Heavy trigger pull on Ruger Single Six. How best to lighten it?

[Louis of PA]

My brother purchased my friend's Single Six, but the trigger pull is quite heavy. What's a good way to lighten it?
Thanks much

[n64atlas]

depends on how light you want it to be. If this is the 1954 you were selling for your friend, I would leave it alone as it is very collectable. If it is a later model, you can drop it around a pound by changing the hammer spring. This is not an easy job . If you want a lighter trigger than that, it takes the proper fixture to get the correct angles needed to get it below 4 lbs. I have two Ruger single actions in the shop right now. One came in, all aparts as the owner couldn't put it back together once he took off the hammer spring. It's trigger pull is 4.5lbs with a lighter hammer spring. This is a Blackhawk. The New model single six has a 5.5lb pull from the factory. Unless you want to invest $300+ in a fixture and prober stones, then learn how to use them, I would let a 'smith that has done many of these do the work. Never been easy to get parts from Ruger if you mess up. I've been doing triggers for over 25 years and have invested in these tools for my shop. I do have a FFL. One of my stones cost over $100 when new and it is only used on the final polish.

[musculus]

depends on how light you want it to be. If this is the 1954 you were selling for your friend, I would leave it alone as it is very collectable. If it is a later model, you can drop it around a pound by changing the hammer spring. This is not an easy job . If you want a lighter trigger than that, it takes the proper fixture to get the correct angles needed to get it below 4 lbs. I have two Ruger single actions in the shop right now. One came in, all aparts as the owner couldn't put it back together once he took off the hammer spring. It's trigger pull is 4.5lbs with a lighter hammer spring. This is a Blackhawk. The New model single six has a 5.5lb pull from the factory. Unless you want to invest $300+ in a fixture and prober stones, then learn how to use them, I would let a 'smith that has done many of these do the work. Never been easy to get parts from Ruger if you mess up. I've been doing triggers for over 25 years and have invested in these tools for my shop. I do have a FFL. One of my stones cost over $100 when new and it is only used on the final polish.

for heaven's sake, just REPLACE the hammer spring with a WOLFF 19 pound spring. Ruger's have HEAVY springs to overcome friction or parts.

1. You can SMOOTH out the engagement surfaces yourself (lots of stuff on the internet and youtube) or have a smithie do it for 30 bucks. This will not significantly improve/reduce the pull, but will clean it up a LOT.
2. THEN simply REPLACE the spring(s) (you should feel a significant improvement at 19 pounds yet still have total reliability even with hard primers). Again, LOTS of info on how to do this easily on the internet.

http://www.gunsprings.com/Revolvers/...3/mID52/dID228

[n64atlas]

The differene in trigger pull weight is a little over 1lb when just replacing the hammer spring with a Wolff 19lb spring. I just installed one on the Single Six that came into the shop.
The heavier spring that Ruger uses is fortotal relighablity. Has nothing to do with the friction of the parts. Ruger does polish the parts a bit and they will wear in, in time. All a trigger job is, is accelerating that wear.
A good lube will also make the trigger feel lighter.
Just polishing the internal parts, as said above, just makes it feel smoother. You can get these down to 1.5 lbs if you know how to change the angles and have fixture to keep everything square. I have seen more rounded edges and hammer push off on revolvers and pistols done by people who thought they could do a trigger job. Like I said, getting new parts can be difficut at times, besides having to wait to get them. Some parts are restricted to maufacturer install. Be careful, go slow and check often. You cane take off metal easier than put it back on. Buy a trigger pull gage to start, just to give you the current pull weight. Then start with the spring replacement. If you need to go lighter than that, then you will need to know how to take it appart and assemble it. Keep track of what screw goes where. A good way to do this if write it down or use a card with hole location and screw that went in there.

[da gimp]

if it is an old model Ruger, Ruger will not return the original parts with the gun. At one time they did, no longer & I'm not sure they'll sell the early style parts to anyone, gunsmith or not...

[Louis of PA]

Thanks to you all for your well informed advice. I've passed it along to my brother, John. We live not far from Newtown Square, where Wolff Gunspring is located, so he'll be talking to them about springs and also ask if they can recommend a gunsmith in the area.

Thanks again,
Lou Flanagan

[highplainsman]

Just got through doing a poor boys trigger job as posted on Jeff Quinns site. Will drop those trigger pulls way down and takes five minutes of your time. Take off grip panels and simple remove one side of trigger return spring from its location and allow it to drop down beside the hammer spring. Put grip panels back on and be pleasently surprised by your new trigger pull. I was about to spend some money on two recently purchased Ruger single actions and thought I would check it out on line before I did . Just google trigger pull single six and you will come accross an article by Jeff on his site and some others. I did both guns in about ten minutes. Since you are only messing with the trigger return spring the hammmer spring is not affected. I have been messing with ruger single actions for over fifty years and just now come accross this. Oh by the way all gun safty rules apply!

[aintright]

I'll second the poor boys trigger job. My uncle, my father and myself have shot single six revolvers and Blackhawks for years with these type of trigger jobs, they work great and none of us have ever had a malfunction of any type . And we have put alot of rds through our Rugers . Kenneth