Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Custom Rifles & Wildcats Mauser build for my son

I'm not going to lie I've been hesitant to do some of the metal work, specifically working on the hinged trigger guard conversion and latch. I've never done one and I want to do it well. But it was time to do it. I started with the floor plate. I ended up drilling the exiting hole for the release larger, then turned a piece of steel rod to make a press fit plug.



Then filing and sanding it down. Having a plug allowed me to drill a new hole the size I wanted. In my case since I was making a swivel latch it allowed me a little more room to fit the locking tab. The other thing the plug did was leave a relatively flat base under the lever instead of the lever overhanging the bevel on the back of the floor plate.

and after sanding:


I relocated the through hole in the floor plate, I made it .180" diameter. Then I made a lever with a one piece stud to go through the floorplate. And then I turned a 'tab' that would fit on the stud, sanded 2 flats on the side and pinned it to the stud with a 1/16" roll pin. The tab is a pretty close fit and was pressed tightly before pinning. I'm hoping the friction of the fit will keep it in place.