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My new 1916 SHt LE III Looks MINT
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It looks like a Standard Small Arms rifle as rebuilt in Australia. Not really sure. It sports a Parkerized finish and what looks to be coachwood furniture. Are there any FTR markings on the top of the receiver ring? I don't see any on the buttstock.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Brian Dick
It looks like a Standard Small Arms rifle as rebuilt in Australia. Not really sure. It sports a Parkerized finish and what looks to be coachwood furniture. Are there any FTR markings on the top of the receiver ring? I don't see any on the buttstock.
I think it is a crown, with G R below, then crossed flags, and a P. Beside that it looks like an L with 3L below, then a B
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Very very nice mate, looks to be in fanastic condition!
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It's been back to the factory/workshops at least once, when it was converted from Mk.III* to Mk.III, and then a second time when it was converted back to Mk.III* standard. So I am afraid that it is far from issued.
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1916 SSA
One of the rarest manufacture/date combinations!
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If you pull the year hand guard you will be able to see when it was rebarreled. As nice as this rifle is I am curious as to when it was rebarreled. Nice piece of history there.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Bear43
If you pull the year hand guard you will be able to see when it was rebarreled. As nice as this rifle is I am curious as to when it was rebarreled. Nice piece of history there.
Will do. I'll do that tonight, thanks for the info guys, the rifle really is in amazing condition, hard to capture in the pictures. I'll post more pictures tonight. The conversion from MKIII* to MKIII and then back, is interesting, was this common practice?
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Norton, interested in your logo. Any significance in the NORTON JPS to the motorcycles?
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Yes, exactly. I happen to know where one is with 1400 miles on it..........:D
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Ah yes, Norton Commandos. Just be glad Lee-Enfields don't have rubber parts in them! My own '74 has only 5000 miles on it but the isolastics were totally shot. Miserable job replacing them.
Ridolpho
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Yes, Norton ownership is a labor of love.
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Nice rifle. Odd mixture of park and blueing. I've never seen that color on a smle, looks like the park they put on m1 garands. I recently picked up a new ( supposedly NOS )forend with the same cartouche below nosepiece as yours. It's a light reddish hue like yours that matches well with coachwood but is some type of walnut. Definitely been issued, just restocked and mix of finishes. Any new found markings? Great year!
Cheers
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Thanks! I did find some markings on the back of the receiver, SSA and others, I've got some betters pics, I will pull the rear upper hand guard and see what markings are under there. The finish is beautiful in person, the wood really is not a reddish as it appears in the photos, looks like walnut to me.
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The only 'problem' I ever had/have is the top engine steady fracturing, even the latest box section ones. Can I have a nice picture of the JPS Commando JPS. Just a slight blip of the throttle and the distinct roar of a Commando does it for me............. No tinny Japanese bumble-bee in a jam jar noise there lads.............
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Peter Laidler
The only 'problem' I ever had/have is the top engine steady fracturing, even the latest box section ones. Can I have a nice picture of the JPS Commando JPS. Just a slight blip of the throttle and the distinct roar of a Commando does it for me............. No tinny Japanese bumble-bee in a jam jar noise there lads.............
Sure, I've got it in storage for the winter right now, a friend of mine has a nice garage with a few of his collection, when I unloaded it last fall I messed up the center stand.:( I have not had time to fix it. I'll go check on it and get a couple pics for you. NOTHING sounds like a Norton. Gives me goose bumps.
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Nice follow up photo of the charger bridge with no JJinc import stamp. The dual finish does look like that in a previous posting of a JJinc import.https://www.milsurps.com/showthread.php?t=38243
Again, lovley rifle. Thanks for the nice photos.
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The forend is an Enfield replacement. They were pretty common up until recently. With the lack of Australian FTR markings on both the metal and buttstock, I'm leaning more towards thinking it's a rifle that's been restored here in the USA at some point.
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I have a 21 Lithgow MkIII* that was rebarreled by Lithgow in (I believe) '45 that has very similar (although lighter) colour of Parkerizing applied to everything. Can anyone comment if that was a normal Lithgow practice late in the war? Thanks for all the photos NortonJPS.
