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Thread: Contender trigger safety

  1. #1
    Boolit Master
    historicfirearms's Avatar
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    Mar 2011
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    Contender trigger safety

    I've read everything I could find online about adjusting the trigger in a Contender. My trigger is 1.5lb with just a bit of creep, and I'm happy with it, except I'm not sure its "safe". With the grip off and hammer cocked, if I give it three sharp hits with a plastic mallet to the grip stud the hammer will fall. I can't get the seer to release no matter how smartly I shut the barrel. So my question is, is this gun safe as is? I'm thinking if the gun were dropped with a cocked hammer it could go off. How many hits with the plastic mallet would you consider safe? I'm thinking I probably went too far with the trigger spring.
    I was a dog on a short chain.
    Now there's no chain.
    Jim Harrison

  2. #2
    Boolit Grand Master
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    If it goes off with anything but an intentional trigger pull, it's unsafe.

  3. #3
    Boolit Master Boolit_Head's Avatar
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    Unsafe if it drops when it receives a sharp blow. Think about what could happen if you dropped it and it went off?
    On every question of construction let us carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates, and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed.

    Thomas Jefferson, letter to William Johnson, June 12, 1823

  4. #4
    Boolit Master C A Plater's Avatar
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    When you adjust a trigger that light, a sharp smack to any gun with the safety off can cause it to fire. With a Contender the safe thing to do is to not cock the hammer until you are ready to shoot. This kind of firearm requires one to use the safety between your ears.

  5. #5
    Boolit Grand Master Tatume's Avatar
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    You can still drop the gun even if you are ready to shoot. The trigger is unsafe.

  6. #6
    in Remebrance
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    There was an episode a while back where a fellow had a Contender, loaded, in a carry case, in his vehicle. It fell out on the driveway, went off, killed him graveyard dead. Don't know any details. Use the safety between your ears. GW
    "If you can walk with crowds and keep your virtue,
    Or walk with Kings, nor lose the common touch,
    Yours is the earth and everything that's in it,
    And, which is more, you'll be a man my son!" R. Kipling

    "Brother to a Prince, and fellow to a pauper, if found worthy." Kipling

  7. #7
    Boolit Grand Master Tatume's Avatar
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    Never trust a mechanical safety. Never trust a trigger. But is it using the "safety between your ears" to deliberately make a gun unsafe to handle?

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Abbreviations used in Reloading

BP Bronze Point IMR Improved Military Rifle PTD Pointed
BR Bench Rest M Magnum RN Round Nose
BT Boat Tail PL Power-Lokt SP Soft Point
C Compressed Charge PR Primer SPCL Soft Point "Core-Lokt"
HP Hollow Point PSPCL Pointed Soft Point "Core Lokt" C.O.L. Cartridge Overall Length
PSP Pointed Soft Point Spz Spitzer Point SBT Spitzer Boat Tail
LRN Lead Round Nose LWC Lead Wad Cutter LSWC Lead Semi Wad Cutter
GC Gas Check