Lee metford/Enfield cavalry carbine restoration

[englishman_ca]

I was having a bit of a log jam with my carbine restorations. With RIC carbines and NZ contract jobbies I could get away with using a MLE rifle nose cap or one from a Martini Enfield. Not always an easy thing to find, but still doable. However, trying to find a nosecap for a cavalry carbine turned up a big fat zero. There simply are non out there to be found.

Then a chap in New Zealand stepped up with some nosecaps that he had made by investment casting. Very high quality and the fit is quite good. The nosecaps have a healthy price tag, but it is an expensive process and no other options if I wanted to complete those projects. I have restored a couple now with the cast ones, they turned out quite good.

So as an alternative, I made a contact with another collector who was into restoring a sad sportered cav carbine. He basically needed everything except the action. He has access to a full machine shop, including a master machinist with a CNC controlled milling machine. We made a deal. I made him a wood set and supplied the parts he needed, he supplied me a brace of nosecaps copied from an original that I supplied as a pattern. Win - win.


Left is a CNC machined unit, center is original, right side unit is investment cast.



Now to address the lack of barrel bands. Stay tuned!!

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