Originally Posted by
Cosine26
That is an extremely long cut out for a Timney trigger. I wonder if someone tried to install a set trigger assembly that required an extra long cut out. Below I have posted a picture of a Timney sear, and while it does require some removal of metal from the front of the slot, it is no more than 1/16 inch. Later Timney and other commercial sear release triggers did not reqire any cuto out. I have used later Timney, Dayton-Traister and MK II commercial riggers that required no modification to the receiver.
Imgur:
https://imgur.com/a/X5rmHp1
The magic of the Internet
I think that to repair the damage would require a very skillful person and be very expensive procedure. If the Timney trigger works in the action I would suggest that the easiest approach and most satisfactory would be to reinstall the Timney and sell the action, acquire a new unmodified action and start over. I believe that Chuck will tell you that to repair the present action would be expensive, extensive and maybe not fully satisfactory. Personally I do not believe that any standard sear and trigger could be made to work satisfactorily with the present action -though I could be wrong. I believe that to make it work, you would have to modify the stock and original M193/03A3 stocks are becoming hard to find and expensive.
FWIW
FWIW,
Problem solved. I received another USGI 03A3 trigger assembly (square faced sear Marked "R" on the left hand side & a "2" inside of a Square on the right hand side / Remington manufactured / unmarked trigger with a truly smooth face / does not have the raised line down the center of the trigger that 03A3 triggers have & the profile seems to be minutely different / what trigger?) & to my amazement this somehow solved the issue. I threw this trigger assembly in & the trigger pull is remarkable. The weapon now functions properly with a proper & crisp break (very smooth 2 stage). It baffled me. So I decided to punch out the trigger pin on this square faced 03A3 sear & threw in my blued 03A3 Remington manufactured trigger & it would not fire (same issues as before. Sear could not be pulled down enough to drop cocking piece). Once again, baffled. I then proceeded to take that Remington blued trigger out & I put the unmarked blued trigger that came affixed to the sear back on. The oddest thing, but for some reason this specific trigger assembly properly works in my M1903A3.
Just as the WWII TM states for the M1903A3 (I'll poorly quote it): That you may mix triggers, sears & sear springs, cocking pieces, etc., around until you find a desirable trigger pull (granted my receiver has been altered). I think I have done just that 
Honestly, thats what I was hoping for when ordering all these different triggers, sears, sear springs, cocking pieces, etc..
WAR DEPARTMENT TECHNICAL MANUAL
TM 9-1270
ORDNANCE MAINTENANCE
U.S. Rifles, Cal. .30, M1903, M1903A1, M1903A3 and M1903A4
20 January 1944
(2) "Should the action still be faulty, it will be necessary to interchange the parts until a combination of cocking piece, sear and sear spring, trigger, and mainspring is found which will correct the difficulty. The probable importance of these various parts in the perfection of the trigger pull is in the order given. A number of parts should be tried in their various combinations until a satisfactory pull is obtained."
I'll get some rounds down range & see what happens.
Lastly, I could easily throw the Timney back into this action but thats not my cup of American GI Joe. If it isn't USGI, trash it. It seems to be the easiest fix but I would rather purchase a new receiver & start over from scratch. Also, the WWII USGI Scant Stock that was on previously had the trigger area cutout for the Timney. I would have to cannibalize my minty, original, WWII USGI M1903A4 stock to run that Timney & that I want no part of. I would shed a tear or two.
Thank you for keeping me sane during this ordeal because those first few days I looked right past my altered receiver.
Semper Fidelis,
Benny
PM
