As the Long Branches flood in...

[Cantom]

They've been coming fast and furious lately...2 months ago I had the same 49 LB I've had for 15 years. Now I have 6 of them...
41, 42, 43, 44, 49, 50

The 41 is a Whitworth Sporter from England. Here's the writeup on it from CGNTZ EE.
Whitworth No 4 Sporter in 303. Assembled post war with surplus parts. (no Enfields were harmed in the production of this rifle) Witworth and Manchester are stamped on the barrel. Action is Long Branch Mk 1, 1941. Early bolt design. Magazine is the proper 5 round "Made in England" stamped on the bottom. Bore is bright and shiny. Wood is VG, metal is VG. The bolt, action and barrel have all matching serial numbers. "56" on barrel indicating year of manufacture. Not drilled and tapped for scope mount. Nice little hunting rig or bush gun. EMT preferred.



I also got a 42 in rather challenged shape, which I've already improved considerably...the barrel is bobbed 1/2", the finish is chipped British black paint and worn original, the s/n has been scrubbed and redone in British...but the price was right and it is a 42. Pics to follow as I think I deleted the ones I had by mistake...

Yesterday, I picked up this 1950. The metal is as new, perfect bluing and a bore that looks like it never fired a round. It is a blued rifle and the s/n is just a few hundred above my 49. (I know of someone with a parked 1950 for sale).
The wood is a bit beat up, but it's within reason. Numbers match.






Mag in this rifle is a Savage.

Information

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[Claven2]

Savage mags are normal on a 44 or later LB. Nice rifle.

[Cantom]

Here's the 42 I got a few days ago. It's hurtin' a trifle...I put my early LB bands and LB rear sight on it, plus some non matching wood I have around...









The gunsmith tells me for $200, he will extend the barrel and give it the stock tapers and refinish it in the same grey finish that early LB's were in originally. He said powder blasted and blued will give it that grey smooth finish...I don't have that much in this so would this be worth it? I believe so, 42's aren't growing on trees...I have 3 NOS LB safeties of the right year and design coming from New Zealand...
This rifle has a mint mint 2 groove barrel...looks unfired. Barrel and receiver are both C Broad Arrow marked. Barrel also has Surrey on top...hmmmm...

[Cantom]

Today I bought a 1945 Long Branch at the gun show. It's a beauty...that gives me one of every year up to and including 1950. I kind of doubt I'll ever get anything newer than that but you never know...

As I once said, sometimes Bubbas are more interesting than scoring a perfect standard specimen...what's to say about an almost perfect stock rifle?
I wish to thank Bob, who made this available to me.








This rifle is fitted with a LB Mk I rear sight, which isn't right, but who am I to hold it against it...it's my favourite sight anyway.

[Cantom]

I guess I'm done for now. Here are 6 of them lined up from right to left, from 41 to 50, the 49 is away getting the Bubba scope mount holes I Bubba'ed in it welded up so they're lined up in a bit of a missing man formation...

[stencollector]

I put my early LB bands

Do you mean the hinged type bands, or the milled type bands? I have a front hinged L band, but need to find a middle one.
Why is the origional serial number ground off? I can't make out the numbers underneath the grind mark.

[Cantom]

Do you mean the hinged type bands, or the milled type bands? I have a front hinged L band, but need to find a middle one.
Why is the origional serial number ground off? I can't make out the numbers underneath the grind mark.

Hinged? Were the bands on a 41 or 42 supposed to be hinged? Somewhere I saw a pic of a rifle with hinged bands I think...was any No 4 made with hinges?
The bands I have on here are the thick style, possibly milled? The later years have much thinner bands.
I had a very hard time convincing myself to get this rlfle. The serial number desecration and cut barrel made it near worthless IMHO...but over 2 or 3 weeks I thought about it and suddenly decided it might be worth it anyway. What the hey, it's still a 42 Long Branch...the Brits probably did that in some FTR ing frenzy...just like that lovely black paint peeling off all over the place.
The nice bore was a very unexpected bonus. The rifle is actually not bad looking as it sits with full wood on it...here's the before pics from the seller.(top one)

[stencollector]

Early LBs were hinged. The one hinged band I have is clearly LB marked. It even shows them in the Cdn parts manual. I'm not so sure about the middle band though, as the parts manual doesn't show or mention it. Nor do I know when they changed from hinged to non-hinged. I do know that the low wood (made to fit the mag cutoff that was only on the earliest no4mk1s) ran to about 7L rifles.

I was pretty sure my no4mk1T trials rifle (Enfield made) had the hinged center band, I recall for certain that it had the front one.

[Cantom]

Early LBs were hinged. The one hinged band I have is clearly LB marked. It even shows them in the Cdn parts manual. I'm not so sure about the middle band though, as the parts manual doesn't show or mention it. Nor do I know when they changed from hinged to non-hinged. I do know that the low wood (made to fit the mag cutoff that was only on the earliest no4mk1s) ran to about 7L rifles.

I was pretty sure my no4mk1T trials rifle (Enfield made) had the hinged center band, I recall for certain that it had the front one.

I know where you can get a hinged No 4 centre band...on an AIA M10...

[36 hamon]

The very early 41's had hindged bands like the early brit but they were changed to the heavy milled type quikly in 41 so both types are legit .in all my years of collecting LB's I've seen one set of hindged bands and they are on my friends early 41 .keep digging in parts boxes at gunshows you might get lucky