This old Remington shotgun has lots of
problems, but they're all repairable, let me show you how. It's a model 1900
side-by-side made about 1904 and has seen better days. Collectors refer to this as
a KED grade. The "K" refers to the basic grade, the "E" indicates it has automatic ejectors, and
the "D" refers to the Damascus barrels, KED grade. We call this a numbers-matching gun which means
the serial numbers on the barrels receiver forend and many of the small parts all match. These
guns were hand fit during the manufacturing process and the serial numbers on the parts kept
them together. During my initial inspection, I discovered several problems. The forend won't
stay attached, the barrels are off the face, which means they aren't tight against the
receiver. Also one of the automatic ejectors doesn't work. It's problems like these that
let you know this gun saw a lot of hard use. The first problem to fix is the forend latch,
it's a small spring that secures the forend to the barrels and is referred to as a baker style
latch. Taking the forend off another Remington 1900 it's easy to see how the latch works, pretty
clever idea that was patented in the 1880s. I start by disassembling the forend, the
wood is held to the iron by two screws and a single cross pin retains the latch. The
pin is driven out with a small punch using a bench block for support. Since I have an
original latch to copy it functions as a pattern. I have a piece of 3/16" spring
steel flat stock which closely matches the thickness of the original latch. First I
need to determine the size of the cross pin hole. The pin itself is about a hundred
and five-thousandths, a #35 drill is a hundred and ten thousandths which is just large
enough to let the latch spring rotate freely After coating the steel with dykem, I scribe
the approximate width of the latch spring and the location of the cross pin hole.
An automatic center punch is used to mark the location of the hole. After center
drilling, I follow with the #35 drill. Next, I saw out the rough flat spring. Now it's a pretty
simple matter to file and forge the steel to the correct shape. I use a 10-inch second cut hand
file to remove the bulk of the material and establish the correct width. The next step
is to forge the front end a little wider. A torch is used to heat the
metal red-hot and a 24-ounce hammer provides enough power to upset the metal. After letting it cool, you can see that
we have the basic shape. Now I begin to file the latch to the correct taper, once this is
established the next step is to shape the curve. I have a small shop maid fixture that
would duplicate the original shape. Heat and careful use of a big hammer
forms the curve. The new latch spring is still rough and oversized but a bit of
filing will bring it to the final shape. Once all the shaping is complete, I
cut it to the correct length. Then install the new latch to make sure
it holds the forend iron securely, it snaps right on. Next I'll polish the
spring with the selection of abrasive paper finishing with 320 grit. A small file is used as
a backer. All polishing must be done lengthwise, any marks that go across the spring
may cause it to break at that point The latch still needs to be hardened and
tempered. For hardening, I heat the spring red-hot then quickly dunk it in quenching oil. Oil
is used rather than water as water will cool the part too quickly and may cause it to crack.
It's now glass hard so I need to temper it which will remove some of the brittleness, but
before the spring is tempered I need to remove the scale created during the hardening process.
It's pretty easy to temper the spring in nitre bluing salts. The salts are brought to about 600
degrees and the latch submerged, once the steel turns a nice blue color it's dunked in water.
Now we have a genuine working spring with a finished look. The finished latch is reinstalled
in the forend iron and the iron snapped back on. With the forend latch complete, the
barrels can now be put back on face. They should fit tightly against
the face of the breech and have a slight gap about the thickness
of a piece of paper at the bottom. This William Cashmore double made in England is
a great example. The barrels are tight against the receiver, and a three-thousandths feeler
gauge will just fit between the bottom of the barrels and the receiver. The latch was
repaired first as the forend iron needs to be attached during this process. As you can
see the barrels of this Remington 1900 are loose. A six-thousandths feeler gauge easily
slides between the barrels and the receiver. One old gun traders trick is to put a small
piece of paper or business card in the hook. This will temporarily tighten up
the gun but after a few cycles of opening and closing the barrels will
be loose again. It's something to be on the lookout for if you're inspecting an
old gun. Another trick is to upset or peen some metal on the hook. This is a sure sign
of an amateur repair and won't keep the gun tight for long. There are several correct
ways to put the barrels back on face. On some guns, a new oversized hinge pin can
be installed and the hook on the barrels fit to the new pin. Another technique is
to weld up the hook and refit it to the existing hinge pin. In addition, the Brits
used a process called shimming the hook, in which a piece of steel was dovetailed into
the hook and the barrels refit. I'm going to use a variation of shimming the hook using a
bit of modern technology. A couple of things the old-time gunsmith didn't have were modern
adhesives and ultra-thin steel shim stock. I'll glue the appropriate thickness of shim stock
to the hook using 680 green Loctite. Then I'll smoke the barrels back in just like
it's been done for over a hundred years. Before starting, I need to true up the face of
the receiver. This gun has a small burr at the corner which is easily removed with a fine stone.
