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Help with Hawken Hammer

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jgraham1

40 Cal
Joined
Feb 28, 2019
Messages
179
Reaction score
119
Location
Dayton, Wyoming
Hi,

I recently picked up a very nice Sharon rifle barrel Hawken that appeared in excellent shape. After receiving it, I noticed that the hammer does not land squarely on the nipple, but is in fact at a slight angle from the direct line of the nipple and also is not center on the nipple. One side of the hammer slightly rubs on the nipple, without a cap on it. I have removed and tightened all the screws on the rifle and this still occurs, although not as much. But the cap will definitely interfere with the hammer falling freely.

So my question is, who would your recommend to look at the rifle and work on squaring and centering the hammer strike on the nipple? I can send it out if needed, but I am located in the Springfield, VA area and was wondering if there was someone around in this area.

Thanks.

Jerry
 
I recently had to adjust a hammer for same issue. I wrapped it in leather and put it in a vice with plenty of material above the vice and a piece of soft wood on the side it needed moving to. Using another piece of soft wood and a mallet I lightly struck the hammer. Where you strike it will depend on what movement is needed. Then check alignment. If it didn't move revice it and strike a little harder. Check it. If it moved use same strike pressure. Do not try to move it in one strike it can break from too much at once.
If the amount of movement is great use a clamp to put pressure on it over several days. Clamp it with decent pressure and increase the pressure by 1/4-1/2 turn. 1/4 preferred. This like lightest strike pressure and will allow the metal to move at a minimum and allow it to move in a relaxed state.
If you need to open or close the angle (move the cup fwd or aft) the clamping method would be best and the addition of heat would be advised.
Don't be too concerned about hitting dead center. As long as it strikes flat and clears the hammer cup edge . Sometimes absolute perfection can result in a broken hammer. I only had to move mine about .080. Three level strikes were enough to put it very near center at which point I considered it good.
Another thing to look at is if the barrel tang is fitting level in the stock. If it is high on one side that lowering it will improve the hammer strike without causing odd barrel cant or at least improving it.
If it's low shim that side with same considerations.
 
Last edited:
This happens often with aftermarket barrels on the tc Hawken.
I've seen it happen with a green mountain barrel as well ...
Just put hammer in a good padded vise , and gently ( little at a time ) bend
and tweak it till it lands square on the nipple ....easy ..
 
Hi,

I recently picked up a very nice Sharon rifle barrel Hawken that appeared in excellent shape. After receiving it, I noticed that the hammer does not land squarely on the nipple, but is in fact at a slight angle from the direct line of the nipple and also is not center on the nipple. One side of the hammer slightly rubs on the nipple, without a cap on it. I have removed and tightened all the screws on the rifle and this still occurs, although not as much. But the cap will definitely interfere with the hammer falling freely.

So my question is, who would your recommend to look at the rifle and work on squaring and centering the hammer strike on the nipple? I can send it out if needed, but I am located in the Springfield, VA area and was wondering if there was someone around in this area.

Thanks.

Jerry
Before I would start trying to bend the hammer the first thing I would do would be to make a note of which way the hammer needed to move to get it centered on the nipple.

Then, (on a right hand gun) I would remove the lock and get out my small scraper. If the hammer needed to move to the left, I would lightly scrape the wood at the top of the lock mortise to remove just a little bit. This would be on the small surfaces that the lock plate rests against.
If the hammer needed to move to the right I would remove a little wood from the wood at the bottom of the lock mortise that the lock plate rests on.

Because the hammer is usually sticking out quite a long way above the mortise, it doesn't take much removal of the wood to make quite a big difference.
In fact, on some factory guns, I've found that just scraping off the finish coats that were applied in the lock mortise is enough to fix many of the alignment problems.
 
First, check if the lock is tight to the barrel with no gaps between the lock plate and the barrel. Even a tiny gap is enough to cause the alignment issue. Hawken rifles, especially those with tapered barrels, are difficult to set the lock in place since the stock needs to taper toward the wrist instead of parallel to the barrel. A correct stock taper will move the nose of the hammer off the center of the nipple. This is just one of the subtleties of Hawken rifle architecture that makes building a Hawken rifle more difficult than it would seem.
 
Before I would start trying to bend the hammer the first thing I would do would be to make a note of which way the hammer needed to move to get it centered on the nipple.

Then, (on a right hand gun) I would remove the lock and get out my small scraper. If the hammer needed to move to the left, I would lightly scrape the wood at the top of the lock mortise to remove just a little bit. This would be on the small surfaces that the lock plate rests against.
If the hammer needed to move to the right I would remove a little wood from the wood at the bottom of the lock mortise that the lock plate rests on.

