sportered 03 Barrel--worth re-militarizing?

[Calfed]

I recently nabbed this sportered 03 barrel thinking that it could be remil'd. now I'm not so sure. It has been heavily polished and blued and has what are probably light wrench marks and a flat spot near the threads. The spline cuts are still present.



There is a shallow drilled hole on the threads that doesn't go very deep and is not actually over the chamber area. The bore is shiny and rifling sharp. It measures about a .75 on the CMP muzzle gauge


Is this barrel worth trying to remount military sights on? Is it even possible? If the 03 rear sight can not be remounted, could this be used as an 03A3 barrel or would the cost of making the cuts for the front sight be prohibitive?

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[45B20]

Calfed

Of course that barrel could be returned to a ‘kinda military’ condition. But unless you have a $100 or so, you are willing to put into an appearance thing,,, you are going to have to do all or at least most of the work yourself.

And you must ask yourself, WHY? It will still be a cosmetic thing and you will never get your money or effort out of it.

But if you feel it is something you must have:::: read on, be careful and have fun.

You need to remove the shine and blue,,, But first, fit the sights, if you take off the shine/blue first and have the metal bare, you must worry about rust and if you put oil on it you must get all of the oil off before you refinish. So get the sights fitted, remove sights,, remove shine/blue, refinish , then install sights.

The barrel looks to be reduced in diameter when it was polished, for one, I can not see any of the barrel marks that would be behind the front sight. So I am figuring that any GI sights will be too loose on that barrel. But try them first,, they may fit just fine. If not,, you must reduce the inside diameter of the fixed base (rear sight base) and the fixed stud (front sight base). You might try low temp silver solder and put a liner into each one and using an expandable hand reamer expand these liners until the sights fit snuggly on the barrel.

OR cut the bases lengthwise on the bottom with a very thin hacksaw or a Dremel cutoff wheel. Then sneeze them on a mandrel of the correct size and welded them. You can make the mandrel out of a piece of steel pipe that you have reduced to the correct diameter,,, (0.0005”) under the diameter were the sight base should fit on the barrel. Be sure to drill/cut a slot in the steel pipe were you will be doing the welding so you will not weld the sight to the pipe. OR take a piece of 1/8” steel flat stock and reduce its width to slightly less than the dia of the barrel where the sights will set and use that for a mandrel. If you need to have the welding done for you, set everything up first, then take to welder. Best to make both front and rear bases inside diameter slightly too small and then enlarge to a snug fit on the barrel. To enlarge the inside diameters use an expandable hand reamer, or a round file and sandpaper on a wood dowel or steel or brass road. On the rear base, you probably could just fit the rear of the sight base and hope the front inside dia. is close.


Now removing the shine/blue,,, do any&all of this work with good stoppers/corks firmly inserted in each end of the barrel. Sand/bead blasting is best and if you can do the work your self, great, if not, money. A wire wheel could do the job, hold the barrel diagonally to the wheel and reverse the angle for each pass. There is usually oil on wire wheel so clean the barrel before you refinish. Or by hand with sandpaper/emery cloth is a possibly, cheap but time consuming. Another possibility which has some real dangers. ACID, not stuff to take lightly, have full face shield, rubber/plastic apron and long rubber gloves. Most home improvement stores have those long red troughs used to mix plaster in. Get two that your barrel will fit in,, some swimming pool acid and some heavy nylon cord. Set up one trough so there is NO chance of it tipping over, set up another trough and fill that one with a water baking soda mix, have it close by but not next to the first trough and have a garden hose on and running with someone holding it near by. Also have dry rags and a hair drier close by.

Have whoever has that running hose be very careful, no water near the acid through.

Now with cords to form a handle around both ends of the barrel. All your protective gear on, fill the first trough with straight acid, now holding on to handles, dip barrel in acid, do not release handles, do not let barrel set on bottom of trough. With straight acid this should be quick, remove & check barrel about every 10 sec. until you have completely removed the blue and etched the barrel steel slightly but no more than is necessary. Then into the water/baking soda mix to kill the acid, slarsh the barrel around in there for a good two or three min. Then to the running hose a wash the barrel off, then a complete dry with the rags and hair dryer, then a spray on finish or if you want to park.,, coat with oil. But given what this is,, I would recommend one of the spray-on finishes, GunCoat, some of the Brownells stuff or simple bake-on barbeque or hot engine paint, what ever you wish. Then install sight bases, you can give the sight bases the same finish remover process and finish as you used on the barrel. Hopefully the pin holes will line up and give enough grip, if not, try backing them up with epoxy.