I also polish the back of the barrels removing the light pitting, it's important to do this
step first before the barrels are put back on face. Abrasive paper around a file will do the job
nicely. I'm careful to keep the file flat against the back of the barrels. I only need to use 400
grit paper as any finer polish would be ruined when I fit the barrels to the receiver. Once I've
cleaned up the breech ends the barrels and forend iron are reattached. Even with cleaning up the
breech and polishing the back of the barrels, the six-thousandths feeler gauge is still
the largest that fits in the gap. I know the barrels need to be set back at least six
thousandths and a couple extra thousands will give me enough material to fit the barrels. I
cut a piece of eight-thousandths shim stock just slightly larger than the hook. Ordinary
scissors easily cut this thin material. Looks pretty good. Now high degreese both
the hook and the shim 680 green Loctite has a relatively thick consistency and fills
any small gaps. With both surfaces coated a short piece of half-inch dowel and the clamp
hold the shim tight against the hook until the Loctite cures. Once the Loctite is cured, the
excess shim stock is dressed down even with the hook. Notice I've removed the extractors they
should be out when fitting the barrels. smoke from a small lamp will show how much contact
there is between the hook and the hinge pin. We have almost full-contact. Smoke on
the back of the barrels will show where they are touching the receiver. Now when
I put the barrels on and try to close the action I can see metal will have to be
removed for the gun to close completely. Using a needle file I carefully remove the high
spots. These are indicated by shiny areas where the smoke has rubbed off. The process of smoking
and filing is repeated. After a few cycles, the barrels are making more contact but the top
lever is still well right-of-center. The gap at the water table is about seventeen-thousandths,
so plenty of travel remains to bring the barrels down and allow the lever to move closer
to center. A bit more work and the barrels fit tight against the receiver and I
have a small gap at the water table, now the barrels are back on face. All of the
file marks are polished out starting with 220 grit abrasive paper and finishing with 400. The
extractors are reinstalled and I make sure the gun closes with them in place. The last item
on the repair list is one of the automatic ejectors. Their purpose is to automatically
eject empty shells when the gun is open. The extractors are located in the barrels and
are hit by the ejector hammers in the forend, which are powered by small v-springs. In this
case, the right ejector needs to be repaired. I remove the broken spring during my initial
inspection, all the pieces are here so I've got a pattern to work from. This piece of spring
stock closely matches the thickness of the ejector spring. The first step is to bend the metal over
double to form the two legs of the spring. Using a torch I heat it red hot and bend at the mark.
The steel should be allowed to cool naturally as cooling it in water would harden it making shaping
difficult. The ejector spring is only about a hundred and seventy-thousandths wide, so I'll have
to cut the spring stock down to match the width. It's a simple matter to mark the new spring for
the correct width and file to the line. Now I need to taper the legs the first leg needs to taper
from about fifth-thousandths, all the way to the full thickness of the spring stock. It also tapers
in width down to about 125 thousandths. The second leg is formed the same way. However, there's a
little foot on the end that has to be filed in. Keeping the spring attached to the long piece of
stock, makes holding it in the vise much easier. An 8-inch file makes quick work of it. With the
legs tapered and shaped, I cut off the spring. Now we can bend the legs of the spring to match
the original and polish out all of the file marks. Here comes the fun part. The spring is heated
red-hot and quickly dunked in quenching oil, at this point it's glass hard. I need to temper
it which will allow it to flex and return to its original shape without breaking. First I remove
all of the scale from hardening, the nitre bluing salts are heated to about 600 degrees, and the
spring immersed. Once the steel turns a nice blue color it's dunked in water. I compress it
in a vise to make sure that I have a spring. Now it can be installed in the forend iron and the
forend reattached. once the gun is back together I test it with some dummy rounds, works like new.
I remember that guy! I used to love watching his videos. Thanks for posting!
This was great. I loved how thorough his explanations were. I have an older SxS that has an ejector gone bad as well and now I feel I can repair it myself because he walked me thru the whole process!
I'm Larry Potterfield, and that's the way it is!
Love this channel but the latest ones were barely a minute long. He is so thorough I love them.