Author Topic: Grips screw hell (Read 719 times)

flyers92afs · « **on:** April 22, 2005, 08:29:47 AM »

New to the forum. Seems pretty cool though. Down to it: I bought a set of hogue grips for my 92afs. When removing factory grips, I noticed that one of the screws appears permanently attached to the grip. I bought a set of stainless Hogue hex-head screws, but when I got them, the shanks are way too small to fit the frame (measured factory screw is 4mm, and the Hogue screw is 2mm). Hogue says to call the manufacturer about "grip screw bushings." This wouldn't be a problem except that Taurus's Customer service number is useless--three different calls=40 minutes on hold. Don't know where to turn to find screws that will fit. Any ideas??

DirtyHarry · « **Reply #1 on:** April 26, 2005, 04:21:00 PM »

Welcome,

I suggest taking it to a good gunsmith, or if it were me, I would most likely drill and tap to a size of my liking....

flyers92afs · « **Reply #2 on:** April 28, 2005, 09:35:36 AM »

Got a fix from Hogue. They sent me a set of grip bushings. They also told me that the screw I though was attached to the grip was actually a screw and bushing put on by Taurus. They do this with one screw, and then make it almost impossible for you to get it off without stripping the threads off of the bushing (this makes more money for Taurus with people needing to buy replacement bushings/screws/ another grip panel. All in all, I'm happy with the gun, but upset at the design of this particular part. Great shooter though, and that's what matters.

Zippy77 · « **Reply #3 on:** August 17, 2005, 05:01:28 PM »

I had a similar experience with my 92. I actually had no problems replacing the original factory plastic/rubber grips that came with my 92 with some nice wooden checkered grips (old factory grips) which made it look very nice. No problems with the bushing at that time. The wooden grips were significantly thicker than the newer plastic ones though so several months later I decided to change the grips back and sure enough I had one hell of a time getting one of the bushings to let go of the grip screw. I could remove the grips (along with the one bushing still stuck to the grip screw) but could not put a new set on obviously. I thought Taurus must be putting some loctite or something similar in there for it to have held like that as I am rather paranoid about overtightening anything like that. However, I found no visible evidence of that. Eventually I got the two parts to separate with the right tools and a lot of nasty words.

I will say this, I like Taurus firearms a lot but if I really thought they did in fact intentially do something like this for some devious business reason of soaking their customers I'd liquidate every gun I own by them and never buy another. For now though I will give them the benefit of the doubt until I see evidence otherwise. Speaking of loctite, put some of the blue on the new bushing threads before putting into the frame and of course DO NOT put any on the grip screw threads unless you don't mind ruining the grip screws should you ever need to remove them. That should eliminate the problem in the future.