Re Fitting a No. 4 Mk 1* Fore-end

[Flying10uk]

I could get a new collar but the steel shims will at least get me going in the right direction

Have you checked the collar for increased diameter/distortion? Often when an item such as a steel bush is crushed it's diameter increases because, as my first foreman once said, "The metal has to go somewhere.". Obviously, an over diameter/distorted bush/collar is going to do little to aid alignment in this situation that is the subject of this thread.

[Peter Laidler]

I have got a much better idea. Just parcel it all up and send it to Brian. He has the mysterious fitting of fore-ends down to a fine art.

As apprentices, it took months and months of classroom theory and practice to fit a fore-end properly and correctly. And if we did it wrong, we had to patch the fore-end and fit it again - properly this time. Just send it to Brian.

I have fitted plenty badly, patched and refitted plenty too as an apprentice. And done literally hundreds since. And you ain't going to learn by reading, believe me

[mrclark303]

I have got a much better idea. Just parcel it all up and send it to Brian. He has the mysterious fitting of fore-ends down to a fine art.

As apprentices, it took months and months of classroom theory and practice to fit a fore-end properly and correctly. And if we did it wrong, we had to patch the fore-end and fit it again - properly this time. Just send it to Brian.

I have fitted plenty badly, patched and refitted plenty too as an apprentice. And done literally hundreds since. And you ain't going to learn by reading, believe me

I've done a few now and its really not easy, that's using your clear instructions Peter and going very slowly and methodically! That said, fitting a NOS 1903 Springfield stock is even worse, that really is a royal pain, getting the action seated at the 'exact' right height.

[CINDERS]

From memory I think the uplift at the front 1 1/2" near the muzzle is 4-5lbs is that correct.

One of my No.4's is solid bedded with no uplift at all and it shoots very well indeed have won shoots & comps with it, my go to one I use predominantly has normal bedding is just as good winning an invitational shoot a fair while ago at the SASR range in perth against 40 other Lee enfield, Springfield, M-17 & mauser shooters.

[flygrimm]

Peter

Sending the whole kit to Brian might be an option in the future. I wish we had discussed it when I sent him the barrels and action but alas it didn't occur to either one of us I guess.

So onwards, or should I say back to the beginning.

I've been messing around with the fit at the draws. I had inadvertently left a small amount of tape on the action behind the draws and reassembled it. The fit was fantastic at the rear with no back and forth movement at all. I wondered what had changed and when I took it apart I realized that I had a tiny bit of tape on the back side of the draws. Well an experiment was in order so I put 1 layer of tape (about .0045") over the entire face of the draws (picture 1) and reassembled. Fitting the fore-end again the fore/aft movement was completely gone as well as the side to side at the draws. Hmmm.

Putting everything back together resulted in some other interesting things. The gap between the collar and the trigger guard is almost completely gone and now I'm getting contact at the muzzle. Not much, only about 0.5 pound but it's better than the negative value I had before. As for the collar I can only guess that there was something protruding from somewhere that was keeping the fore-end up a bit. That seems to have resolved itself anyway.

Now that the fit at the rear seemed to start cooperating with me I turned my attention to the muzzle. As I said I am now getting positive contact at the front end now. So another experiment was in order. As the front trigger guard screw is a pivot point instead of removing material at the barrel reinforce I added more tape shims to the back of the fore-end (picture 2). A temporary measure, If I don't remove any wood, I won't have to put it back! I added around .018" at the rear and that brought the muzzle force to around 1.5 pounds. Admittedly a bit on the low side of the 3-7 pound range but at least I appear to be moving in the right direction.

Got to fly the jet for the next week so I won't be able to work on her for a bit, but as always your comments are greatly appreciated.

Stuart

[scharfschutzen63]

If you are going to be flying jets this week, you can certainly afford to pay someone to do the work properly.

[flygrimm]

If you are going to be flying jets this week, you can certainly afford to pay someone to do the work properly.

But where would be the fun in that and I wouldn't learn anything.

Stuart

[Flying10uk]

you can certainly afford to pay someone to do the work properly.

You don't know that Stuart isn't going "to do the work properly", as you put it, at this stage. He may take longer and do the job in a more roundabout way than someone more experienced but it's the end result that counts.

[CINDERS]

If I was going to do what Stuart is doing there are beater stocks out there one can practice on till the cows come in honing ones skill set and practical knowledge, rather than work on the one for the rifle.
That way any faff up's won't matter as you cannot put the wood back well you can but from some of Peters work I have seen and in other books replacing the draws in the stock is a fairly big operation to do correctly.
Besides you'll have some kindling come winter time.