Cadet Bands

Figured I'd start a new thread on this one.

OK, so we discovered my 1926 Lithgow had a cadet band. I recalled having seen red paint, but upon further inspection last night... I also found yellow. Here's the basic idea here.

The yellow paint was found around the harder to clean out areas on the nose cap and in the seam in the wood. It is in small quantities on the wood, but pretty obvious on the nose cap, even around the bayonet lug.

Now, I found red paint on the wood, but none on the metal. It is in some dings on the stock and in the seam between pieces, it is also fairly obvious. It is only below the discolored part of the stock where the cadet band would have apparently been. Believe me, I was in there with a flashlight!

Now... the stock and nose cap are numbered, and they do match. I haven't seen anything on this rifle that isn't matching.

When I get home tonight I'll try to take some pictures and diagram where the paint is. But in the meantime, any thoughts?

If the rifle gauges up and has been inspected by someone who knows what he's doing and looking for, then the colour of the paint or its previous Cadet Force use is pretty well academic. But in short, so far as I remember from my time as an Armourer in Australia, Cadet Forces at the big schools utilised both colours of paint on their Brens and rifles. Red first and then yellow later or vice verca

That's part of the issue. Short of boxing it up and sending to Lord knows where, I've got no one to look it over. The local smith here isn't taking any more customers and the other only handles tacti-cool stuff.

Suggest you look at the thread you started at. If the two smiths you mention ain't interested, then boxing it up and sending it seem to me to be the only viable option. Sorry to sound so positive about it!