Colt woodsman sear problem

[Hagar1]

Back in the 1950's my dad bought a Colt woodsman. He didn't like the trigger pull and tried to polish the sear and he took too much off. The pistol was unsafe to shoot and he put it away and never did anything with for the rest of his life. I ended up with it when he passed. It took me a long time to find another sear for it. I bought one from a guy online who said he was a Colt dealer long since retired and that the sear was a new Colt made part. I finally got around to installing it and found for one thing that it was about .005" wider than the original sear and fit too tight to function.
I filed the new sear down to the same width as the old part, working both sides down evenly and it now moves freely like the original. However the it would not release the hammer when the pistol was reassembled. I discovered that the trigger bar now does not move far enough up on the rear face of the sear to make full contact with it and it slips off when the trigger is pulled.
When I apply upward pressure on the trigger bar it will move far enough up and the hammer will release when the trigger is pulled. I can feel resistance when manually pushing the trigger bar up.
Does anyone have any experience with this problem? I thought that maybe I need to file the rear face of the sear off a little, but don't want to ruin a part that took me years to find.
I thought also that it might be a sear spring tension problem, The hammer will release when I apply pressure on the sear from inside the magazine housing. I hope that someone on this site has had a similar problem and can tell me how to fix it. The pistol as a result of being stowed away in a drawer for 60 years has has very few rounds fired thru it and I'd like to change that.

 

[Jim Watson]

Numrich still has sears for the Woodsman.
http://www.gunpartscorp.com/Products/184940A.htm

 

[Old Fuff]

Colt made some parts oversized in some dimensions so that the final assembler could fit them to each individual frame/gun. This is a long-winded way to say that parts in older Colt's are not supposed to be a drop-in sort of thing.

Be aware that most of the parts at Numrich were salvaged from broken guns, and it probable a sear was fitted to another pistol. That being the case it might, or might not work in another one. When ordering parts specify "new" if that's what you want, but if they have such expect it to be expensive.

If all else fails, you might check with Colt's customer service department to see if they still work on them.

 

[Taurus 617 CCW]

I would recommend taking it to a qualified gunsmith for fitting and installation. That way you can be sure that it will work right.

 

[Jim Watson]

Yup. I wish I knew a knowledgeable Woodsman gunsmith to recommend.