Need advice! My Taurus is seizing, I'm baffled...

[soupah]

Hopefully the knowledgeable here can chime in and tell me what's up with my newish revolver. I've never had a revolver w/a problem before...

I bought a used Taurus md66 .357 a few months ago, but stupidly neglected to take it to the range right away for a test run. It was in pretty good shape, looked basically mint and like it'd been hardly fired. Timing and lockup seemed really good, so I wasn't in a hurry. Plus like I said I'd never had problems before w/wheelguns.

Yesterday I finally got a chance to fire it. I gave it a good cleaning beforehand, and loaded up some Winchester .38 LRN ammo and blasted away.

On SA, no problems. On DA, every 20 rounds or so, the trigger would bind up...it would go about 1/3 of the way back and no more. If I let the trigger go slack and then squeezed it again, it would work fine...but when it seized, you HAD to let the trigger go slack, you weren't able to force the hammer back with your thumb in SA mode, or get it to work by wiggling the cylinder gently. The only way to make it work was to let the trigger reset.

I took it home, gave it another cleaning, put a drop of oil in the pawl slot so it would lube up the action...no dice. It still binds, even when clean and no ammo in the cylinder...but still rarely, like every 20-30 trigger pulls.:banghead:

A gun store guy took a quick gander at it and said he thinks it's a linkage problem, not a timing/lockup issue. He advised oiling the action just a touch...which is what I did w/o luck.

What do you all think is going on? Is it worth fixing (I paid $250 for it) or should I just live with it? It's too late to return to the store and demand my money back, and I'd rather not send it in to Taurus. Is this a simple, common thing that can be easily remedied? HELP!

 

[Bboomer]

Sorry I can't be of any help but, I have seen a post on one of the many forums citing this same problem. Keep searching plus, I'm sure someone will chime in here.

GL

 

[soupah]

Thanks... it's tough to search for posts covering this particular problem, as many posts I've read seem to deal w/timing issues, which I don't think is the culprit here. Simply looking for the keywords "Taurus" or "revolver" and "problems/seizing/binding/jamming" haven't given me much relevant stuff either, so far. But I'm still hoping to find something...

 

[Colt46]

I've got the same problem with my M-94 .22

That coupled with a horrendous trigger pull allows me to bury it in the back of the safe and dream about turning it in for one of those gift cards that gun buyback programs often host.

 

[Steve C]

The gun is worth saving and probably has a minor mechanical issue. Best and least expensive bet would be to send it to Taurus for repair under their Life Time warranty. Check the Taurus website http://www.taurususa.com/, click "Customer Care" and follow their directions regarding the work order and shipping. Write a good letter describing the problem as you did in your post here.

Unless it is a stolen gun there's absolutely no reason not to send it to Taurus as their warranty follows the gun not the owner.

 

[soupah]

Wow, I didn't know about that warranty thing...thanks!

(I didn't want to send it in because in my experience company gunsmithing/repair always cost more $ than my local gunsmith)

 

[craig_o]

hope the warrantied repair works out for you... I'd hate to have any gun, especially a revolver, go to pot on me like that. spooky.

 

[Down South]

Same thing that I was going to suggest. Get hold of Taurus customer service and send it in on warranty. I hear their customer service is pretty good although I've never used it.

 

[tinygnat219]

Pull off the sideplate as well and look for metal shavings. I have had this happen in both my Model 905, and my Model 94. Take some compressed air and blow them out, oh yeah WEAR EYE PROTECTION when doing this. Then, pop some more oil in there. If the problem persists, send the gun and metal shavings to Taurus for fixing.

 

[Master Blaster]

Yesterday I finally got a chance to fire it. I gave it a good cleaning beforehand, and loaded up some Winchester .38 LRN ammo and blasted away.

On SA, no problems. On DA, every 20 rounds or so, the trigger would bind up...it would go about 1/3 of the way back and no more. If I let the trigger go slack and then squeezed it again, it would work fine...but when it seized, you HAD to let the trigger go slack, you weren't able to force the hammer back with your thumb in SA mode, or get it to work by wiggling the cylinder gently. The only way to make it work was to let the trigger reset.

Were you rapid firing in double action?
Were you letting the trigger go all the way forward every time?
It may well be that soemone lightened the trigger return spring, or you are short stroking the trigger, the trigger on any revolver must be returned all the way forward before you pull it again, or the gun will tie up. You cant return it halfway or most of the way like a semiauto.

Just a thought.

 

[Old Fuff]

When this jam occurs, does the cylinder start to revolve and then stop, or not revolve at all, even though the trigger starts back?

Can you duplicate the problem when the revolver is unloaded, or just when you are shooting it?

