Last night, I decided to give my Browning BL-22 a good clean. I mean, a full strip and clean… Not just a bore snake treatment it usually gets.
Now, I am more than comfortable reassembling all sorts of weird and wondering firearms, but this! FMD! I should have sold it as is and just bought a new one. What a ride!
Intro
(Browning BL22 Rifle - This Gun Is FUN, FAST & A Blast To Shoot.)
BL-22 or it’s rebranded Miroku version are considered to be an excellent lever action 22 LR rifle. I love mine and have no intentions of parting with it. If you think Henry 22 is good, BL-22 takes it to the next level with ridiculously short and crisp lever throw (it’s hard to explain, it’s very smooth as far as lever actions go, but the ‘crisp’ part is what matters on this one). Other than going semi, this is as fast as you’re are going to get and with targeted shots, it’s probably the same rate of fire.
So, back to cleaning, Browning would flip in his grave if he saw the guts of this bitch.
I am not going to go into detail, because the video explains all of it and this is what I followed… Video (below) starts at 6min 29sec to experience the full extent of my suffering.
(Starts at 6min 29sec)
In reality you need three hands and a submissive midget to put this prick together!
Hand 1:
- Push the ejector down on the ejector spring; and with the same hand
- Holding the receiver in place.
Hand 2:
- Hold the locking block plate in place, on the side of the bolt. At the same time (still one hand)
- Hold the bolt down, on top of the bolt. At the same time (still one hand)
- Inserting the entire trigger assembly into the receiver.
Seems simple enough? No! If you never played tiny-spring-flying-across-the-room-missing-your-eye game before, hey, you are about to have an authentic experience.
To top it all off, the ejector groove on the bolt is of course on the opposite side to where you can see, so you are pocking that c*nt in completely blind, while trying to smoothly insert the ejector into the grove, without misaligning the spring or the ejector.
Awesome gun, pleasure to use, trivial to strip and an absolute turd to reassemble. You will notice a few ‘uh you f*ck’ in the video, that was me. It took me a few attempts to get it all sorted (read: at least 30 minutes), but the intensity of swearing was at a much higher level. Ejector falls out, spring falls out, ejector and spring fall out, locking block plate falls off while ejector glides into the bolt, locking block jams the action… Bah!
NOTE:
Slight misalignment of the ejector and could have that tiny spring flying across the room through the ejection port. Yes, the same hole that you are watching to make sure everything is aligned. So wear eye protection when you are doing it. Have lots of light and make sure not to lose that freaking turd of a spring.