Sniper Ammo Selection

[Edward Horton]

As a poor example of an author, it's worth remembering two important thinmgs about writing books and even short articles. The first thing is that NEVER, not EVER take for granted anything thet's been written previously. Two little examples of this are that the Sten fires up and left ....., or right, depending on who you talk to and that the Bren was too accurate. Both myths as it transpires. Myths soon become fact

The second and most important is that the first person who reads what you've written immediately knows more than you. That's because he knows all that you've written PLUS the tiny bit he knew before.

And some of us understand a British Enfield Armourer is a trained expert and the rest of us are just rookies trying to understand what we read in the manuals and what the Armourer tells us.

The real problems are the people who misread the books and manuals and then misquote what they misread and continue to misguide people with their massive mistaken myths.

“Inherent weakness” my Gluteus Maximus

[Alfred]

Any action can be overamped if the cartridge its chambered for is subject to being loaded at higher pressures than the loads it is intended for.
The Winchester Model 95 is a good example. In .30/06 it functioned just fine so long as loads giving pressures no higher than the original 150 grain .30/06 cartridge is used, but when the later 172 grain M1 Ball and equivalent sporting loads were used the rifles developed excessive headspace.

When the standard .30-40 Krag ammunition giving pressures of about 40,000 CUP were in use the US Krag functioned perfectly, but when they increased the chamber pressures to 43,000 CUP a significant percentage ended up with setback lugs or cracked bolts.

Every reliable source I've come across states that the 7.62 No.4 conversions were intended for use with the NATO standard Ball cartridges that generate Aprox 48,000 CUP with Max deviation of 53,000 CUP, some specialized NATO 7.62 loads generate 52,000 CUP normally with Max Deviation of 57,000 CUP.
I'd have to agree with the British NRA and the Australian NRA, some 7.62 ammunition cuts too deeply into the safety margin of the action type.

I'd early seen the argument that there are no documented cases of an Enfield rifle blowing up when using service ammunition, after quite a bit of work I found dozens of recorded cases, in the most unlikely sources, the records of the Canadian House of Commons and the British Parliment.
In discussions on the safety of the 7.62 Conversions on another board a member of this board recounted an accident they had witnessed with a bystander injured, the injuries in that case were minor though a friend of mine died of a similar injury to the neck involving a different type gun many years ago. No neck wound is minor in my book, I've seen a man bleed out from a neck wound, it wasn't pretty at all.

In one of the accidents listed in the Canadian records an officer standing near the shooter was struck by a broken bolt head that passed completly through his neck just missing the juglar vein.
In an account of an accident investigated by James Crossman a hunter died when a blown blothead resulted in the extractor entering his abdomen, another account of the same case told that the Vena Cava was severed, death followed quickly.

Firearms accidents are rare, seldom given any press to speak of unless fatal, and if litigation is involved records may be sealed for generations.

There is at least one known case of a serious injury involving a 7.62 2A rifle when .308 commercial ammunition was used. Escaping gas propelling the magazine into the shooter's groin, damaging the family jewels.

If I ran across a nice looking 7.62 Enfield for sale and the owner told me he knew the rifle was safe because he'd fired hundreds of rounds of M118 Special Ball through it, I walk away from it regardless of how good the deal looked on the surface.
Spotting that sort of abuse in a Mauser type action is easier, at least if you know where to look. Overamped actions with front locking will show set back of the locking surfaces. Due to the distance between bolt head and locking lugs of the Enfield the stress is taken up by the side rails and bolt body so the hardened locking surfaces aren't as likely to set back.
I've seen a rippled bolt body, never occured to me at the time that this was a sign of excessive pressures or a weak bolt.
A member of this forum has mentioned a 7.62 suffering damage when fired in wet weather, and a British Sniper had to abandon his L42 during a heated battle of the Falklands campaign when firing in cold wet weather resulted in the bolt binding so badly he could no longer operate the action, he finished the battle with a captured Argentine FAL.

The main reason fire arms accidents are rare is that most shooters take heed of safety warnings.
These collectors forums are the only places I've seen where posters are constantly encouraging others to ignore safety warnings from reputable shooters organizations like the National Rifle Associations of Britian, Australia, and America.

