Sniper Ammo Selection

[TonyE]

The experiments with boat tailed bullets that Lord Cottesloe and other match rifle shooters carried out took place in the 1920s, and resulted in the Kynoch match ammunition that was so successful. The War Office took a close interest in these trials and they led indirectly to the adoption of the Mark VIIIZ round in 1938. They were also busy developing the .303 Magnum round, and some of this work would probably have fcontributed to the new British infantry cartridge if WW2 had not intervened.

Very few Pattern 14 sniping rifles made it to France in WWI, although there were plans to re-barrel several hundred Pattern 13 rifles still in store to .470 Nitro Express for sniping. By 1918 the favoured ammunition for snipers was the AP Mark VIIW round, as it could defeat German sniper shields and loopholes at the ranges encountered. The earlier Ap rounds, the VIIF and VIIP were not capable of this.

F.W.Jones was a noted chemist and ballistics expert who worked as a consultant to the Ministry of Munitions during the war and was closely involved with the development of AP, incendiary and explosive ammu ition for the air service.

I have a copy of his notes of all his work that he wrote in 1920, and although he worked on such diverse topics as electric caps for .303 and 12 bore Chain Shot, he makes no mention of any development of boat tailed ammunition.

The first real military interest in BT bullets for .303 came about in 1920 as a result of work on the new .5 Vickers ammunition, when the Director of Artillery suggested that it might be worth investigating. There is a great deal of information on the trials of the next few years but the end product was the Mark VIIIz in 1938.

Regards
TonyE

[Peter Laidler]

And a fine adjustment backsight on the P'14 in WW1?

[Peter Laidler]

P'14 fine adjustment sight in WW1 too...............? That's not quite the Ordnance Board understanding of the matter is!

[Thunderbox]

Tony,

Do you have any descriptions of the various types of Kynoch .303 match ammunition - ie bullet weight/shape, propellant & headstamp?

I have a few sealed boxes that I am reluctant to open, and a selection of loose rounds that appear to be Kynoch civilian target loads but that do not have much in the way of distinguishing marks. It seems that Kynoch was loading flat base 174gn bullets over cordite up until the 1960s, when they switched to same bullets over nitro (presumably all the military cordite production facilities had by then ceased), followed finally by a boat-tail over nitro.

Do you also happen to know by what arrangement cordite was used in commercial ammunition? Presumably all cordite came from ROF plants, and would therefore have to be subject to government sale before being used for civilian purposes.

[Alfred]

P'14 fine adjustment sight in WW1 too...............? That's not quite the Ordnance Board understanding of the matter is!

As World War I progressed, the need for a sniper rifle became apparent. Due to the P14's demonstrated accuracy it was the natural choice for a precision rifle.

Efforts were quickly made to develop a micrometer type back sight to improve upon the P14's natural accuracy. By late in 1917 a windage adjustable micrometer sight was available. These sights were approved for fitting to Winchester made rifles. The Winchester, having proved to be the most reliable and accurate of the three manufacturers. These rifles were designated Pattern 1914 MkI(F), the F denoting Fine Adjustment Sight.

Pattern 1914 (T) Sniper Rifle

Doesn't say who manufactured it.

Rifles of the world page 110
Rifles of the world - Google Books
Lists both remington and Winchester manufacture Fine adjustment sight (F) rifles.
I's suspect the windage adjustable slides were by Lyman. Similar slides were fitted to barrel mounted ladder sights for match shooting.

I would imagine that this was the same windage adjustable slide used for the BAR, that sight being basically the same sight as thw M1917 except for the windage adjustment feature.


I have an old American Rifleman magazine around here somewhere that has photos of several experimental scope sight attachments for the P-14 rifle, one I remember was a German style claw mount dovetailed into the receiver ring.
Lord Cotteslowe's Scope mounting design was not approved till December of 1918 so it would have only seen action on a trial basis, perhaps a few other prototype scoped rifles were tested in the field.

Since commercial sporting rifles were used to some extent, its not unlikely that prototypes of scoped rifles of various sorts were field tested as well.

The only Kynoch Matchgrade .303 I've read of is the "Swift Bullet" designed by J H Hardcastle, a heavy ball pointed bullet that is considered a step in the evolution of the lighter MkVII bullet.

I have a copy of his notes of all his work that he wrote in 1920, and although he worked on such diverse topics as electric caps for .303 and 12 bore Chain Shot, he makes no mention of any development of boat tailed ammunition.

You can check Hatcher's Notebook
Hatcher's Notebook - Google Books

Jones may have been testing a bullet designed by someone else.

As for civilian use of Cordite, Greener says in his "the Gun and its Development" that if ammunition is to be loaded using cordite one should obtain it only from those factories that supplied it to the government and be sure it met government acceptance standards.
Records of the British Parliment mention deffective lots of cordite obtained from commercial sources, huge quantities being found contaminated by mercury.
There are mentions , in Greener's book perhaps, of Cordite being delivered to ammunition manufacturers still in a paste form, the manufacturers extruding the paste into whatever form they used for their ammunition. Besides the common strands there were flat ribbon types and flake types.

