Mossberg Safety Update

[Guy B. Meredith]

I followed the advice of forum members to check at Brownell's for part for my Mossberg 500 loose safety. Best info was in the Schematics section of the Brownell's web site where I found out that I was missing a detent ball and (I thought) a detent spring. Getting into the safety required munging up a one-way screw and the plastic button.

Turns out the 590 metal button is available ($15.94) as well as the plastic ($5.50).

It appears that $4.03 is the minimum price for small items like the microscopic detent ball and for the spring. That didn't sound too good so I checked with Mossberg. The Mossberg site did not have the schematic on the safety parts and it turns out they don't sell to people without gunsmith certification.

Back to Brownell's. Picked up the metal button, screw, ball and spring (found out the original was still in the frame). The package arrived today (2 days after order) and the Persuader is ready to persuade. I think I will go out and buy about $.10 worth of generic ball bearings to fit just in case and a two way screw or two.

 

[mattw]

that sucks that you had to spend so much money to fix something that shouldn't have been a problem in the first place... isn't it fun to get gun parts in the mail though? its like Christmas!

 

[Guy B. Meredith]

I bought the Mossberg used and may have failed to check the safety. Don't know that I'd know the difference at that time. The parts cost a good portion of what I paid for the shotgun.

Yeah, receiving the parts was fun, particularly so quickly. Hat off to Brownell. Had fun doing the assembly, in particular hunting down the tiny ball bearing on the carpet several times.

 

[mattw]

but don't you feel so much more accomplished and satisfied now that you KNOW it will work because YOU fixed it and YOU put it back together?

 

[Guy B. Meredith]

Yup. And that my 686+ won't have to stand HD duty.

 

[slopemeno]

I was at a cabin with some friends shooting once. One of them lost the front sight to his Officers ACP. Later that day he and a friend were spotted with a speaker magnet "minesweeping" the area they had been shooting for the front sight.

 

[mnrivrat]

I know I'm coming in a little late here but thought I would let you know that the small detent ball is suppose to be staked into the reciever .

The best way to do this is to have a cupped tip punch slightly larger than the hole the spring and ball sit into . The cup (concave ) end of the punch then will help hold the ball as you push it down under its spring tension. When the punch makes contact with the reciever a couple small taps on it will stake the top of the hole slightly so that the ball will not come out. One has to take it easy with the staking process so that the ball still remains high enough to give proper tension to the sliding safety button.

The reason I wanted to give you this info is because even with new parts and the ball not staked, there is a chance the ball will ride too high and make the safety bind at times. So if you do get some binding you can go back in and stake the detent ball.

 

[Guy B. Meredith]

mnrivrat,

Uh, now you tell me. How does one get the button off to stake the ball? It is held on with a unidirection screw.

 

[Justang]

My dad's Mossberg had this problem. It was just at $20 for the detent ball, spring, plate, and screw. I also got him the metal safety switch. all the stuff was gotten at Brownells.

First thing I did when I got my Mossy was get the metal safety.

 

[mnrivrat]

Uh, now you tell me. How does one get the button off to stake the ball? It is held on with a unidirection screw.

Well the good news is that most of them will back out if you put quite a bit of downward force as your turning.
If that doesn't work your in a bit more trouble as you will likely have to distroy the button when you cut a channel in the screw head with a dremel or hacksaw.

 

[vega]

Guy - Can you please post a link for that metal button? I want to replace the plastic safety on my mossberg.

edited to add - Never mind, I figure it out.

vega

 

[in0de]

metal trigger guard?

Ok, I'm coming into this waaay late, but hopefully someone will still see this post...

I'm looking to get a mossy 590, but I'm not a big fan of the non-metal safety and trigger guard (please correct me if I'm wrong and these really are metal parts). For that very reason I was leaning towards the 590A1, but that model has the heavy barrel, which I'm not interested in and that adds cost for something I'm really not looking to have on the gun. In addition to that, the barrel makes putting a heat shield on the weapon more difficult, so I think I may just go with a regular 590. I've seen the metal replacement for the safety that you guys mentioned, but I haven't heard anything about the trigger guard. Does anyone know of a way to replace that with a metal guard? I haven't really looked at the gun very much yet, so I'm not sure if its even possible without major gunsmithing.

Thanks ahead of time for any info you can give me.


-in0de

 

[mnrivrat]

To my knowledge Mossberg does not make a metal trigger group housing.

The beefed up 590 has a thicker barrel and I have seen reference to a heavier reciever and other parts, but I think it also has the plastic trigger group housing. The good news is that they are pretty tough and the failure rate is very low. In 15 years of repairing I think I have changed 2 of them. Frankly, if you are concerned I would just watch ebay as I have seen the whole trigger group and housing sell there for as low as $25 . That would give you a very easy to change spare assembly.

The failures I have seen are the front tabs that lock the trigger housing into the reciever. I have not seen the trigger guard itself break.

The safety button however is the first likely failure you will have with the 500 series gun. I still cant figure out why Mossberg hasn't went back to the metal safety button - the fact they haven't does not speak well for them . It is a common failure that should have corrected long ago.

 

[in0de]

Thanks for the info. I think I'm just going to go with the 590A1 with the 18.5" barrel and bead sights. I'll have to rig up a heat shield for it, but that model seems to be a bit more solid than the regular 590. Also, the A1 I'm looking at is actually cheaper than the regular 590 since all of the non-A1 models listed on the mossberg site had all kinda other goodies on them like ghost ring sights, ammo holding stocks, etc.

-in0de

 

[New_geezer]

The plastic safety button is annoying but that uni-directional screw simply $uck$. Bad enough you usually end up having to replace it but why make the task nigh impossible. When I lost the detent ball on my 500, pressure didn't budge it. I ended up drilling a small hole into the center. Good idea about staking the ball. The basically simple design was a real pain to put back together. Added advice, use some locktite on the screw when you finally get it together.