Another problem is legend taking the place of fact.
The tidbit about Enfields being designed to fire muddy cartridges, and that they functioned flawlessly in the trenches despite rain and mud for example.
A small dash of fact with a heaping helping of myth.
The manual of Musketry gives clear instructions on the necessity of keeping mud out of the action and chamber of the Enfield, with the notation that a great many rifles had been rendered unseviceable because of firing with muddy ammo.
As a side note it also gives instruction on cleaning ammo and wiping it down with a oily cloth, so theres no doubt that they recognized that it was not possible to use only dry fresh ammo in a chamber completely free of oil under combat conditions. A target shooter can keep his rifle free of oil and use only fresh clean ammo, but the rifleman in the field can't do that very often.
As an Infantry rifle the 7.62 conversions of the No.4 would have been a disaster in the making. I've never heard of any of the countries that held huge stocks of Enfield No.4 rifles in store considering converting them to 7.62 for issue as an infantry rifle or even as a emergency reserve arm, it just doesn't have enough of a safety margin to be safe in the hands of the average trooper under combat conditions.

The rifles are safe enough for range and hunting use, but only if the owner uses ammo that does not overly stress the action type.
The poor quality of some 7.62 ammunition is another factor, some of this stuff isn't safe for any rifle, and some was never intended to be used in infantry rifles to begin with.

The main "inherent weakness" is in the mind of the collector who puts mythology over practicallity, and encourages unsafe practices.

I'll stick to the opinions of the expert riflemen and inventors who were closely associated with the development of the Enfield Rifles and its ammunition.
I'll also side with the National Rifle associations of Britian, australia, and the US on the issue of what sort of ammo is safe for use in the No.4 rifles.

[Peter Laidler]

If Alfs article was broken down into several answerable sized chunks, it'd be, well...., answerable!

But I'd like to take issue with with paragraph 11, regarding a heated battle in the Falklands..., and with an L42 at that! Cold wet weather never stopped an L42 in my, albeit very limited, experience with them. Because even here on darkest, bleakest coldest, wind-swept Salisbury Plain in the winter, as the snipers Armourer of the era, the old plodders (L42's I mean) took it all in its stride

And chapter wotsit, further down. Britain very nearly had 60,000 No4 7.62mm conversions on its hands. Saved from a disaster then by the fact that...... I won't go on as the reason why we didn't embark on the L8 programme has been aired several times already. BUT, just to prove or emphasise the point, might I politely ask just ONE question.

Just WHERE do you think the stockpiles of 1965 dated 7.62mm No4 magazines, extractors and charger guide inserts come from. Just a point to ponder chaps.....

[Edward Horton]

Thirty years hunting with my ol' Winchester 30-30 and now they tell me it has an inherent weak design problem because it has rear locking lugs just like the British Enfield Rifle.

I wonder if Mr. Winchester hired British engineers to help in the design of this American inherent weak design tragedy.

[Alfred]

If Alfs article was broken down into several answerable sized chunks, it'd be, well...., answerable!

But I'd like to take issue with with paragraph 11, regarding a heated battle in the Falklands..., and with an L42 at that! Cold wet weather never stopped an L42 in my, albeit very limited, experience with them. Because even here on darkest, bleakest coldest, wind-swept Salisbury Plain in the winter, as the snipers Armourer of the era, the old plodders (L42's I mean) took it all in its stride

Then what other explanation is there for an Enfield Rifle bolt binding so badly the sniper had to discard the rifle and continue the battle with a captured enemy weapon?
There is the possibility that at that late date, shortly before the L42 was replaced, that this particular sniper may have been issued an unsuitable ammunition for his rifle.
The incident is recounted in several books on snipers, and since the gentleman was decorated for his role in turning the tide of that battle I would be suprised if you had not heard of it before.

And chapter wotsit, further down. Britain very nearly had 60,000 No4 7.62mm conversions on its hands. Saved from a disaster then by the fact that...... I won't go on as the reason why we didn't embark on the L8 programme has been aired several times already. BUT, just to prove or emphasise the point, might I politely ask just ONE question.

Just WHERE do you think the stockpiles of 1965 dated 7.62mm No4 magazines, extractors and charger guide inserts come from. Just a point to ponder chaps.....

