Restocking a Canadian marked 1918 No1 Mk III

[Sentryduty]

This is a simple before and after of a project I did late in the fall.

This rifle was purchased as a very cheap sporter that turned out to be a gem.

More details to follow!

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[browningautorifle]

Nice to return them to standard. It looks great.

[CINDERS]

Couple of sling swivels and period correct 1918 sling and its all done. The period gear is out there you just have to keep trolling it took me a few years to get a 1916 black sling for my '16 Lith I had a tan coloured Wrights 1916 but preferred the black type, if you wait it does come up for sale. Nice resto looks great

[Peter Laidler]

I have to say that the No1 rifle is a most impressive bit of kit............

[Sentryduty]

Thanks for the comments!

The total build cost of this "restoration" is approximately 50% of market value of a similar rifle in Canada,and since this was for my shooting collection, I wasn't too picky when sourcing the parts.

The wood and hardware came from the same fellow who had been building a few LE's and decided to sell this set.

The nosecap and rear sight protector (Not the rifle of course) are DP marked, in different fonts. The wood is very dark with a "S" short butt, and a small stock repair on the left side of the fore-end. The stock originally came with an aluminium butt plate, but I liked the look of brass and reused the one from the sporter stock.

Speaking of the rifle, I checked it over prior to firing and it headspaced within military specification, and the bore was lead slugged to .312". I ran some commercial hunting ammunition through it and was able to smash a clay pigeon at 100m, prone unsupported after 3 windage corrections. I think there is potential in the rifle with a little more accuracy work on my end and some handloads.

I do need a swivel and sling set, but that will come with time, I was initially worried that I would have an inaccurate slingshot from an untested rifle once the next stock was installed.

[browningautorifle]

prone unsupported

All three of us know that if you bag that rifle you'll shoot better. Prone supported...before you make any radical decisions...like running 'er through the shredder... The white buttplate may have been Indian. If you place a WTB here, you'll likely glean the parts you need...

[CINDERS]

I agree PL they are simple, functional and have been through more conflicts around the world than we care to imagine and still going strong albeit in the wrong hands in some cases, I love my MKIII's allot and hope to pass them on to my son who actually likes shooting them but sorta dissapears when the reloading has to happen!!
One would expect better accuracy when reloaded rounds are used and everything has settled after fitting up the full wood and having the fore end stud and spring as I have known people to delete this part but to me its simple the guys who invented the rifle knew far more about barrel harmonics than I ever will.

Let us know how it goes once you put some hand loads I use 45 ~ 46 grains AR 2209, FLS'ed Rem cases trimmed to length, Fed 210 or CCI Large rifle Match primers and the 174gn Sierra Match King I make them to Mk VII milspec COAL and crimp them.
Now before the detractors get on my case about crimping and it being a needless function I do it so I know every round has the same neck tension regardless in fact they are crimped once rotated 180 degrees then crimped again so if there is any mis alignment it is kept to a minimum yes I am not shooting an eff class rifle but I like to have everything the same so I can fire the rounds out of any of them with no dramas and having accurate range card for each of them.
I have seen guys who get their brass mixed up when only neck sizing get to the mound on the day and cannot chamber a round and are in a quandary as they have to sort out what fits what rifle I can take the brass life issues FLS'ing my brass every time because no matter what 303 I have the ammo will fit that weapon just have the correct card as I may take 6 303s to a match for certain fire strings having rifles different is hard enough but ammo as well shoot not for me.
Hope you next session on the range is gasser sentry duty and it cloverleafs for ya..........

[Sentryduty]

I do have plans for handloads, the main issue just now is obtaining the proper components, especially the SMK 174's, I have a number of local shop available and it appears they have been stripped of anything .312 diameter. So I will have to keep my eyes open. I have some very good brass on hand waiting to go, just need powder and projectiles, both of which are proving elusive.

The main test with the commercial stuff was more to ensure the gun wasn't going to pop and would shoot better than minute of barn door, I had another unknown LE to try that day, so I didn't even take paper targets, just a lead sled, and a length of string for the trigger, I only grabbed the clays in case things went well. While I did my due diligence before purchase, a guy never knows what gets done to a sporter. Some are great, some are very bad basketcases that need to be broken down for parts.

In this case I was pleasantly surprised, and both rifles got to move on to the next rounds, serious attention. I do have a couple more kicking around that are waiting on handloads as well.

[CINDERS]

I do have plans for handloads,

AR 2209 is a good powder and has good temperature stability, I have tried AR 2208 (Varget) found it a bit sharp, if you have no SMK's try Hornady 150gn Spire points these are .312 Flat based and go well to 400m well they worked fine in both my No.4's one thing I did was get the guff on a few different powders and develop some loads with different projies as well it does take time to get there but it has heaps of rewards mainly;
Whilst others are scrambling with a one powder/projie load and finding their powder and projies supply has dried up you can swap out to a known combination in your rifle you have developed and keep on shooting.
Trust me I learnt the hard way as in my state of West Aust we suffer constantly from various components not being available hence it is good practice to have a fair few load combinations that work. Hope it all goes well

[Sentryduty]

Last summer I obtained a No4 for my brother-in-law and we worked up some loads with his expansive collection of equipment. He had gotten the Hornady 150gr SPFB projectiles, a large volume of surplus once fired IVI .303 brass, and we worked up some loads. He had a lot of Varget powder on hand so we researched some of the Australian articles on the combination and rather arbitrarily settling on the following:

150 gr Hornady SP .312"
Federal 210M Primers
IVI '08 Mark 8Z once fired surplus brass.
41 gr VARGET
OAL 2.995' without a neck tension crimp.

The results were excellent, the only issue was a rookie mistake of FL sizing of the brass which gave us a few uneventful case head separations that the ruined the brass. We didn't have a neck sizing die at that time, and the brass was already prepped. I have gotten a neck sizing dies for the future. The recoil was a tad sharp (for a LE) and there was quite a crack to the report but the cases showed no pressure signs and the bolt worked easily.

Performance was better than I could shoot through the mirage that day, with most rounds touching, aside from obvious flyers due to sighting errors. But personally I am hoping to build a Mark 7 or 8Z ball equal to give that bit of long range stability and hopefully keep the sight regulation as engineered at the factory.

As always, more to follow as projects develop.