Roller bearing hammer, has this been tried?

I was pondering on ways to reduce lock-time and trigger force and it occurred to me that a shaft on a pin has fairly high force requirements. It seems like the Trigger would be the spot where it would make the most difference, but there isn't enough room in the part. Where there IS room is in the hammer. It would be a fairly trivial matter to oversize the axle hole and pack the space with needle rollers. The question is, would it matter?
It's not a huge amount of work to just do it and see the before/after effect, but if it's already been proven as a failure, why chase that again is my thinking.
So, has anyone tried this or seen it done, and if so, how did it work out?

If I'm understanding you correctly, I'm not sure if that particular adaptation has been tried. (ie: needle bearings in the hammer, at it's contact with the frame stud)

Seems to me as though the contact stress that is largely created by the mainspring is exerted almost entirely at the hammer and trigger interface's two points of contact during the actual DA pull....... the double action sear at start up and then midway in the pull, transfer to the camming surfaces on the hammer and trigger. I'm certainly not an engineer, but I would suspect that changes that would mitigate the rotational stress at the hammer stud would be of little or no benefit in terms of lightening this load.

I believe a "roller" type trigger / hammer adaptation was tried at one point back in the 60's or 70's with some success. This adaption involved a roller bearing interface between the hammer/trigger contact interface, instead of the current direct contact camming surfaces.

Perhaps someone here will remember this design and post the details.

Cylinder and Slide used to sell them. Don't know if they still do or not.

I seem to remember reading an article in American Handgunner about this.The article focused mostly on colt pythons.

armorer951 said:

If I'm understanding you correctly, I'm not sure if that particular adaptation has been tried. (ie: needle bearings in the hammer, at it's contact with the frame stud)

Seems to me as though the contact stress that is largely created by the mainspring is exerted almost entirely at the hammer and trigger interface's two points of contact during the actual DA pull....... the double action sear at start up and then midway in the pull, transfer to the camming surfaces on the hammer and trigger. I'm certainly not an engineer, but I would suspect that changes that would mitigate the rotational stress at the hammer stud would be of little or no benefit in terms of lightening this load.

I believe a "roller" type trigger / hammer adaptation was tried at one point back in the 60's or 70's with some success. This adaption involved a roller bearing interface between the hammer/trigger contact interface, instead of the current direct contact camming surfaces.

Perhaps someone here will remember this design and post the details.

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Gunsmith Walt Sherman was known around Florida for his roller bearing actions especially on Colt Python PPC revolvers. He fabricated a hammer strut that held a pinned roller that contacted the trigger to smooth DA pull.

The Llama Omni pistol used a bunch of tiny ball bearings to eliminate friction between the sides of the hammer and the frame - you never wanted to take the hammer out because of the aggrivation trying to get the bearings back in.

I remember seeing this done commercially. The sear was split and shortened and a very small roller bearing on a very small axel inserted into the sear. I strongly suspect it was one of those things that is a great idea in theory but in actual practice left something to be desired. Also it was not cheap.

dwh said:

I seem to remember reading an article in American Handgunner about this.The article focused mostly on colt pythons.

Click to expand...

Walt Sherman is the gun smith that pioneered this back 40 or more years ago. SHERMAN'S CUSTOM GUNS was the name of his business in Tallahassee Florida. Walt worked with the Florida Highway Patrol for a number of years. That article ran around 92/93 if my memory is working, I also recall reading it

Walt did his roller action job to my 2 1/2" Ultimate Stainless Python back in the early 90s. At the time he was getting $200 for an action job and I felt that it was well worth the price

The double action is incredible. It measures at 5 pounds. One of my associates said it was as smooth as pulling a hot knife through warm butter. I do not have words that better describe the DA trigger pull.

My original intent at the time was to use the revolver in PPC Snubby matches. I did carry it for several years and I still shoot it from time to time

The triggers that Cylinder and Slide sold back in the day should accomplish the same thing, though I have never personally fired a Smith & Wesson that had one in it

Walt retired not too long after he did my revolver and I believe passed away within the last decade. On that day, the shooting world lost one of the Great Python gun smiths

I know someone with roller bearing hammers in his Ruger Mark .22 target pistols. The original set-up from Ruger is a hammer, with a bushing, on a pin.

armorer951 said:

If I'm understanding you correctly, I'm not sure if that particular adaptation has been tried. (ie: needle bearings in the hammer, at it's contact with the frame stud)

Seems to me as though the contact stress that is largely created by the mainspring is exerted almost entirely at the hammer and trigger interface's two points of contact during the actual DA pull....... the double action sear at start up and then midway in the pull, transfer to the camming surfaces on the hammer and trigger. I'm certainly not an engineer, but I would suspect that changes that would mitigate the rotational stress at the hammer stud would be of little or no benefit in terms of lightening this load.