 

[jack the toad]

You might want to trade your south american S&W for a north american one.
just kidding.
Has anyone done any "action" work on it?

 

[SASS#23149]

I had a simliar problem with a Rossi revo,and the cure was to take off the sideplate and lube the trnsfer bar area.As I recall,the Tbar was riding on the main frame of the gun,and when dry would create quite a bit of friction.
Hope you get it fixed,it's prolly something simple.

 

[vicspank]

I had a 651 that did that.I took the side plate off and cleaned the oil out.If the oil is to thick,{such as 3 and 1)or too much oil,it gets between the hand and the hammer and cozes a vacume which in return,makes the hand stick to the hammer.Did you ever try to pull 2 peices of metal apart that are saturated with oil?As they rub together it's almost like super glue.Once I took it easy on the oil,it ran like a charm
vicspank

 

[Waitone]

Second the transfer bar. In my case it seized up solid. Turns out the transfer bar broke in half and locked up the mechanism. Called Taurus and it made a round trip back to me in 7 days flat.

 

[scbair]

I had a M431 (.44 Special snubbie), "pre-lock" version that did the same thing. I removed the sideplate, applied liberal carb cleaner & compressed air, carefully re-lubed, and


traded it in when it kept locking up.

I have a newer (has the lock) M94 (.22LR) that's never exhibited this problem, so it's luck of the draw, I guess.

 

[mugsie]

Exact same problem with my Taurus - and how to fix it

I had the exact same problem with my Taurus wheelgun in 38, 851 series. I also had a problem with my Tracker in 357 as well! Talk about frustrating - both were purchased new. After much talking to Taurus (they were virtually zero help on the phone and were very hesitant to give any information at all! They seemed annoyed that I was even calling, which doesn't say too much for their customer representatives). So I sent my 38 back for repair. They told me, after just about 8 weeks, they had to replace the main spring. Since then it's worked perfectly. The Tracker was sent back some time thereafter because it too would hang up and I would be forced to actually move the cylinder by hand because it would bind and would not let me pull the trigger all the way in DA mode. Again, after 8 weeks they returned it with no paperwork or anything telling me what was wrong. I called them and the person I spoke to said "we replaced the missing part". What missing part I asked - I purchased this brand new and it fired fine for about 5 months. He refused to tell me - just kept saying "we replaced the missing part". When I started to get mad he then told me it doesn't say on the paperwork, it only says replaced missing part. So much for quality control I guess.

Both guns, after repair have worked fine. I like the feel of the tracker, and it's one of the most accurate guns I've ever owned. Same for the snubbie, which BTW is my carry gun. Both are fine now, but what got to me was Taurus is leaving it up to the consumer to do their quality control for them. That, and they have a really sh@#ty attitude when asked questions about my own gun.

So - the way to fix the problem, and you're not going to like this - is to send it back to Taurus. Prepare yourself for a two month wait, there's no getting around it. Once returned however, you should be good to go.

Final thought - while I'm always tempted by the low price of the Taurus line, as well as it's accuracy, I try not to put myself through that type of aggrivation again and now stick with Rugers for my wheel guns (of which I've got one shy of too many!).

Good luck and I hope you fare better than I did. Stay well and enjoy the holidays....

 

[Grandpa Shooter]

I have a stainless snubby which has had zero problems. My son has a stainless snubby in 38 spec. He has a problem with shooting it that sounds exactly like what you are describing. It tollk me forever to figure out what was happening since it never malfunctioned in my hands. Turns out he was creeping the trigger so slowly that when it should have broken over the sear it would get "right there" and park. If you let off it would reset and then if you pulled it through the break point it worked just fine. He started shooting it at 13 and got to be decent with it. Then he got bit by the semi-auto bug and totes my Firestar 9mm.

Try creeping the trigger and see if it doesn't do that to you too.

 

[Thumper5]

So - the way to fix the problem, and you're not going to like this - is to send it back to Taurus. Prepare yourself for a two month wait, there's no getting around it. Once returned however, you should be good to go.

I wish.

Sent my M450 Titanium .45 LC back to Taurus. Came back two months later with no indication of exactly what they did, but it worked fine for about 50 rounds.

Now it binds up again. Back to Taurus I guess.

This is getting old.

 

[Beerwolf]

Greetings, I have more taurus handguns than I should and 2 of them had the same problem. Check the gap between the cylinder and the barrel forcing cone, There should be approx. 3 thousandths of an inch gap there, any less and powder residue builds up very quickly and puts the stops to DA shooting.
I don't know why they do this but, a lot of new taurus revolvers I have looked at the cylinder and forcing cone are touching. Great for accuracy but not great for reliability. Gunsmiths around here charge $30-$40 to fix, or wait 2 months for taurus to repair. Good luck