A Little Known No32 Bracket.......The Mike Baylis variant.

I mentioned on another recent thread that a friend & I had clubbed together to buy the collection of scopes & ancillary bits & pieces of a recently deceased old acquaintance & club mate, the late Mike Baylis. Mike was a skilled machinist & in the early to mid 1990's having purchased a couple from me, he decided to tool up & make his own No32 mounts. He had patterns made & did the machining of the resultant castings himself. I had made a copy based on the Dalgleish bracket variant, so he plumped for the Rose Brothers type. He only made a very few - I don't know exactly how many, but at a guess maybe between ten & twenty, though he definitely did sell a few to the general collecting public. So, there is quite probably one or two of them still out there, maybe in the hands of collectors who aren't quite sure what they have. You can see from the enclosed photo's that he 'slimmed down' the main lengthwise strut of the bracket & made it parallel, not slightly tapered, as on the original Rose Brothers products. However, Mike's brackets were of a very good standard of manufacture, & sand cast very similar to the originals. When we bought his collection a couple of weeks back one of his scopes came with a home grown bracket on it. I'd forgotten about them as it was so long ago, but recognised it almost immediately. I thought they deserved a mention as most people, if seeing one, would probably assume it was some sort of recently produced mount. It is a reproduction, but a thirty year old one! Incidentally, I assume Mike added the 'JG' stamp himself, though I am sure not for any nefarious reason. He never sold this bracket.Attachment 106001Attachment 106000Attachment 105999Attachment 106002

Roger,
Real shame he never used his own initials, as that would would have been a real accomplishment and a credit to the man.
Moving times and it must have been a really hard one too!

It's only speculation Gil, but I wonder if there is a reason he chose 'M' as the letter prefix on the cradle clamps?!

I've seen several of that design bracket (on guns) - all advertised as original.

Also he put the JC upside down perhaps to signify it was a copy and a very well made repro of the mount notwithstanding the straightness of the design. See pic of the J C stamping on my 1944 M47C T's bracket.

He might have stamped the JG upside down for that reason, but they're sometimes upside down & sideways on on the genuine item. I guess the inspectors weren't too fussy, after all they were no doubt in a hurry, & there was a war on!