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Nambu Type 14

• moderate
• Shop tier 2
• medium confidence
• Pistol
• surplus
• historic
• collectible
• scarce ammunition
• magazine safety

field strip ~4 min · reassembly ~6 min · detail strip ~35 min

Specifications

Model-specific safety

• The Type 14 has a documented weak striker spring problem. A tired striker spring produces light strikes and misfires, and broken strikers are a known failure. Inspect the striker and spring, and treat this as a collectible rather than a shooter unless it has been checked.
• The magazine safety on most Type 14s prevents firing with the magazine removed. That is not a clearing check.
• The pistol fires the 8x22mm Nambu cartridge, which is low-pressure, scarce, and not interchangeable with anything else. Do not attempt to fire any other cartridge in it.
• Late-war production quality declined significantly. Inspect any example carefully before firing.
• Surplus ammunition of this era is frequently corrosively primed. Clean with a water-based solvent the same day you shoot.
• Newly imported pistols are often packed in cosmoline including the firing pin channel. Clean it out and reinstall the firing pin dry — a pin held forward by congealed grease causes slam fires.

Under spring tension

• Recoil spring
• Striker spring
• Magazine spring

Easily lost parts

Striker and spring · Recoil spring · Bolt · Firing pin

Tools

No tools required for the field strip.

Shop difficulty

Shop tier 2 Tier 2 — moderate among pistols, for the full job: strip to the parts that get coated and put it back together working. A simple, open design that strips with a drift and hammer, but the US manual warns that the trigger-release spring and plunger and the sear spring are small and under considerable compression, and that the magazine-catch spring flies. No part count found, so the tier rests on the manual's warnings.

No sourced part count yet.

Bench time: about 25 min to strip, 40 min to rebuild (estimate). Cocking piece, firing pin and spring, bolt, bolt lock, recoil springs, trigger guard, magazine catch, safety, trigger release and sear; rebuild longer for the small compressed springs.

What comes off for coating

• Bolt/receiver: cocking piece, firing-pin spring guide, spring and firing pin, bolt and bolt lock, two recoil springs, barrel/receiver from frame — drift
• Frame: trigger guard, magazine catch and spring, left grip, safety lever, trigger release, spring and plunger, sear and sear spring — drift and hammer

Special tools

• drift and hammer — Trigger-release and sear pins (per TM-E 30-480)

Known pain points

• Collectors warn that many Type 14s have been damaged by people trying to take them apart without knowing how. (disassembly)
  Source: Disassembling These Guns — Nambuworld.com (Teri Ursacki) nambuworld.com [3] — “Many of these guns have been damaged by people trying to get them apart without knowing how.”

Fit or check on rebuild

• Firing pin condition — Type 14 firing pins are notoriously brittle; inspect before reassembly (well known among collectors, not sourced here)
• Function check: trigger reset, sear/striker engagement, safeties — Standard post-reassembly check on any pistol whose fire-control parts were removed; a mis-seated spring shows up here, not on the bench

This is Pew-Takedown's rating, not the manufacturer's. How tiers are rated. Forum reports are owners' experience, not specifications.

Procedures

Torque specifications

No sourced torque values from the manufacturer are recorded for this firearm. Where a fastener has a specified torque — action screws, scope bases, muzzle devices, barrel nuts — get it from the manufacturer or a gunsmith rather than estimating it.

Function check

• Verify the pistol is unloaded with no magazine inserted before each check.
• With a magazine inserted (required by the magazine safety), cock the action and press the trigger. The striker should release.
• Remove the magazine and press the trigger — the magazine safety should prevent release.
• Rotate the safety lever to safe and confirm the trigger is blocked.
• Confirm the striker moves freely in its channel and shows no cracks.

Maintenance

Lubrication points

• Bolt body and receiver rails
• Recoil spring guide
• Sear and trigger contact

Cleaning notes

Keep the striker channel clean and dry. Surplus ammunition of this era is frequently corrosively primed. After shooting it, flush the bore, bolt face, and gas system with hot soapy water or a water-based solvent the same day, dry completely, then oil. Keep the firing pin channel clean and dry — a pin held forward by congealed cosmoline causes slam fires.

Suggested inspection interval: roughly every 300 rounds. This is a general guideline, not a manufacturer specification.

Wear parts to inspect

Striker (a known breakage point) · Striker spring · Extractor · Recoil spring · Magazine feed lips

Common issues

Also covers

The procedures above are reported to apply to: Type 14 early and late (large trigger guard) production. Verify against the manual for your specific model.

Similar manual of arms

• Luger P08
• Mauser C96

Sourcing