Puma 92 lever action ??

[gunrunner32]

So I'm taking in on trade a Puma model 92 lever action. I have only seen pictures of the rifle and it looks good to me. The wood looks good, it has high-vis fiber optic sights on it, an 18" ported barrel and is chambered in .454 Casull. Included in the trade is a Ruger Super Redhawk in .454 Casull/.45LC as well. I know enough about the revolver, so I'm good there. My question is, is this rifle worth a damn? Is it going to be reliable? If not, what normally breaks on it? In .454 Casull is this going to be accurate out to say 100 yards/meters? Does anyone have one in this caliber? If so, how do you like shooting it? Thanks in advance.

[1gewehr]

The Rossi rifle is a an accurate copy of the Winchester model 1892 designed by John Browning. The only complaint I have heard is that some parts could use a little polishing to function more smoothly. This is not hard to do, or you can just fire it and let it smooth out naturally. The action is very strong and .454 should not be a problem.

I have one in .44Mag that works great. It's almost twenty years old and has never given a single problem. The only problem I know about is that the wood in the wrist of the stock is a bit thin, and you sometimes see cracking or breakage from hard use and/or lots of heavy recoil ammo.

[East_TN_Patriot]

The Rossi rifles are generally good guns for the money. I have an EMF Hartford, which is basically a Rossi Puma and I am very happy with it so far. They are fairly common in the cowboy action shooting world as a low-cost entry level rifle and there are smiths out there who specialize in slicking them up for competition if you are so inclined. The biggest gripe I read, and I can confirm this, is that the springs are heavy in them. They aren't so heavy that it's a pain to shoot, but definitely a knuckle buster if you are trying to cycle the lever action quickly (I wrapped my lever in leather to help this). I purchased a spring kit from Brownell's, but haven't taken the time to install it yet. The two springs that seem to get the most attention are the mainspring and the ejector spring. Some also thin down the loading gate spring to make reloading a little easier. Overall, they are good little rifles and with minimal tweaking, you can have a nice shooter. I love mine and haven't changed out the springs yet.

Here are a couple of links that may be of interest to you:

The Rossi '92

Rossi Field Stripping

[chemprof]

Ditto to above. Got my Rossi late last summer, and those first 100 rds were necessary to get that action/cycling to smooth out. Now she's really smooth and I'm nearly as accurate or better with it than I am with my handguns! Some day, I really would like to have an actual Winchester and a Henry, too! This hits the spot until then.... Good luck!

[graycrait]

I had a pre-top of the receiver safety Puma .357. I should have never gotten rid of that rifle, haven't seen another since. That was in my "everything" has to be .357 magnum phase.