Printable View
I spoke with them recently and they are preparing to offer .303 No.4 barrels soon. Criterion is a volume barrel maker. Their products are relatively reasonably priced. I asked them about making one for me in .308 and they said they don't do custom work just volume production.
Still, it would be nice to get one to replace a hammered out pipe and maybe it would have a tight chamber...
I spoke to them perhaps 2 months ago and was told they were "working" on producing No4 barrels. I was put on a mailing list I think. Havent heard a word from them yet. I'll believ it when I see it.
As I understand it, Criterion was a production grade division of Kreiger, but is now independent. A while back, Kreiger (Criterion? I do not know) was approached about making No. 4 barrels. I supplied a barrel for study purposes. Apparently they were prepared to produce these, muzzle end lugs and all.
I was wondering about that, tiriaq. That would be fantastic indeed if they produced barrels with the bayonet lugs on them. i pretty much just figured they would be without lugs.
Attachment 34683I have one waiting on the transplant list if the cost is not crazy high.Have gathered a few of the other bits needed to reconsitute this Savage No 4 into military configuration.
You know that I'm an old cynic, but knowing the complexities of machining vertical and horizontal indexing planes and then indexing a thread to boot (or vice verca....), I am prepared to bet £25 to any Forces charity that this project won't have produced a barrel to the indexed spec in the next 6 months. Just make a note in your diary for New Years eve to remind me.................
I'm genuinely puzzled no one has stepped into the gap, especially with the machines we have now, not to mention the lo slave labor costs in china.Quote:
Originally Posted by Peter Laidler
---------- Post added at 12:42 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:39 PM ----------
Hi 32nd, do you know what they say would be the number of barrels required to get them making a run? I need a couple of H barrels too... Thanks, this would be good to know, rjwnzQuote:
Originally Posted by 32ndgeorgia
China? Let's not go there.....
It was waaay more than six months ago that I send off the sample barrel.
Criterion makes M-1 and M-14 barrels. Those certainly require indexing with a vengence, so Criterion does know what timing is.
If I were going to make replacement barrels like these, I would leave the shank and chamber a bit short, and no Nock's form.
A 'smith would have to adjust the shoulder to bring the sight base to index, and then deepen the chamber to final headspace. No need to search for a bolthead, just use the one in the action.
Incidentally, the barrel would have a SAAMI chamber, and not the generously dimensionned service chamber.
There has to be a market. I know we are not alone in the search for No 4 barrels.
There's FAR more to it than that Tiriaq....... Just from an Armourers perspective, we'd re-barrel one body with, say, 25 barrels to choose from and they'd all under or even overturn differently and even when it was all correct on the parallel gauge, the foresight block would/could be visibly off line and.............. and.............. Someones STILL got to set the machinery up and if they're doing it from drawings gleaned from back engineering, well.........
Just mark my words............. If they're serious, ask them to speak to someone who has breeched up a few or even had cause to manufacture just the breech end. And at the end of it, you've only got .010" CHS to play with unless you supply a set of bolts.
Not a job for the faint hearted. Just phone me and remind me of my bet at the end of December and we'll down a small scotch together over the phone!
Added later. Errrrr, I meant bolt heads and not bolts! Sorry
These barrels would not be the equivalent of service replacement barrels. They would be commercial barrels ready for final fitting, not unlike the barrels widely available for installation on any number of other actions. It is a standard gunsmithing job to rebarrel rifles. Often the 'smith starts with a barrel without any machining at the breech, and threads, chambers and headspaces the barrel. Barrels with the breech already threaded and the chamber cut almost to full depth are common. Machining a barrel shoulder to allow the barrel to breeech up with sights t.d.c isn't rocket science.
I don't know about UK or Canadian service, but here in Oz, Lithgow actually produced No4 barrels for the target rifle fraternity into the 1960s. These were produced alonngside the "H" barrels for SMLE target rifles.
These Lithgow No4 barrels had the front sight locating lugs but no bayonet lugs and were apparently otherwise as per original spec.
One very interesting note is that the drawing specifies two "grades". What this means is that there was a "standard" barrel with the nominal "factory spec" thread start and a "replacement" barrel on which the thread start was advanced by 10 degrees.
This "advance" of the thread start was to allow appropriate breeching torque on installation on "pre-loved" receivers exhibiting crush of the internal breech thread and/or the front face of the breech ring.
Note: No4s and 5s breech up on the front of the receiver; SMLEs and older models breech up on the internal ring at the rear of the breech thread of the receiver, just like Mauser 98s are supposed to.
Trivia time: Mausers (98s anyway), use a true 55degree Whitworth form thread. Many commercial replacement Mauser barrels have 60degree threads; not good practice. No4s also have a true 55 degree Whitworth form thread. HOWEVER, SMLEs and earlier Lees and Martinis use a wierd "Enfield special" form of 49degrees, 40 minutes included angle. Pitch is the same 14TPI, diameter is nominally the same but with different tolerances.
Bruce, I had a few lithgow No.4 barrels, the front lugs were long and extended almost to the tip, doing both jobs.:wave:
The receivers that would be the candidates for these barrels - if they ever materialize - would be an extremely mixed bag. Provision for fitting could be an asset. Installation is going to be performed by civilian gunsmiths, rather than by service trained armourers. The tools will be generic. While it would be most convenient if the barrels could be simply torqued in, that would not be a reasonable expectation.
The "embuggerance" with No4s is the lugs at the muzzle end.
I have done a couple of P-14 and SMLE barrels by carefully measuring the distance from the receiver front to the internal breech ring and from the receiver front to the face of the bolt-head (striker cocked to hold the bolt back against the lugs).
A few simple calculations give the maximum tenon length and how much headspace will result; tweak carefully.
