Rossi safety causes confusion

[Picknlittle]

I was back out with my 12 y.o. nephew this past weekend doing a little deer huntin. We'd moved our blind and I was relocating some scent wicks, when nephew let's out this exclaimatory whisper "uncle stan! deer!

I turn around and here comes this lone doe across the open field straight for us.
I turn to Kendrick and ask, "bubba? why ain't she dead?,....shoot her!

He raises his Rossi sangle shot .243, places the dot on the sweet spot and pulls the trigger,.....gun goes "click", recocks hammer (deer now walking toward us), pulls trigger,....."click!" deer stops ten yards away,...he breaks down, checks primer,...unmarked, closes, cocks, ....."click!" Deer walks into woods.

Well, puzzled is only one of the words describing the expression on my face.

I take the gun and give it a good once over to find the safety was set to safe. Ok, so the gun shouldn't have fired, the safety worked, I get that. What I don't get is that the safety does not block or lock the trigger.

I'll admit to being a bit drifty, but when I forget to release the safety, I'm immediately reminded as soon as I try to pull the trigger,... it don't move! I release, reset sight pic, and pull boom. Let's wait a few then go get our deer.

But this is not the case on the little youth Rossi set. I told ya about it a few weeks ago. Kit comes with .22lr, 20 ga. and .243 cal barrels. I don't have nor have I ever handles anything without a trigger blocking safety,....Please tell me this isn't commonplace now.

 

[TexasRifleman]

Yeah its the one thing I don't like about the new Marlins. The brain of the shooter and the position of the hammer should be safety enough but of course that doesn't work anymore.....

I'm with you. If they insist on putting these things on then I'd prefer it to lock the trigger, that way if I pull the trigger I immediately know something is wrong.

 

[Liko81]

I don't know about rifles, but some handgun safeties disengage the trigger without blocking it. Pulling the trigger does exactly that and nothing else. You can tell the safety's on when the trigger has less than a 1-pound pull, but the gun doesn't go "click" when the safety's on.

 

[mp510]

The Rossi safety is a dual purpose safety and decocking lever. With the safety on the hammer is released to a stop point by the trigger- it doesn't drop all the way. The safety may then be disengaged, and the hammer will slowly release to an all the way rested position (I would still recommend keeping a thumb on the hammer to further slow it...). That feature is sort of nice actually....when I was a young kid, and hunting for the first time, I was scared schittless of lowering hammer on an H&R single shot- I was afraid that I might slip and AD.

It sounds like your son was carrying the weapon cocked, safety on, correct?
Bad practice. Carry it safety off, uncocked (hammer down). When game is seen, cock the hammer and shoot. Lots of hunters, like me, carry our H&R's in this condition, because the hammer being down/ transfer bar system is the only safety (there is no selector switch). It is more fail safe as well- it is a lot easier to accidentally hit a safety selector to fire than it is to inadvertantly cock a hammer- this could cause an unsafe situation.

 

[rangerruck]

the safety on the rossi's, move the transfer bar out of the way, so that when you pull the trigger, without that trans bar being in alignment, it does not move the fireing pin.

 

[Picknlittle]

It sounds like your son was carrying the weapon cocked, safety on, correct?

I don't think so. I'm pretty sure I heard him cock the hammer before firing. I like that the safety blocks the hammer from the firing position, I don't like that the trigger moves and drops the hammer while safe.

As for carrying it hammer down and safety off, it's possible he could fall, trip or whatever and hit the hammer hard enough to fire the gun,...I think that prospect scares me more. I just like that little rigid trigger reminder if I forget to release the safety rather than an loud "click" with out the bang. I could live with the free safe trigger that moves but noting else. It tells me I forgot, release then shoot without all the other possible questions about misfires and such.

Last year I had a POS BSA scope that cost me a deer or three, this year a weird safety cost my nephew a doe,.....dang the bad luck!

 

[dmazur]

If I understand the posts correctly, the Rossi has a transfer bar that drops out of the way if the hammer isn't cocked. An additional safety that removes the transfer bar is ... weird.

Winchester did something like this with the 9410 shotguns, and I think the later Model 94's. There is a rebounding hammer design, and the tang safety intercepts the hammer and stops it from falling past the rebound point. It does not prevent it from being cocked and it does not block the trigger. (That's another safety, on the lever -- lever has to be squeezed to release trigger safety)

I guess we're all supposed to read the manuals and practice. Not a lot of consistency out there...