here's the new spring, old spring and buffer. as you can see, the new spring is longer. i don't know if that's because the old one has gotten compressed over time. the sales spiel says the longer spring will cycle the action better, maybe it's on purpose, IDK.
after lengthy research (about 2 minutes) i determined that a couple of drops of oil in the buffer tube might help with noise and corrosion. then the spring goes back in, followed by the buffer, all threaded/wriggled/persuaded in past the hammer and detent. i probably should have hosed it out with brake or parts cleaner first. oh well.
so we're basically done. close it up, work the action a couple of times to make sure you didn't leave anything out and we're done. time to head out to the range and burn some powder!
i'll hang onto the old spring until we know it works.
i'm retired. what's your excuse?