Most likely the information I found on the other forum confused use of Mk8Z in WW2 with use of MkVIIz in WW1.
Both the French and the Germans used heavy Boat Tail bullets for Long range Machinegun fire during WW1.
Hatchers notes on the development of the M1 boat tail bullet mentions the superior range of the German, French, and the Vickersguns in .303 used by US forces compared to the Browning using the 150 grain 06 loads. His notes give the range of the 06 load as very near that of the published maximum range given for the Vickers using the MkVII round which is no where near the near 50% greater range that Hatcher attributes to the Vickers of WW1. His figures seem more suited to the MkVIIIz which was not officially adopted till more than ten years after the M1 boat tail heavy Ball rounds.
Makes me wonder just what the US crews were feeding their Vickers Guns.

[Badger]

Pattern 1914 (T) Sniper Rifle

Doesn't say who manufactured it.

Rifles of the world page 110
Rifles of the world - Google Books
Lists both remington and Winchester manufacture Fine adjustment sight (F) rifles.

No need to run all over the web looking for references to cut-n-paste when there are Knowledge Library entries of "all correct" Pattern 1914 snipers right here in the England - Milsurp Knowledge Library (click here).

No.3 MkI* (T) Rifle - (Pattern 1914 Mk1* W (T) Sniper Rifle)
c/w matching Model 1918 (3x) Scope Serial #226763 (Mfg by B.S.A Guns)

No.3 MkI* (T) Rifle - (Pattern 1914 Mk1* W (T) Sniper Rifle)
(Manufactured by Winchester - Serial #W196128)
c/w Model 1918 (3x) Scope (Mfg by Periscopic Prism Co. Ltd.)
c/w 1908 Web Pattern sling (Mfg in 1913 by M.E. Co.)

Under the Collector's Comments and Feedback section of those MKL entries, there's a discussion of the fine adjustment aperture rear sight.

1. In reference to the special aperture rear sight with fine adjustment screw on the top, they were all Winchester made and converted by the British. All had the original Winchester rifle serial number on the back (as per unconverted Winchester sights). If Serial No. is barred out, it means that sights were taken off rifles, converted at Enfield, and then the sights were sent to WW1 sniping schools to retro fit on existing rifles at the school. If Serial No. is not barred out, then the same conversion process occurred, but the sight was put back on the original rifle held at Enfield. From the 30 or so that I have seen the ratio of barred out to not barred is 70:30

The giveaway on the fakes is a slightly larger adjustment knob with cross checkering. Real ones like the one mounted on the rifle which is the subject of this Knowledge Library entry (see pics below), have vertical lines on the knob.

P14(F) Authentic Sights
(Pics Courtesy of ~Angel~)
(Click PIC to Enlarge)
(Click PIC to Enlarge)


P14(F) Reproduction Sights
(Pics Courtesy of Terryinvictoria)
(Click PIC to Enlarge)

(Click PIC to Enlarge)


It took a while to search through a large ammo tin holding about 5000 P14 and M1917 rear sights but by the law of averages I thought I would find a few P14(F). Found about 20 and another ten or so turned up later. Sold most to friends and we formed a P14(F) team. Only got one spare left. You can get your elevation dead on so hitting Fig 14 Huns Heads at 400 yards was easy! ....... (Feedback by "Nigel Greenaway")

Regards,
Badger

[Alfred]

I don't see a windage adjustment on that sight, so would that mean that the fine adjustment was to elevation only?
Or is that sight missing the adjustment knob at the pivot. There seems to be a threaded stem sticking out to the right side of the base.
I checked the BAR sights and the ones pictured adjust at the pivot rather than a adjustable slide.
A major complaint against the M1917 was lack of windage adjustment except by drifting the front sight.
Hesketh Pritchard gives a description of the apeture sighted P-14 as a sniper rifle, so despite lack of a scope mount it would still be a sniper rifle, though these days it would fill the role of designated marksman or sharpshooter.

[Alfred]

P'14 fine adjustment sight in WW1 too...............? That's not quite the Ordnance Board understanding of the matter is!

What would be the Ordnance Board understanding you speak of?

[Badger]

I don't see a windage adjustment on that sight, so would that mean that the fine adjustment was to elevation only?

Letting the empirical data speak for itself, that would be a fair guess ...

Regards,
Badger

[Alfred]

Letting the empirical data speak for itself, that would be a fair guess ...

Regards,
Badger

Since the British had disabled the windage adjustment feature of many No.1 MkIII rifles to conform to the non adjustable MkIII* type I wouldn't put it past them to have done the same to a windage ajustable P-14 sight.
The length of threaded rod sticking out of the base of the sight you posted of has me wondering, it does look like the threaded rod of the MkIII sight with windage wheel removed.
Illustrations of the fine adustment sight in Sniping in France show the end of a headless slotted screw end there.