L42A1 Sniper Overview: The Last Lee Enfield

[Peter Laidler]

To be honest Darren, it'd take a whole book to relate the woes of the little SA80. But I have been saved the job by Steve Raw who wrote a book called The Last Enfield published by Collector Grade. But there's always a silver lining to every dark cloud because the much heavily modified A2 variant seems to have put all its critics into their place and shown that while the basic design was good, it needed perfecting and trialling PROPERLY before it could be considered fit for service.

Some have said that too much emphasis was spent on pushing the rifle forward too early, others say that the trials teams were prevented from saying thins they ought to have been saying while others say that there were far too many fingers in the original pie. Quite whoever suggested that the little L86/LSW was a light support machine gun and could replace the Bren or augment the GPMG was clearly on another planet. A rifle with a bipod and a long barrel is simply a heavy rifle! (As were the RPK,and the heavy L2A1)


But that said, nobody can really complain about the A2 rifle. It is however a case of give a dog a bad name that the good A2 version has had to shake off. The SUSAT was the only part of the rifle that noone ever complained about so far as I recall.

Added later..... It has been told that H&K did all the work to improve the A1 version but that isn't quite correct. MOST of the ideas were formulated at Shrivenham by some of the brains and technical bods there including WO2 Ray xxxxx and one of the bit part contributors to this forum incidentally. H&K won the contract to put all of the relatively small ideas into one package. There were other bidders to do the work but politics and business and........ Lets stop here!

Anything major amiss with it now Skippy? Brit Plumber? Apart from the fact that they're all getting a bit tired now

[Sentryduty]

Thank you for the post Peter, I will try to track down that book.

Quite whoever suggested that the little L86/LSW was a light support machine gun and could replace the Bren or augment the GPMG was clearly on another planet. A rifle with a bipod and a long barrel is simply a heavy rifle! (As were the RPK,and the heavy L2A1)

I had always thought this was a tactical delusion as well, the magazine capacity was not increased, and it lacks a quick-change barrel did it not? After basic training I was handed a C9 (FN Minimi) for the next few years of my soldiering career and grew to really appreciate the volume of fire delivered with 200 round belt boxes and barrels that could be changed in less than count to 3. The C9, like all Minimi's could be fed from standard rifle magazines in emergencies, with the gas set to adverse and no drag on the feed pawls from a belt, a clean gun would run at 1000+ rpm. A 30 round box would be depleted in 2 angry "burps" unless very dedicated trigger control managed to stop at 7-10 rounds per squeeze.

[Son]

All this discussion is irrelevant anyway. The last Lee Enfield was the No1 receiver, in whatever form the very last one off a production line was (2A1 ?)
The No4 was developed by the engineers at RASF Enfield to make it stronger and easier to produce utilising modern machining techniques and was accepted at the time to be such a departure from Lee's original design that "Lee" was removed from the nomenclature. The new rifle was always the "Enfield Rifle No4"

[Roger Payne]

Everyone is going to have their own interpretation of this question - & it's academic anyway, really. One might argue that the humble little No8 is the last - it's still in service with cadet units.

[Peter Laidler]

If I might humbly disagree on one small point Brad (thread 13). Whether or not the No4 was or wasn't ever designated as a LEE or not, the fact remains that it contained the LEE bolt, the Enfield rifling and basic body mechanism. Additionally, it was always the RIFLE, .303" No4 Mk xyz. Neither Lee nor Enfield were in the title.

Is it right to call the No8 the last Lee Enfield. It's Lee bolt with a cock-on-opening is a significant departure from Lee's idea. As is the whole mechanism in the body. Just an pinion of course.

It's something that we did ponder over at work. But we do know that the L59 rifle is the last officially authorised incarnation of the Lee Enfield and Lee's basic design. That's why I think every serious collector should have one in his collection, especially now while they're cheap and readily available - and off licence in the UK too!

Personally I'd like to see a bit more input into this lively thread and thank everyone so far.

[blurrededge]

I picked up my L59 years ago at the Militaria fair down at Chatham Dockyard for around £230 I think, it's the only Deact I have and hangs up on the wall getting dusty. It was pretty battered when I got it so it got stripped, wood refinished, action re suncorited (that reminds me, I need to give that tin a shake and a turn). I refinished it exactly as it was when I got it, the stenciling of the DP letters was originaly with marker pen so I did the same although I'm sure it should be painted, which I'll have to get around to doing. Only anoying thing is, it's been deactivated further to UK specs, bolt head ground away at an angle and bar welded across the chamber preventing a drill round being chambered. I'm sure I read somewhere, probably on this forum, that some were converted to L59 spec at the factory and some were done at base workshops, be interesting to know where mine was done, if there's any kind of giveaway clue.
Also, here's a pic of my No8, currently sporting a SUSAT I had knocking around. it's on a one off mount, just for a bit of range fun..... I hasten to add, no No8 was hurt in the creation of this dogs breakfast, it's a "no gunsmith" type of mount so purely temporary, yes the eye relief is all wrong, the sight picture is terrible, kind of like using a ZF41, and as for cheek weld, forget it unless you have a chin like Jimmy Hill, even so I can shoot good groups with it. One more 50yd shoot though and I'm back to irons.

[Peter Laidler]

Your L59 was converted at a large Field/Command workshop. The DP status has now been accepted as truly deactivated as it was already deemed incapable of discharging a shot, bullet or any other like missile.

Er....... Shame about the No8!

[CINDERS]

I was under the impression we were looking at the rifle No 1 Mk III the last one off the production line which I gather is a bit like a chicken and egg question. And not withstanding the satellite places like good old India when they brought the tooling from England but a bona-fide example of the last unit assembled by Enfield. One would think that it would be known that the said rifle was going to be the last and some measures put in place to preserve the example.
Agreed the services did not give a toss whether it was the first or last as long as it functioned as designed, was within military spec to kill the enemy, but sometimes moves were afoot to navigate the system to collar an item for posterity, the SA80 is a different saga and will never ever get to the figures produced of the Lee Enfield No 1 Mk III rifle. Frankly I know naught of the SA80 saga and do not care about it, I have seen our Army reservists utilize the Steyr on our range @300m and from what I have seen given Australias topography I would want an SLR in 7.62 as the rifle served Aussie troops well and has a good deal of horsepower for persons hell bent on hurting the innocent people of this world.
All in all I guess the quest will be a never to be found example but imagine if you did own such a rifle considering the millions of them made over the years..........?

[Roger Payne]

I agree Cinders.........& the question can mean different things to different readers. Do we mean the last design, or the last rifle of the Lee Enfield family to roll off the production line, or the last rifle to remain in service? There are no doubt additional ways of interpreting the question too.......it reminds me of the old chestnut of 'which is the better rifle, the Lee Enfield or the Mauser 98?!!' That one will roll on for as long as there are shooters! This debate, to my mind, is similar. But, as Peter insinuated above, it stimulates lively discussion.

[Gil Boyd]

Agreed, but I do have the last one.................a bit like "I'm Spartacus"