If I can get my hands on some sheet steel I may be able to fabricate up a new latch using the other side as my template. A little finessing in the vise and a bit of orange paint will finish it off
THAT! It was my FIRST thought.
Ya know... these days we seem to automatically leap to a “buy a replacement” rather than actualy FIX something. Our forefathers wouldn’t think that way or we’d not have gotten this far. John Browning was quoted as telling how his first job as an apprentice gunmaker was to make an octagonal barrel from a plain bar of steel using nothing but a file. He wasn’t allowed by his master to use a drill or lathe until he could make a perfect octagon blank with that file.
I have my Father’s Mod 80C Marlin which was made before serial numbers were required on firearms. Marlin has kept the magazine design for their modern stuff, such as a Mod 25 I keep to discourage vermin around the ranch, ..but these new ones have an orange colored plastic follower which breaks easily. I don’t like using the original Mod 80 mag in the Mod 25. While I like the orange in the new Mod 25 mag... the plastic sucks. Especially when a squirrel has an eye on my loaded peach-trees and the damn Mod 25 won’t chamber a round due to that cheap magazine follower.
I used a file and a hacksaw to cut a strip of metal off a scrap of C-purlin and made a new follower on the workbench. Disassembled the magazine and installed it. Works perfectly and cannot be distinguished from the original.
The peaches are so juicy you’d better have a napkin for your chin!
You will have SUCH a feel of Accomplishment and Pride when you make your own repair on that latch! Congrats!
