Remington 700 safety hard to disengage??

I have a Remington 700 BDL 223 Rem. that my parents got me for my birthday and Christmas when I was a kid in 1989. . . . .wow I feel old! When they bought it, they bought it new. It's been a great rifle. However, over the last year I've noticed that the safety has been getting harder and harder to disengage. It's as easy as it was from day one to put it on safe. It's just disengaging it so I/we (as in my young son and I) can shoot it that's the problem. Now it's to the point where it's really hard and something needs to be done about it.

Have any of you had this type of issue with a Remington 700? If so, what did you do to fix it? Mine is all factory, no aftermarket parts have been added. I'd like to keep it that way. I had the trigger pull lightened a little bit in the mid 90's. That never effected anything that I could tell in the 17 or 18 years since I had it lightened.

Any thoughts or ideas?

Thanks, NYH1.

I took the safety apart and cleaned the little ball and the safety lever itself. I put it back together with a light coat of oil on it. It still the same as when I took it apart.

NYH1.

Is the ball supposed to stay in the hole with the large chamfer? Or is it supposed to go back and forth between that hole and the hole next to (without a chamfer) as the safety is engaged and disengaged?

Thanks again, NYH1.

I'll have a smith or my friend look at it before it go's back to Remington. In May I took my 7600 Carbine (for the second time) and my sons Marlin 336Y (little 12.75" stock, 16.25" barrel) back to Ilion. We're an hour or so from it.

They sent my 7600 back again saying it was "fine and in spec". It wasn't. I ended up taking it apart and fixing myself it with the parts Remington's customer service department sent me. Nothing was wrong with it. . . . . .but we'll send you parts to fix it!

They fixed the problem we were having with the 336Y, the front sight was canted to the 11:30 position. They put a new barrel on it. However, they created three other problems while they fixed it. 1- It was now splitting cases when we fired it. 2- It was firing 5 inches high at 25 yards with the rear sight at it's lowest position. 3- The front forearm was as loose as a pump shotgun. Their fix to this was send me a new forearm. You would think they would check these things out before sending it back. I dropped it back off at Ilion and told them I wanted a new rifle. They said yes. After the flooding is over in the Mohawk Valley, they'll send us a new rifle.

As you can probably guess I don't have any confidence at all in Remington's service and repair department. I think they're pretty much worthless. And I see no reason to send my Remington to Ruger to have them fix it.

NYH1

Reloadron, I looked at the link you posted. All those same parts in my rifle look to be in great shape. There is no rust at all, hardly any wear. I'm at a loss. My rifle was new in Dec. 1989. I think my parents had to order it to get by Christmas.

I can work the bolt with the safety engaged or disengaged.

NYH1.

I saw the Timney triggers that come with the safety that blocks the firing pin IIRC. I might look into replacing all ours with those when money allows. I have to get this one safely and correctly working for now though.

Thanks, NYH1.

I took all of the safety parts out of another one of my 700's and put them in my 223 that I'm having trouble with. It worked good as new with the other safety parts in it.

Then I put the all the safety parts from my 223 in the 700 that I took the safety parts out of. The safety worked. However, it didn't function the way it should have. I put all the parts back where they came from.

I'm going to get a Timney Trigger for my 700 that's giving me trouble. I didn't even bother putting the safety parts back in it. So it won't be taken out of the safe until the Timney is here for it.

Thanks for all the help, NYH1.