Walker was in his 90's when that interview was conducted and may well have been confused. But in 1946 and again in 1948 he was perfectly clear in written memo's to management stating his concerns about a "serious safety issue" with his trigger design. I've seen copies of the memo's.
Any trigger that is dirty or adjusted improperly can fail. But the floating connector is unique to the Walker trigger design. It has proven beyond doubt that it can allow the sear to be released with no trigger pull. It can fail with a brand new, perfectly clean rifle with the trigger pull adjusted to 15 lbs, it is irrelevant to the problem.
It has been estimated that less than 1/2 of 1 percent of all of these rifles will ever do this. But it is also a fact that 100% of them could do so the next time the gun is picked up. The fact that someone has owned several rifles for years with no problems changes nothing.
I've owned 8-10 700's or 7's over the last 45 years. One purchased new in 1975 did it the 1st time in the 1990's. Never had an issue again until about 2 years ago when it did it a 2nd time. It got a Timney at that point. The factory trigger was never adjusted and it was perfectly clean.
Excellent post and right on the money. Wish I could have articulated it so well myself. The thick headed Remington fan boys won't be convinced no matter what though. I've tried before and it's a waste of time.
Actually a rather uninformed post. Not a thing about sear engagement--and that's where most of the misadjusted trigger AD's come from. Of course, dirty triggers are still the other most frequent reason. Most rifles out there have never had their trigger assemblies cleaned.
I've bought very nice looking M70's from the 60's-90's that were FILTHY when the stock was removed--and was probably the first time the stock had ever been removed on those rifles.
I bought a rifle from a 'fire member that had a little more than half of the recommended sear engagement. If that gun had killed somebody I'm sure it would've been all Walker's fault...........
Casey