Remember, be flexible, these are some ideas but not the only ones. Examples, you could braze/silver solder not weld the cut edges of the sight bases or forget about the mandrel thing and simply squeeze the cut edges of the sight bases together weld/braze them and then open up the inside diameters to fit, or what ever ideas you or anyone elce can think of.


I have tried to keep this simple, using things you could by at most home improvement stores or good old Harbor Freight. You can see this will take some time, but if it is what you want,,, do it.

Good luck

45B20

[Chuckindenver]

you would have to modify the front sight area so that it would accept a front sight, a shim, drill and tap a hole in the front sight base, through to the barrel, just deap enough to hold the base in place would do it.
it is a 1903 barrel, and not an A3 barrel, id check to see if a rear sight base fits tight before you go any farther, also make sure the barrel doesnt over index on the action you plan on installing it on.
on pre war 1903 barrels the front sight key is made as part of the barrel, SA 42, Sedgly, HS and Remington barrrels had a key way made into the barrel, and the key is removed.
you could also install a key way into the barrel for the front sight base,
however, unless you have the right tools yourself, it can get pricey, and would likely be cheaper to get a 1903 barrel that hasnt been messed with yet.

[Calfed]

Gee, 45B20, this sounds like a piece of cake

This barrel has been heavily polished, at least in spots. There is no trace of the flaming bomb, manufacturer or date at the muzzle end. On the other hand, there are letters and numbers midway down the barrel that are still clear.


I guess my main question was "How much polishing will an 03 barrel take before it has been reduced enough in size that the front or rear sight bases will no longer fit snugly?" Can I measure the outside of the barrel where the sight bases fit and compare my measurements to a known value? Or is it clear, with the date/manufacturer/flaming bomb completely polished away that the front sight simply will never fit correctly absent the "heroic" measures that you have described?

I'm also concerned about "flat spot" on the breach end of the barrel. Did some 03 barrels have a flat spot located in that position.

You obviously put a lot of thought and effort into your response and I appreciate the issues that you raised and the time that you spent.

[Chuckindenver]

slide a front sight base over the muzzle, should fit tight, looks like that may be a RIA barrel..
never seen a flat spot on a 1903 barrel, likely it was done long after the military had that barrel, the rear sight base should cover that spot...
i saw it, but thought it was a glare from light....run a patch down the bore slowly. see if its been squashed by the vise...if it has been, youll feel it with a oiled patch..
if its sqaushed....its garbage...
may be in the chamber area, you may be able to see if its distoreted... iv seen them squashed from a vise before,, ruins any hope of hitting a target..
on the front sight issue..
yesterday, i finished up one of my personal shooter projects, i rebarreld a 1903 to .260 Remington, and wanted it to look like a NRA sporter. and wanted a military front sight.
since it had no spline or keyway for a front sight, and a front sight base fit pretty tight, i slid it on. made sure it was square with the rear sight, and drilled a hole through the front sight base, and into the barrel, just enough to hold the set screw in place..
made a set screw from a standard 6-48 screw, counter sank it a bit, cleaned up the top, and a front sight fit fine...havnt range tested it as of yet..but will, doubt it will fly off.
some Lyman front sight bases were held on the same way, set screw is covered with the front sight.
wanted to comment on your second picture. i see that the shoulder has been crushed hard....hense my check index before going any further..
if you check the rebarrling post..it will help you check the pre index.

[Calfed]

Thanks, Chuck.

The flat spot on the barrel is over the chamber. I looked carefully and it does not seem to have crushed the chamber. I also slipped a 30.06 resized case into the chamber and it seemed to fit fine...the same as in another replacement 03 barrel that I have. Looking at the flat spot, I believe that it was ground, rather than crushed flat. It is pretty smooth and uniform. Why anyone would bother to grind a flat spot is a mystery to me.

Does the shoulder being crushed hard ruin the barrel, or just make it impossible (or at least difficult) to mount the barrel with the sights properly indexed? If it is still usable as a barrel, but not with military sights, I may just use it for a "faux" (and I mean really "faux") 03A4 that I would like to make up for my son.

Steve

[Chuckindenver]

Attachment 17742Attachment 17741Attachment 17743you can roll the shoulder back for one more fit sometimes..
heres some pics of how i did a front sight..