Ridolpho
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Under the sight. Thanks again for the info guys, I will get pictures of the stamping on the barrel, as soon as I get the courage to take it apart. So maybe the parkerizing was part of a restoration? Interesting.
https://www.milsurps.com/images/impo...MG_15291-1.jpg
https://www.milsurps.com/images/impo...MG_15301-1.jpg
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Just a guess but I'd say it's been Parkerized and restored with new wood since it left military service. It just doesn't sport the FTR markings that would give it provenance as a legit FTR rifle. The Australians distinctly marked their FTR rifles as shown in another post here on this forum. If it was a post WWII British FTR by either Enfield or BSA in the 1950's it would be well marked and also painted and baked with Suncorite 259. If it was a John Jovino restoration, it would surely be stocked in Australian coachwood as they had loads of it. The replacement wood on this rifle appears to be the new British wood that's been offered on the civvie market for the past several years. I'm just speculating but I've seen a few and done a few too over the years. At any rate, the serials match and if the forend is fitted properly, it should shoot well for you.
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Looks like one of the incomplete JJovino actions that someone completed with a mixture of English and Australian parts.
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The rear sight had been around the block a couple of times before it found a home on this rifle. Nothing wrong with that, being a 1938 rebuild, but the finish overall would have been a fine bluing at that time as noted above. ("Rust bluing" in modern parlance- "browning" in the pre-WWII terminology.) It does seem to have had a heavy blasting before the phosphating, not sure why, it doesn't look like they were trying to hide anything.
The SSA "peddled scheme" rifles are a bit scarce, as also noted above, and have an interesting production history.
Looks good, regardless, hopefully it'll shoot as well!
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Great info everyone. So basically I have a SSA manufacture (peddled scheme) rifle, that has had a stock replacement, been restored and parkerized at some point. I'm actually happy that it is not some super rare Enfield, because I could not bring myself to shoot it. It looks great and I plan to take it to the range and have some fun! Thanks again everybody.
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jmoore:
"It does seem to have had a heavy blasting before the phosphating, not sure why",
Basically, you cannot get a decent phospate finish unless the work is "blasted" beforehand, and the item goes in the phospahing tank as soon as possible after the blasting stage.
The grit-blasting "activates" the surface of the steel by doing a couple of things:
1. It removes the very thin "ceramic" skin on heat-treated (especially hardened) steel.
2. The mechanical "disruption" to the otherwise smooth surface increases the effective surface area enormously.
3. The molecular micro-stesses caused by this "disruption" greatly increases the reactivity of the surface with the phosphoric acid brew.
The grey colour comes from Zinc being added during the process: If you want black, add Manganese.
Basically, you cannot get a decent phospate finish unless the work is "blasted" beforehand, and the item goes in the phosphating tank as soon as possible after the blasting stage.
When the item comes out of the bath it has a VERY active surface and will just about rust while you watch.
Thus, it is usual to rapidly immerse the item in a second bath of boiling water. This process partly "closes up" the crystal structure, but it is still porous.
Then you have to quickly douse it with a de-watering fluid before applying a light oil.
Ultimately, the entire purpose of phosphating is to form a strongly-bonded skin that holds oil to prevent corrosion.
Apart from all that: A heavy "blast" will also "hide" rust pits and other "imperfections". This may or may not be a good thing.
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Bruce In Oz: In your experience did WW2 Lithgow refits include Parkerizing with a relatively light gray color? My '21 has both '42 and '45 dates on buttstock and barrel, respectively, but the most striking feature is the Parkerizing which is similar to but lighter gray than that on the featured rifle. By recollection (not at home) there is no recognizable "FTR" mark but the new furniture and barrel are Australian.
Ridolpho
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The metal on this rifle shows definite signs of having been blasted with sand or some sort of heavy grit that is used for automotive blasting. I use a very fine AAA grade of glass beads in my blast cabinet before I Parkerize and it doesn't heavily etch the surface of the steel but really just cleans it nicely. The resulting finish is very smooth. It won't hide deep scratches or pitting like a coarse sand blast finish will.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Ridolpho
Bruce In Oz: In your experience did WW2 Lithgow refits include Parkerizing with a relatively light gray color? My '21 has both '42 and '45 dates on buttstock and barrel, respectively, but the most striking feature is the Parkerizing which is similar to but lighter gray than that on the featured rifle. By recollection (not at home) there is no recognizable "FTR" mark but the new furniture and barrel are Australian.
