Rossi lever action that does not want to be loaded.

**Carbine** · 16-05-2018, 21:57

I have a Rossi / Puma .357mag rifle that likes to give me a hard time when I want to top off the mag.

The action is fully closed. I attempt to ease a .357mag cartridge through the loading gate. The loading gate doesn't open. The bottom of the loading gate stops against the carrier (that lifts the round up into the chamber when working the action).

The carrier should be lower than the loading gate when the action is closed. On this rifle it tends to rest 1mm or so too high when the action is closed. I have to give the bottom of the rifle a thump with my support hand to get the carrier to drop a bit lower, then I can load more rounds through the gate.

Is this a common problem?
How do I fix it?

I was thinking of filing a bevel on the bottom of the loading gate and the edge of the carrier where they make contact, so the loading gate can push the carrier clear when I feed it more ammo. Is this a solution?

Thanks

**Ds J** · 17-05-2018, 00:57

I think you should be able to find answers here:

https://stevesgunz.com/

**Toxxyc** · 17-05-2018, 06:54

No, something's not right. Apart from the loading gate eating the skin off my fingers when in a hurry, that's a problem I've never experienced before. It sounds to me like the carrier is too stiff, not lowering correctly. Have you tried to clean it out, maybe give it a good close-distance spray with RAM Trisol to get grease and gunk out of the hinges? It's supposed to open and close up freely, not get stuck halfway up. Maybe if it's clean it'll drop clear?

If all else fails, take it to a gunsmith. Don't file a working part, it's the wrong solution to the problem :P

PS: Can you maybe take a pic or two? I'll compare with mine.

**Minerva10210** · 17-05-2018, 07:55

Yeah, as Toxic mentions, that does not sound right.

I personally would go one further and possibly even detail strip and clean all the moving parts in the action. I was quite surprised when I got my rifle (third hand possibly) that it still had some of the packing grease in some spots. So I'd wager that some of that grease may have become sticky in your rifle even.

Check boobtoob for instructions to detail strip, but I would also say no to any filing/machining/dremeling...

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**shooty** · 17-05-2018, 08:09

Sometime back had a 44 Rossi. And had it Cerakoted. Came back with issue similar to what you described.
Took it back to Gunsmith and they just cleaned the inside. Where maybe some Cerakote got into moving areas casing hickups.

**DYA** · 17-05-2018, 13:30

Ditto on Ds I'd post

I brought a new Rossi .357 carbine a few years back worked fine but action was rough, With help of " friend" Google I striped and polished the internals. Got rid of the yellow plastic mag follower and turned myself a metal one.

One thing I noticed on mine was that the loading gate had a lot of burrs on.

Also played around with springs that all made a HUGE difrence.

I still want to get round to those finger eating corners of the loading gate tough.

**Carbine** · 17-05-2018, 20:13

Thanks for the info.

I'll spray Trisol on it this weekend and see if it helps.

**A-R** · 17-05-2018, 21:21

Those Rossis are finished very roughly inside. A relative has one that would catch the hammer in the half-cock notch when pulling the trigger. Had to grind quite a bit of steel off to make it work as it is supposed to.

Just be careful. Once filed off the steel is hard to replace...