Then cut the breeching thread and try-fit hand tight.
Remove barrel and cut chamber, then try-fit again.
The extractor cut should be done before final torquing up. If you have a Mk1* P-14, don't forget the clearance cuts in the back of the tenon for the 1* pattern bolt lugs
Once the barrel is "final" fitted and headspace is correct and chambering and extraction is satisfactory, jig up the whole assembly and cut the slot for the frontsight key.
With a No4, one trick is that when you profile the barrel before fitting, leave the muzzle-end section where the lugs are as a cylinder. Then after the back end is OK, set the assembly up and mill away everything that doesn't look like a sight base or bayonet lug. Unless you have a custom-ground shell cutter, this will keep you busy for some time.
Plan "B": Turn a simple collar where the front sight assembly goes. This should be a little smaller than the width across the usual lugs.
Then centre the base up in a chuck and bore out to a close match to the cylindrical lug on the barrel.
Slide on the base and line it up using the instruments of choice.
Douse the mating surfaces with "Super Wick-In" Loctite and leave for a day.
Carefully drill hole for locking pin. Note, you can be traditional and go with tapered pins, or be tricky and use a parallel hole and nested roll-pins.
Machining the bayonet lugs to actually retain a bayonet is an optional extra for bonus "tech-head" points.
Cheers
If you shoot under current NRAA rules and are looking at replacing a No4 barrel don't even worry about the bayonet lugs. Rules now say you don't need them to look like a genuine barrel just original profile,
Cheers
ned
Yeah Ned, that's why they are getting away with reprofiled heavy target barrels in 308 and just necking down.
Some people call it cheating.
But wait, there's more......
The blanks I have been playing with are 0.3025 / 0.311, 1:10 L.H. twist and made here in Oz in a joint experiment with the barrel maker. The first ones went into P-14s. These shot fairly well on first outing with boat-tailed Jugoslav ball. I just don't have a spare pallet or two of Mk7 lying about. The donor rifles appear to be "rufurbs" from the Baltic states and the bedding is "interesting" where it exists. The next step is to whip out the Decvon and tidy that area up.
However, I also run a No4 that has been fitted with a "pre-loved' barrel from an Omark target rifle. Because of the profile of the Omark barrel, and the lopping off of most of the chamber end, the breech reinforce is not quite the same as the original. The rest of the barrel is profiled as per a "proper" No4 and the front sight is attached as per previously described, with Loctite and roll-pins.
Yes, it is a .308" (nominal) groove job. The reason for this was the rapidly diminishing supply of "proper" ammo or projectiles. It is throated so that it will take Mk7 if I had any. It mostly gets fed the Australian 155gn BJD answer to the classic Sierra Palma bullet. These are used in my "real" Omark for other types of matches.
In the "No4.1", these work quite nicely, but the "compromise' throat means that I am probably not getting the best out of the barrel or the bullets. However, I AM shooting; that is, whenever I can get the time away from earning a living. The No4, (with only original sights), and using the BJDs, has a couple of deer to its credit, so I must have done something more-or-less right.
.30/.303 is an option that allows the use of the numerous fine .308 bullets.
Here is another way of mounting a service type front sight on a lugless barrel-
Obtain a scrap barrel, and soft solder the front sight base to the barrel. Cut off the barrel section with the front sight base, and bore out the barrel/base to suit the barrel. Cross pin or bond in place. The remains of the lugs may be just "cheeks" soldered in the grooves in the front sight base.
My opinion is that anyone competent to rebarrel M1A/M14s would have no trouble with No.4 barrels. Both have inclined locking surfaces, variable receiver face lengths (the commercial M1a are almost certainly worse than any variation in No.4s), indexed sight attachment points, and bolts that have their own variables. The good thing is that Critereon is quite familiar with the M14 headaches, so it's unlikely they'll be much surprised by No.4s.
Good point on the M14/ M1A issue.
The difference is that M-14s are made from 8620 steel and have a "square' section breech thread, whereas No4s (at least Mk3 and 4 type receivers) are made from, and I quote from the drawing: B.S. 970 En19R or B.S. 970 En 21R and have a Whitworth form thread.
See: Drawing D5(E) 0355/231.
8620 is a very interesting alloy steel that can be heat treated to provide a very hard skin in a very tough interior structure with minimal distortion.
B.S. 970 is a British steel standard first issued in 1941. En19 series are 1% Chrome/Moly with several variations. This is quite a change from the almost purely carbon alloys of the SMLE series.
In the last few years, I have had the opportunity to study the barrel drawings for M-1s, M-14s and No4s. I have also re-barreled several No4s and M-1As from blanks. Back when Australia still had something of a sense of humour about such things, I found the "easiest" way to do M-14 barrels on a one-off basis, was to:
Rough profile.
Thread and counterbore the breech end.
Rough chamber
Profile
Cut muzzle threads and crown
Fit a muzzle "nut" with centre cone and profile barrel.
Fit to receiver with final torque
Cut final chamber with a "drop" reamer
Mill feed ramps
Mill keyways and slots as required.
Drill gas port
This is fairly time-consuming as you would imagine. Doing them in batches cuts costs. Having a barrel that is "80%+" finished and only needs minimal "tweaking" by the gunsmith is the ideal.
HOWEVER, said gunsmith needs to be "Lee Enfield savvy" with regards to such nasties as receiver wear, twist and stretch for starters. "Tired" bolt bodies and bolt head are supplementary curses. With a No4, it is a good thing if the front sight mounting hugs index correctly as well.
If someone wanted to make a production batch of either M-14 or No4 barrels, they would either need to do some serious reverse engineering or get their sticky paws on the "charts".
In the case of No4s, the person doing the final fitting definitely needs Lee Enfield "smarts" as well.