I believe a "roller" type trigger / hammer adaptation was tried at one point back in the 60's or 70's with some success. This adaption involved a roller bearing interface between the hammer/trigger contact interface, instead of the current direct contact camming surfaces.

Perhaps someone here will remember this design and post the details.

Click to expand...

It was offered back in the 60's by a vendor.......Never caught on as it didn't accomplish much of anything.

Certainly a doable project but I should think a really slick lubricant would do as good a job as an expensive smithing. I'm thinking of something like Teflon in oil or the like on the hammer stud and the surrounding surfaces. I have some dry Teflon powder which I mix with a wee bit of Lucas gun oil and it seems to work a treat.

The Olmi revolver , that never was eventually distributed, had roller bearing

Llance said:

Certainly a doable project but I should think a really slick lubricant would do as good a job as an expensive smithing. I'm thinking of something like Teflon in oil or the like on the hammer stud and the surrounding surfaces. I have some dry Teflon powder which I mix with a wee bit of Lucas gun oil and it seems to work a treat.

Click to expand...

I use boron nitride, aka white graphite. you can even suspend it in alcohol, and treat a barrel with it.

boron nitride is the ceramic "fortifier" in Liquid Wrench dry lube.

Korth uses a roller bearing on the trigger I believe

John_M52 said:

Korth uses a roller bearing on the trigger I believe

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On a cenertfire pistol it makes some sense. On a filthy rimfire, probably more harm than good.

Colt first did this on the later Dragoons, so its been around for a while.

Walt Sherman was a great guy. A friend had purchased a PPC revolver from an FDLE acquaintance of ours, and we were shooting one afternoon when I tried it out. I was amazed at how well it shot, and the trigger on it was positively amazing. You could pull double action and hold it right at the release point with no effort at all. The action was so slick - you really have to experience it.

The barrel was marked Sherman Custom PPC, and I immediately searched for his company. It was the early days if the Internet, and I found him without any problem. After talking to him on the phone and discovering he was only eighty miles away in Tallahassee - I immediately ordered a new 14-6 and sent it over. I asked that he work his magic on it and do everything he performed on his PPC customs short of changing the barrel.

Walt called about two weeks later, and asked if the Brown Lantern restaurant was still open in my town. I indicated that it was, and he said he would like to deliver the model 14 to me instead of shipping it. He met me at my office, and we had lunch and visited all the local gunshops that afternoon.

I ended up having him build me a custom rifle on an FN action. Walt wasn't as well known for his rifles, but he built mine in the old English classic style. He did it all from barreling, stockmaking, metalwork, and bluing. It was as nice as anything turned out by the best makers in Europe. I sold it to one of his relatives when he passed as the relative regretted never having one of Walt's rifles. Really wish I still had the rifle, but it just seemed like the right thing to do.

Walt was definitely one of the good guys, and it was amazing to watch him in the shop. I enjoyed many afternoons at his place, and my 14-6 will be around until I'm gone.

I have ran a few thousand wadcutters through this one. Anyone who has had the pleasure of shooting it breaks out with a big WOW afterwards.

Damn glad to have met him.

Burneyr, Very nice. Those model 14-5/6 are very nice guns indeed. Very accurate and smooth out great. Wadcutters in that model is always a fun day....

Llance said:

Certainly a doable project but I should think a really slick lubricant would do as good a job as an expensive smithing. I'm thinking of something like Teflon in oil or the like on the hammer stud and the surrounding surfaces. I have some dry Teflon powder which I mix with a wee bit of Lucas gun oil and it seems to work a treat.

Click to expand...

There's also Brownells Action Magic II (which I think is the same as BP-2000 and Gun Kote from Sentry Solutions) . I believe it's a molybdenum-based lube, one part being in a suspension liquid that evaporates, and the other just a powder.

I think the gun has to be pretty darned good mechanically to start off with for it to make it "better." Nothing can duplicate the "fairy dust" of a master gunsmith.

Absolutely nothing to do with guns, but the 18th Century inventor of the marine chronometer, John Harrison, is also credited as being the inventor of the roller bearing to reduce friction and wear in his clock movements. If it can be used in clocks, it can be used in guns.

I came up with this idea for a uberti 1873 that I was redoing. Works pretty well. I understand it’s not what you’re asking about. Bearings and springs are my thing. I would think that a hardened pin verses a bearing would be just as frictionless given the limited amount of movement involved in a hammer throw. Just my .02.