Today I have been tinkering with a Premier Mk2. I have a much abused one that I bought a couple of years ago and I was offered a frame to swap over. The price was right (FREE!), so I thought I would do it.
I opened the box today and saw the frame,guide, very tired mainspring (even too tired for me to use) and a nice pair of grips. I also noticed the sear was in the frame and held by a split pin. When I removed the split pin and the sear came out, I noticed that the underside of it had been ground down and the pin hole had been elongated. This was a warning sign that made me think a bit. I guessed someone had trouble with the gun cocking and had eventually tried this. I removed the guide/end plug and it had been cut down (the guide) and the face of the plug filed, probably to try to get the holes to line up.
Anyhow I started to try bits off mine and managed to launch the barrel catch plunger and spring somewhere in the kitchen and it has not turned up yet

I tried my sear and piston in the frame and could not get the sear to engage, although the one with the elongated hole would. It looks like the sear pin is in slightly the wrong place. I have seen this with a Premier Mk2 before---and that needed the sear grinding down to work (I did try a working one from another gun and that wouldn't work either). After getting the trigger together I tried the endcap/guide and the barrel pivot holes would not line up. The face of the endcap was very thin so I assume that someone had filed it to try to get the holes lined up and that maybe it was not the original endplug/guide. The guide was cut down a bit an I guess someone did this when the gun wouldn't cock. thinking it might have been touching the piston. My cap/guide was a closer fit but I ended up putting the pivot screw through from the wrong side as the holed lined up closer that way, rather than trying to get the extra half turn on the guide by filing. After the gun was mostly together, the back of the piston started to grind the bottom of the cylinder and I had to clean the cylinder up 3 times. As well as Gn paste, I was using chainsaw oil as I find thickish mineral oil stops the piston digging in the cylinder on the Webleys beter than modern superlubes.
Once I find (or buy) the barrel catch plunger I am going to see how the things shoots and if it is safe.
I get the impression that the quality of the Premier Mk 2's is not as good as the earlier or later pistols.
As I have mentioned, I've seen a couple with sears that wont engage due to pin holes not beeig correctly drilled and for some reason these guns seems more likely to score the cylinder than other Webley pistols.

I really don't do anywhere near as much as I used to with the guns, and what I have had in the last year or so have been very cheap or even free---------So sometimes if they are ropey or I have a lot of troule with them, I try to learn something from them (Other than to stop doing them!). I guess I find it interesting how or why they broke, what the faults were and what people have tried to remedy them. Or to put it another way, I am learning something cheaply other than in time.

Has anyone else had these sorts of problems with Premier Mk2's?