Renovating The Rossi

by JimT, Texas, Friday, April 01, 2022, 09:56 (970 days ago)

I have had a Rossi levergun that Paco gave me some years ago. It's a .357 Magnum, a
caliber I like in the Model 92 guns. The problem with it is that the barrel is 2 feet long! Now a .357 gets most of its power in 16”. The extra barrel is not needed. PLUS ... it is octagon making it really really front-end heavy. That's just a lot of weight to hang out there. I had not messed with it other than to chronograph some loads and shoot a few targets and I got to where I was wanting to use it more. But it was UNHANDY! So I started looking to buy a regular round barrel for the Rossi and found they were almost unobtainable.

BEFORE

I talked to Gary Reeder and he said he could turn the barrel round. His machinists would just turn it down on a lathe. While I was thinking it over I talked to Steve Young and he shared a picture of an octagon Rossi he had shortened to 16”. It looked good. So I decided before I had the barrel turned I would cut it down and see how I liked it.

I decided to cut the barrel to 18”. This left some material to work with in case I decided to have the barrel turned.

The forend wood was 'way too long to look good on the shorter barrel, so I shortened it also. And I had to cut dovetail in the bottom of the barrel so I could install the hanger that the cap for the forend goes on.

Next the magazine tube magazine spring needed to be shortened. This is how much I had to cut the tube. I cut the spring about 4” longer than the tube and it works just fine. After it was all put together I found the magazine holds 10 rounds of .357 Magnum.

I pulled the gun apart and began cleaning up and smoothing the internal parts. Rossi's do not have a lot of handwork done on them and you can improve the feel of the action with some time spent polishing parts and lightening certain springs. It did not feed Magnums smoothly and with advice from Steve Young I was able to get it where it runs .38 Specials and .357 Magnums smoothly .. even semi-wadcutters. In working on the internals I had the gun apart maybe 20 times, polishing something and then installing it and seeing how it felt. If you are interested in slicking up a Rossi Model 92 I would recommend you go to ww.stevesgunz.com and order his DVD on how to work on the Rossi leverguns. He has some really good stuff on it.

I cut the dovetail for the front sight and installed it, then cleaned the gun and put it all together. It came out really nice and feels really good! It balances well, points quickly, carries in the hand comfortably. I think I will leave it as it now is and just use it!

To keep the magazine in place under recoil I drilled through the forend hanger and cut a groove in the magazine and pinned it in place.

FINISHED

A Word About The Rear Aperture Sight

The sight replaces the factory safety on top of the bolt. I like a bolt-mounted peep sight on leverguns. The sight that goes on the tang is right in the way of everything you need to do once you've fired the shot! This sight is available from Steve's Gunz at the website I listed above. And no, I get no payment for recommending them. They work and they get rid of the crappy lawyer-safety.