So the rifles were never issued for military use not even for guard duty or as training rifles, or surplused out to allies I take it, instead squireled away in some storage facilty while .303 rifles continued in daily use around the world throughout the sixties and seventies.
Is there a single instance you can think of where the L8 rifle was used in combat?
If the conversion were considered a usable alternative then why were the other No.4 rifles not also converted rather than continuing to manufacture .303 ammo for them into the 70's?
US WW2 Garands converted to 7.62 were in regular use by the USN during that same time frame.
Practically any third world military has the minumum facilities available to it to rebarrel a No.4 Enfield to 7.62, so why haven't they done so? Quality recent production 7.62 would be far easier to obtain than .303 and the 7.62 NATO caliber MGs and LMGs are everywhere these days with older Brownings easily converted to 7.62.
Converted 7.62 Mausers saw a great deal of combat in the middle east, and soldiered on for decades there, I've never heard of any converted No.4 rifles used in any role other than as sniper rifles and as civilian target rifles.

The Ross Rifle made a fine snipers rifle, but was a disaster as an infantry rifle, I doubt anyone could argue with that.
The amount of care and the quality of ammunition used is a factor in how well a rifle does in its chosen role.

The Manual for US Snipers goes into great detail on keeping the weapon clean, far cleaner than one could expect from an infantry rifle that might well fire more rounds in a single hours long engagement than the number shots fired from a bolt action sniper rifle during its entire service life.


PS
The failure of an L42 rifle in the Falklands is mentioned in the book "Out of Nowhere" by Martin Pegler on page 289 with a quote of what the sniper told the author personally, and in passing in Pegler's book "The Military Sniper since 1914".
I've run across accounts of the incident in other places with the name of the sniper and more detail on the battle.
According to the sniper not only did the bolt become very difficult to operate the rifle lost its zero. He finally tossed his L42 in a stream, probably to avoid it being taken if he was over run, and continued the battle with a captured Argentine FAL rifle, which he said worked fine up to 400 yards.

[PrinzEugen]

A rifle jams in action...never happened before has it?

Oh well - I think this debate's somewhat moved on from Simon's really interesting start...Snip?

[Simon]

Funnily enough I was just thinking to myself that this has gone off on a bit of a tangent.

Cheers,
Simon.

A rifle jams in action...never happened before has it?

Oh well - I think this debate's somewhat moved on from Simon's really interesting start...Snip?

[Thunderbox]

Then what other explanation is there for an Enfield Rifle bolt binding so badly the sniper had to discard the rifle and continue the battle with a captured enemy weapon?
There is the possibility that at that late date, shortly before the L42 was replaced, that this particular sniper may have been issued an unsuitable ammunition for his rifle.
The incident is recounted in several books on snipers, and since the gentleman was decorated for his role in turning the tide of that battle I would be suprised if you had not heard of it before.


PS
The failure of an L42 rifle in the Falklands is mentioned in the book "Out of Nowhere" by Martin Pegler on page 289 with a quote of what the sniper told the author personally, and in passing in Pegler's book "The Military Sniper since 1914".
I've run across accounts of the incident in other places with the name of the sniper and more detail on the battle.
According to the sniper not only did the bolt become very difficult to operate the rifle lost its zero. He finally tossed his L42 in a stream, probably to avoid it being taken if he was over run, and continued the battle with a captured Argentine FAL rifle, which he said worked fine up to 400 yards.

I'll look into this, as the tale seems more than a little "enhanced" - not uncommon twenty years after the event and when someone needs to spice up a book...

AFAIK no British unit in the Falklands was ever remotely in danger of "being overrun" (the Argentines only attempted a single offensive action - a desultory counterattack on 2 Para at Wireless Ridge, which was dispersed almost immediately), and there were certainly no grounds for anyone to destroy equipment.

Some snipers did arm themselves with SLRs/FNs, but that was simply because they wanted to get in on the act and there was little use for sniping in what was a series of advance to contact and deliberate assaults by the British.

The L42 had almost another good ten years' service following the Falklands.

[Peter Laidler]

Couldn't have put it better myself Thunderbox. The book referred to is not on the list of 'required course reading' for the snipers courses ....... so far as up to this lunchtime.

I'll have to go back and read the very extensive after-battle debriefings to read up on this, not having read the book in any depth. 4 L42's were lost in action though, on the Galahad

[Strangely Brown]

.
I'll also side with the National Rifle associations of Britian, Australia, and the US on the issue of what sort of ammo is safe for use in the No.4 rifles.

The NRA of Great Britain has withdrawn the notice regarding the new issue 7.62mm ammunition as being possibly unsafe in No 4 actions.

It does occur to me, "Alfred" that I may have read a similiar post to yours elswhere on the internet, have we met before on a similiar discussion??