1903 Grips ?

[browningautorifle]

Sounds familiar...

[Flying10uk]

Is there any Forum members who actually own an Indian version of the SLR bayonet with wood grips, please? I have only ever seen pictures never seen an example.

[Peter Laidler]

Yep, I have a long variant of the Indian L1A1 one with wood grips. It came to me cheap as chips because it was as rough as guts and with a broken crosspiece. So I picked it apart replaced the crosspiece, assembled it and had it refinished. Don't know why really. You'd have thought that I'd seen and handled enough bloody bayonets to last a lifetime!!!!!

From memory, the crosspiece, catch, screw stay and spring are fully interchangeable with the UK/Can/Aust version BUT the scabbard mouthpiece and spring are different as the mouthpiece screw is positioned slightly further down the scabbard. So if you fit a UK spring, screw and mouthpiece you'll have to drill through the hard spring. The screw is still 6BA though. Don't ask me how I remember all this stuff........

[Brian Dick]

I've got one too but still need to fit the grips. It's complete with scabbard and I gave it the FTR treatment so it looks pretty good.

[Flying10uk]

How did the Indians mark their L1A1 bayonets, please; was it, in English, R.F.I. similar to how they marked the SMLE bayonets that they produced shortly before independence? Thanks

[Brian Dick]

Mine's marked R.F.I.65 on the left side of the blade just below the guard/cross piece. It's got the SA ownership mark on the other side in the same place.

[porterkids]

Here are some photos of my long Indian L1A3. The ricasso is stamped R.F.I.66 (looks like it might be 56 but it's not).

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[Peter Laidler]

The spacing for the grip screws (and the grips) LOOKS like they're from the No5. Mine are definately spaced further apart as per the L1A1 bayonet grip rivets. Seems like there are TWO types of grips available. No5 type grips with short screw spacing and L1A1 type grips with wood or steel more distant screw/rivet spacing.

The plot thickens........

[porterkids]

I have one or two other examples but they were not easily accessible last night. I will have to dig them out and check the spacing. I've never seen these Indian L1 bayonets with anything but wooden grips. But it could be that the spacing is different.

[porterkids]

Dug the others out. I have one short model and two long ones. The short model lacks the RFI marking found on the long ones. Bolt spacing appears to be the same on all three examples.

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