Because the hammer is usually sticking out quite a long way above the mortise, it doesn't take much removal of the wood to make quite a big difference.
In fact, on some factory guns, I've found that just scraping off the finish coats that were applied in the lock mortise is enough to fix many of the alignment problems.

This is a method I have used . I have had to torch the hammer neck also. Zonies method is best if not familiar with some metallurgy.
 
I had a TC with a replacement barrel that the hammer was falling short and right on. Which is the reason I got it so cheap.
I carefully measured the misalignment and laid out the desired positions on a piece of plate with a chalk marker and the angles (extended) to get it where I felt it needed to be.
I torched the hammer until it was cherry (+) and carefully straightened the lower part of the S in the hammer, then sharpened the upper S tilting the hammer head back down until it fit the pattern. After cooling and trying the fit, it took one more heating to get the sideways yawl out of it and make it fit perfectly.
It takes patience and time to get them right doing this, but the end game was worth it.
 
All,

The lock plate fits perfectly into the opening of the stock, however, the mortise is the worst! Part of it missing, other parts too deep, poor glassing and etc. But because the lock plate is flush and sits straight and even in the stock, I worked on the hammer by slowing striking with a hammer as suggested. Now the hammer appears centered and squared up. Next step is to strip the lock, build up the mortise with glass bedding, properly refit the lock in the mortise and then glass bed the lock to the correct position. Should not be too difficult as the part of the mortise that is correct will be left alone and used as a guide. Got my 4th all planned out!

Jerry
 
All,

The lock plate fits perfectly into the opening of the stock, however, the mortise is the worst! Part of it missing, other parts too deep, poor glassing and etc. But because the lock plate is flush and sits straight and even in the stock, I worked on the hammer by slowing striking with a hammer as suggested. Now the hammer appears centered and squared up. Next step is to strip the lock, build up the mortise with glass bedding, properly refit the lock in the mortise and then glass bed the lock to the correct position. Should not be too difficult as the part of the mortise that is correct will be left alone and used as a guide. Got my 4th all planned out!

Jerry
TOUCHDOWN! Sounds like you have your gameplan in place. Please take pictures as you go. I have one I am going to need to do some rebuilding on and would love to see how you go about this.
 
Okay,

Did not mean to ignore everyone, but I have been working steadily on this project since I started this thread. Seems that there is a lot more that needs to be worked on with this rifle. I am slowly working my way through each issue and taking photos, but I may not have this finished for a week or more. But I will update once I have everything worked out. Thanks.

Jerry
 
Sorry it took so long to report back but the initial job to center the hammer on the nipple turned into a real job! It seems that each time I went into work on the Hawken, I found another issue. And the pictures are not the best due to my phone being over 5 years old! I also did not photograph each step of the upgrade and repair.

Here is what I had to do:

1. Glass in the lock mortice as it looked like a hammer and chisel was used to route it out. You can see in the before and after pictures that there was no support for the lock and as you tightened the lock screw, the lock plate would bend in slightly. I built up the mortice to support the lock all the way around using Acraglass.
Mortice Before.jpg

Mortice After.jpg


2. Glass in the tang and barrel. Again, the inletting was terrible as the before and after pics show. Much of the glass already present had to be removed and redone, but I was able to full-length Acraglass the tang and barrel. Fit is nice and tight now.

TangBarrel Before.jpg

TangBarrel After.jpg

3. Also found that the wedge plates needed to be re-fit, another poor job of inletting. Sorry, but I have no pics of that. Got them inlet properly for a nice tight fit using Acraglass.

4. The ramrod guide was also cocked to one side, so I refit that and centered it properly using Acraglass. No pics of that either.

5. Removed the brass ramrod tip, only thing brass on the rifle and replaced with a steel one. No pics of that.

6. The buttplate inletting was poorly done as the pic shows. I built up the butt using glued in dowels and then used Acraglass on the butt to fit the buttplate properly. The new glass job allowed the butt to fit securely. Picture show after but before sanding it down.

Buttplate Before.jpg
Buttplate After.jpg

7. I replaced the lock plate screw, both tang screws and both buttplate screws.

8. A new front sight and rear sight were installed with new dovetails being cut. The front sight is a very nice Rocky Mountain blade and the rear is an adjustable Hawken made by L&R.

9. I bent the hammer to center the strike on the nipple and installed a musket nipple. The pic shows it in the padded vice with the wood and brass hammer used to slowly tap it to center.

Hammer.jpg

10. I browned all the new parts and those parts that were need. I stripped the stock of varnish and stain and used boiled linseed oil to finish it. Not sure why they used what looked like ebony stain originally as it covered the excellent walnut underneath that has lots of figure and tiger striping normally seen on expensive wood. Came out looking great.

11. Still considering installing a simple patchbox, steel Plains style with just a lid and no boarder, that I would brown. Not sure if I will. Stock is now drying and it should be put together in the next week or so.
 
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