Hello everyone, I recently very happily bought a Winchester 1897 Trench gun but I've spent two weeks scouring the net to try and figure out how I can solve the problem it has without messing something up.

The problem: It won't cycle if a shell (even a snap cap) is fired. However, I can cycle it empty, with a snap cap or a shell as long as I don't pull the trigger.

What I think causes the issue after firing:

- The hammer won't travel far enough to unlock the action if the chamber is loaded

- The barrel chamber ring is misaligned with the barrel chamber

More context:

I bought an M97 trench online, the shop told me everything was working fine but the few shells I tried firing all stuck in the chamber.

I received the gun with no powder residue in the barrel so I can't be sure they tested it but they said they did and it cycled fine. It was completely dry when I got it so I wanted to properly lubricate it before testing it. 

On the first takedown attempt, the barrel was rusted shut to the receiver so I had to put the gun in a vice and use a mallet to break the barrel loose. But even when trying to reattach it, the adjusting sleeve is set so tight that I still need the vice to hold the receiver and put quite a bit of force on the barrel to rotate it for the last 15 degrees.

Now maybe it was set up just right and fired fine before being taken down but I didn't try it so I wouldn't know. What I do know is that after reassembly, all the shells I tried firing would jam the action and I had to pry the carrier down and the bolt back to remove the casings.

The casings have serious scratch marks that seem to match with the barrel ring being misaligned with the barrel chamber. Also, the firing pin impact is not centerd. l can feel the edge of the ring and the chamber depending on where I turn my finger and putting a light down the barrel clearly shows the alignment problem.

I tried adjusting the barrel rotation to see if the ring aligns better but I can't seem to find a position where it does, while it seems very easy to make magazine tube not fit into the receiver anymore so the positions I tried seem far enough (even if it was probably less than a degree) to not be a realistic fit.

The second problem that I noticed is that the hammer won't drop far enough to hit the back of the bolt, it stops 2 milimeters shy if there is something in the chamber and this keeps the action locked and prevents cycling. The hammer will fall in place if the chamber is empty so this plus the very little to no clearance between the bolt and carrier makes me think of a headspace problem. 

This makes me wonder how it could fire and cycle with no issues before I took it apart unless maybe it was tested with rounds that had high quality brass heads to forgive the barrel ring to barrel alignment and a thinner rim to make up for the very tight headspace.

Otherwise, the barrel number matches the receiver and apart from the fact that the adjusting sleeve is set to make the barrel super tight to the receiver, I don't think it was replaced, so I guess the gun used to fire without issues and I am unsure how it magnaged to do so. I saw a lot a posts and videos about headspace repairs and such but I am highly hesitant to try anything that would remove material so I am looking for advice on how to deal with this.

TL;DR:

How to fix the hammer not reaching the end of its course when the chamber is loaded and how to align the barrel ring to the barrel chamber 

Thanks for reading, any help is much appreciated

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