunsmith but im a little poor lol so im trying to avoid that. any ideas or advice would be a big help. thanks in advance.
