What is the advantage to a one piece firing pin? Should I get one?

Clayton

Assuming you are speaking of Marlin rifles? The advantage claimed is only for doing fast shooting in Cowboy Action style shooting. It is supposed to make the action operate more smoothly. For normal target shooting and hunting there is no advantage, but rather one great problem, and that is they defeat an important safety feature designed into the rifle. They will allow the gun to possibly fire without the bolt being completely locked, particularly if a Wild West Happy Trigger has been improperly installed also and the lever doesn't have to be held tightly closed to pullthe trigger.

Don't tamper with any safety feature of any gun except for use in special and controlled situations!

I would not do it. With the two piece safety and the rifle on 1/2 cock and your are going through some brush and snag your rifle and something comes up against the firing pin it wont discharge...but with a one piece it sure could. There is no way I would have a Marlin rifle for general use with a 1 piece firing pin.

Thanks for the info. Would a reduced power main spring without a one piece fireing pin be safe. Would it cause a situation where it may not cause the primer to fire every time?

What is it that you are looking do?

I don't know about the cowboy action thing but if you want to "accessorize" your Marlin for hunting and target shooting, look at the Wild West trigger and some good sights.

Thanks for the info. Would a reduced power main spring without a one piece fireing pin be safe. Would it cause a situation where it may not cause the primer to fire every time?

A reduced power main spring can always give a greater chance of misfire. So can a hammer extension.

Competition gun - pimp it up however you like. Hunting gun - must have reliability, and safety as well.

I wouldn't bother, but I hunt with my guns. A trigger job will do what a weaker mainspring will do, without misfires. Might cost more, but I want my gun to go bang when I pull the trigger.

A one-piece firing pin has no place on a hunting rifle, and I am highly skeptical as to whether it really does anything for the competitive shooter that's worth the sacrifice of a safety feature. Lightening a mainspring, properly done, can give some small improvement in smoothness and trigger pull, but it is also awful easy to get it too light and compromise reliability.

If a better trigger is what you're after, you have two choices -- have someone who KNOWS what they're doing work the tigger over for you, or purchase and install the Wild West replacement trigger. The cheapest alternative -- and in the long run, the one least likely to cause any problems -- is to get accustomed to the trigger you have.

On the newer marlins you have the two piece pin, the hammer block safety, the half cock, and of course the trigger block to prevent discharge when the lever is not closed. My 1949 marlin has half cock, one piece firing pin and me handling it. I has a reworked 24oz trigger, and a complete action job including reduced hammer spring (Factory second notch for target shooting) for hunting I simply put it in the fwd notch. The good old days when, the world wasn't out for a free ride by lawsuit. The advice you have recieved is well to be heeded, the trigger should be reworked by a competent person knowing what they are doing. The reduced power mainspring can be shimmed back to hunting strength with #10 washers or by putting back the OEM spring, the one piece firing pin can also be replaced by the OEM. So all of the mods you want can be done safely and returned to OEM for hunting. Sans the trigger job, for hunting I'm mindful of what I do. I do it safety first always.

A reduced power main spring can always give a greater chance of misfire. So can a hammer extension.

Competition gun - pimp it up however you like. Hunting gun - must have reliability, and safety as well.

I wouldn't bother, but I hunt with my guns. A trigger job will do what a weaker mainspring will do, without misfires. Might cost more, but I want my gun to go bang when I pull the trigger. .

Mike,

I'll second the motion on the reduced power hammer spring. Last week I installed them on two Marlins; a 336/.35 Rem and an 1894/.44. The hammer drop sounded weak so I chambered and fired empty brass with primer only. Fired is the wrong word because the .44 would fire after three successive hammer drops and the .35 never did fire.

Needless to say, I removed them and reinstalled the factory springs. Same thing for the lever lock spring that comes with the kit. It was too weak.

There is a spring kit for the Browning A-Bolt that works and works well. Timney makes a 2-spring kit that is the best thing that an A-Bolt owner can do for a good trigger pull. The lighter of the two is far too light for a hunting rifle. I tried it first then removed it and installed the heavier spring. Heavier is really the wrong word because trigger pull is about 2.5 lbs. The lighter spring had to be under 1 lb. Great for a varmint gun.

My next project is a spring kit for my Browning Hi-power. It is right here on the bench and ready for installation. Anything I should know before I start?