First SMLE

[Dad]

This summer I walked into a local gunshop and they had a, Lithgow built, Lee-Enfield No1 Mk3 for $245. From the looks of her, she seemed to have led an adventurous and active life. Her stock was dented and dirty, the metal finish worn bare in places, but her bore was bright and the rifling sharp. She headspaced fine, and all her numbers matched; action body, barrel, stock, fore stock, butt stock, rear sight, nose cap, all except for the replacement bolt. So since she was looking for someone to take care of her I bought her.

I ran a couple of patches down her barrel and headed for the range. She was great, tight groups and a real joy to use.

So I thought that I might as well clean her up and try to return her to something closer to her WWl configuration.

As far as I can tell she was originally built in 1915 and re-barreled in 1936. The stock looked original and had been extended by the Australians by adding a dovetailed piece to the rear of the butt stock.

I limited myself to some steaming out of dents in the wood, general stock and metal cleaning plus replacement of some screws with butchered heads and missing or out period hardware (rear sight protector, pilling swivel, cocking piece, etc) I also replaced the hand guards since the ears had been trimmed off.

The clean stock received a Tung oil finish and the metal was cleaned and cold blued if required.

She was reassemble all hardware lubricated and tightened and off to the range we went. She shot just as sweet, but everything just seemed smoother!

Here are some before and after pictures, I hope I haven't over restored her…..

D.

Information

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[smellie]

Very pretty, friend!

You have restored the old girl to roughly what she would have looked like had she not been just plain abused.

Some guys will say 'too much'.

I, for one, would be very happy if I owned a 1915 that looked as good as this one and shot as well as it looked.

Beautiful piece.
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[Bindi2]

That rifle spent more time in the Brits hands than the Aussies. The butt is a brit replacement the fore end is a Mk111* relieved for the cutoff ,normal FTR . The screw you replaced in the nose cap and other bits are FTR replacements the rifles history which show it was used abused repaired and sent back out for it to all happen again.

[Peter Laidler]

Anyone care to add anything about the extended butt? I have never seen a military butt extended and have never seen any reference to such an operation in our bibles. It seem to be a typically Armourers method of doing it. Dovetailed, glued, probably pegged too, made off and butt plate fitting perfectly etc etc

[bigduke6]

Anyone care to add anything about the extended butt? I have never seen a military butt extended and have never seen any reference to such an operation in our bibles. It seem to be a typically Armourers method of doing it. Dovetailed, glued, probably pegged too, made off and butt plate fitting perfectly etc etc

Have the same butt on my SMLE Sht .22 IV, would say its been extended from a short butt, as its now same length as the butt on my BSA Co commercial SMLE (issued to the South African Police)

[Simon P]

I have had two SMLEs with identical extended butts, I have no evidence, but was told a few years ago by another collector in the HBSA that these were Australian conversions? but I have seen no evidence to this fact only rumour.
The two I had were early LSA & BSA with Australian ownership marks, these were extended to the long length.

[Dad]

Peter,
Found a reference to extended buttstocks in the "Collectors Only" book SMLE (No.1) Rifles Mk1 and Mk lll, Volume 1, 3rd Edition , Revised. by Charles R. Straton (North Cape Publications, Inc).
On page 74 of this publication Mr Straton observes that some buttstocks (specially on British made rifles in Australian service) had 1-½ to 2 inches of wood carefully dovetailed and fitted to the rear of the buttstock. He speculates that this might have been a "field" response to the need for longer buttstocks. He also notes that these modified buttstocks are the same length as the "Long" which were in short supply.

The buttstock on my rifle is the same length as a "Normal" so I guess there was a scarcity of the "Normal" length too….

I have attached some additional pictures of markings on my rifle and some more of the extended buttstock, with and without the buttplate.

D.

[Peter Laidler]

Thanks for those pics Dad. The tung oil makes clear pictures difficult but the sheer quality of the work and the 'factory' shapes of the butt plate end lead me to say that these are a factory method of ectending butts. Without ANY doubt, there will be, somewhere, a relaxation in standards order that has authorised such a change in standards.

If I had to think out aloud, I'd say that this was a relaxation, allowed at a factory (or factories) in order for them to make the best use of the existing resources available to them. This was quite common. I'd say that factory X or so had a lot of wood offcuts say, and in order to save waste or additional expense, would have submitted an example like this, had it approved after testing and given the go ahead. I would also suggest that if the order was for, say 900 medium butts and there were already 250 short butts there, surplus, then they'd modify thhese to save waste and resources. That's only my opinion based on nothing more than the quality of the work and the way the system works. We recently had some slightly undersize XX-XX xxxxx parts that were not exactly to the specification but after a short trial were deemed acceptable and approved for service

I asked the old retired post war examiner about these in a phone call yesterday and he said that he has been asked to extend butts for individual shooting team members in the days of the No4 but when it came to push and shove, the rules always banned any modifications like that (I'm thinking Service SR(a) or SR(b) anyone for comments..........). So I don't think that they're ARMY/in service modifications. It definately wouldn' be a 'field' response because these are machine made fittings, finished on the factory, butt turning pantograph machines

I have to say what a pleasure it is to see such quality woodwork. I took copies of the pictures to the Armourers shop and the ex apprentices all made glowing comments............. Wow............

[jmoore]

Thanks, y'all! It's the real reason I hang out here- learning "new stuff" about "old stuff". (Pardon my language, to some of you anyway.)

[smellie]

I'll have to go down to the Vault where all my fun toys are lurking.

I have something very similar on a Ross Target rifle (Mark II) which extends the butt length all the way from "Mountain Man" to "Gorilla". It is definitely off the scale for mere humans, but the work is very nice and the rifle was shot this way quite enough that I despair of the bore.
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