Ridolpho
Ridolpho your rifle finish sounds typical of the parkerized finish lithgow was practicing during and after WW2. It wont be stamped FTR into the receiver if it was refurbed in 1945 that your butt indicates because stamping rifles with FTR only began in 1950. The only indicator that a rifle was refurbed during WW2 is the singular date stamped into the butt and the appearance of the gun of course. After the war during 1945/46/47, refurbed rifles had R over MA over the date stamped into the butt and I have never seen a butt stamped 48 or 49. Rifles FTR'd during the 50's and stamped as such on the action had nothing stamped into the butt and in the case a used butt was used again, any dates and markings from the previous rifle were removed. Most of the time these stamps are still just barely visible but have no relevance to the gun.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Bruce_in_Oz
Basically, you cannot get a decent phospate finish unless the work is "blasted" beforehand, and the item goes in the phospahing tank as soon as possible after the blasting stage... Apart from all that: A heavy "blast" will also "hide" rust pits and other "imperfections". This may or may not be a good thing.
Was all of that for me? It is the last bit of the commentary that seems pertenent. But blast heaviness usually seems more dependent on the shop doing the work. It varies even amongst US military overhauls. I don't know it a test strip for blast intensity is required similar to shotpeening (Almen test strips). If so, I've never heard of such.
BTW, I believe the real purpose of a roughened finish is improved oil or other surface coating adhesion. Phosphating a surface does passivate it to a small degree, but it's probably more than offset by the induced stresses of the sharp edged blasting media. In actual fact the acid etching done by the solution works fine on any clean metal, polished or otherwise. But the finish itself isn't all that great a protection, and relies on the oil/paint/etc. retained on the surface for most of the corrosion protection. A rough surface is more effective in doing said.
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Was all of that for me?
Not at all; it was a bit of a non-targeted post.
I have had all sorts of fun trying to get consistent colour and texture in phosphated components over the years. In one way, SMLEs are relatively easy, because ALL of the steels are specified as Carbon steels or "special iron"; alloy steels could only be used by "suppliers" after test pieces were submitted and accepted.
You are right about the "blast heaviness". As it is an essentially manual process, there would be the occasional "moment" or two when things got a bit variable. My local friendly phosphater uses garnet grit and what he describes as "moderate" pressure to do gun parts. Crankshafts, (though NOT the journals) and the like, are a different matter.
I have had very mixed results with just dropping a degreased part into a phosphating tank without the blast prep. Mild steel comes out reasonably well. Alloy steels that have been heat-treated/hardened often come out with a very pale and oddly coloured surface.
As for blueing: In the past there have been issues with different components being made from different alloys, and thus requiring different polishing techniques AND different times in the blueing tank. I discovered some years ago that a light bead-blast also works a treat before dropping bits into a modern "blueing" tank. Pre-blasted parts come out of the DuLite tank a deep, satin BLACK; nice finish on serious hunting rifles. The blasted surface holds oil a lot better than a gloss blue, and as you point out for phosphating, holding oil is EXACTLY what blueing is supposed to do.
If someone wants an "Olde English" slow rust blue that is so deep you could drown in it, they will need to set aside a several weeks and a prodigious amount of cash.
And then there is the "French Grey" finish found on some very expensive shotguns.......................
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Quote:
Originally Posted by
Brian Dick
It looks like a Standard Small Arms rifle as rebuilt in Australia. Not really sure. It sports a Parkerized finish and what looks to be coachwood furniture. Are there any FTR markings on the top of the receiver ring? I don't see any on the buttstock.
The Lithgow factory didn't use small hand guards with re-enforcing slots across the top. That was generally a British thing.....
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My guess would be a restoration done in the USA with nos British woodwork and commercial Parkerized finish. The Parkerizing isn't quite the right color for Lithgow either.
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I have a No.1 with SSA 1917 receiver, completely fitted with Australian wood and Lithgow parts. According to the specs/markings it was at least used until 1956.
It seems that some shiploads of british No.1's were send to Australia in return for the supplies send to GB during the first years of the war from AU.
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From the modern and recent looking number stamps and mismatching finish, I would assume it is a Jovino build up from parts obtained from Australia. These build ups have been discussed here before.
Fine looking rifle though.
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It's got a new post WWII British forend and handguards. Wood that's still available here in the USA as imported from England. All of the Jovino rifles I've seen that were assembled after import in the late 1980's and early 1990's were stocked in Coachwood. It would be clearly marked with their import stamp, (J.J. Co. NY NY), on the right side of the charger bridge.
