Last fall I purchased a nice used CVA Kentucky percussion pistol in .45 cal.. The pistol shoots very well but the factory trigger is terrible! I never measured the trigger pull on it but it had to be 15 pounds or more. After showing the pistol to Waksupi at a rendezvous last fall and discussing what could be done about it I decided to try reworking the trigger myself.
After disassembling the pistol it was obvious why the pistol had such a hard trigger pull. When you look at the geometry of the original trigger design there is no mechanical advantage built into the trigger at all. The original trigger consists of a base plate, brass trigger, steel dowel pin and a claw shaped "keeper" that attaches to the inside of the trigger plate with a screw. Below is the original trigger group:
The next two pictures show the measurements of the trigger as pinned originally:
I stripped the trigger plate bare and made a cardboard pattern to test dimensions with. Using some scrap 1/8" mild steel I cut out a new trigger. After some clean up and shaping with a file and a bit of forging on the anvil to flatten the trigger shoe I had a fair trigger made. I used a piece of a finishing nail for the new pin.
Now all I needed to do was assemble it. I had used the pivot point of the locks sear bar as my location for my new trigger pin so drilling that hole was pretty easy to locate as the stock had a faint mark where the pivot screw lightly touch the lock mortise. I used a drill bit slightly smaller than the diameter of the finishing nail pin. Here is the final assembly of my new trigger:
I don't have a trigger pull scale but I would guess the trigger pull on the new trigger is somewhere between 2 and 3 lbs. A huge help and a pleasure to shoot now!
So, if you have a CVA with a similar trigger setup don't give up, they can be fixed with just a few hand tools.