L1A1...what happened to the original receivers?

[82Trooper]

I have been thinking, especially since the recent purchase of my L1A1 with a Embel receiver...where did all the Enfield OEM receivers end up? Were they destroyed, and the remaining parts being sold as surplus that now makes up the kit guns out there? Are they complete, sitting in long-term storage in some London warehouse? Or were the entire weapons sold to friendly governments across the globe?
I compare it with the US surplus items I am familiar with...as long as they are not fully automatic, the complete firearm may be sold/purchased.
Can someone enlighten me with the Enfield story?
Thanks.
Mike

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[philb]

try zib in Germany hes got 100's

[mrclark303]

I have been thinking, especially since the recent purchase of my L1A1 with a Embel receiver...where did all the Enfield OEM receivers end up? Were they destroyed, and the remaining parts being sold as surplus that now makes up the kit guns out there? Are they complete, sitting in long-term storage in some London warehouse? Or were the entire weapons sold to friendly governments across the globe?
I compare it with the US surplus items I am familiar with...as long as they are not fully automatic, the complete firearm may be sold/purchased.
Can someone enlighten me with the Enfield story?
Thanks.
Mike

Well Trooper, the reasons for none original recivers in the vast majority of US L1 builds is that the L1A1, though a semi automatic rifle, has an Auto Sear making conversation to selective fire a easy proposition. Simply a matter of swapping out the safety for a selective fire example and taking 6mm off the trigger plunger.

The auto Sear is a hang over from the parent Fal, but it also meant that exactly the same reciver could be used in the heavey barreled L2A1/C2 LMG.

With that in mind L1A1's could be stripped and shipped as parts kits or shipped with the receiver cut up.

As we have discussed in the past, some original Rifles are available in the US, original British L1A1's, sold as Law Enforcement Rifles, or the rare and highly collectable special production run Lithgow Factory L1A1A that was built with the Sear deleted, especially to be ATF compliant.

Original recivers are still available here in the UK and with others in Europe. Both my Enfield and my Lithgow L1A1's have original Recivers.

[82Trooper]

That makes sense..thank you.

[green]

"Auto sear" or as Cdn and other ordnance called it "safety sear" which prevented the arm from firing out of battery.

[mrclark303]

"Safety Sear" works from a Commonwealth perspective, but just causes confusion to others in my opinion.

Say Auto Sear, and our American friends know straight away why Uncle Sam gets Class 3 nervous over original Recivers.

[Gil Boyd]

Well John,
I miss the old L1A1, but I'll wait till I visit the FBI Academy later this year and shoot a "proper" one un tampered.
So frustrating having got GGG working well in it, and it still had issues, all caused by so many varied parts in our UK versions, to conform to legislation. A real crying shame IMHO when you consider what they left untouched out there!!! grrrrrrrrrr.

[Peter Laidler]

The term 'safety sear' v 'automatic sear' was a discussion point often raised by instructors (Mr Stan Ayley, or better known to us as 'sir') while we were apprentices and later on upgrading courses. It was done to get you thinking in real terms about exactly what was and did what. We, the UK and Commonwealth called it a safety sear. But the rest of the known universe called it an automatic sear. But I held my ground during these discussions and sai that I considered it to be an AUTOMATIC SEAR. Mind you, so did many of the others too.......... and so the discussion went on. Why do I say this and others in the class would say otherwise, like Green (post 5 and plenty of others here I suspect) they have a point. It DOES prevent the rifle firing before the rifle is fully locked. But that's not the whole story.....

Regardless of the 'safety' sear or not, the rifle WILL NOT fire out of battery or when it is unlocked simply because the breech block carrier (the BBC) will not expose the rear of the striker to the hammer UNTIL the breech block (the BB) is locked down. Have a look and see next time you have yours stripped. In addition to this, if there was a mechanical failure somewhere in the trigger mech and the hammer did spring forwards, then in every possible position the forward rotation of the hammer, the hammer blow is absolutely diminished as its rotation is slowed right down by the rear underside of the hammer slowly rolling forwards fully controlled by its shape, frictioning on the rounded underside on the rear of the BBC.

Have a look...... It is another mechanical safety that makes the rifle fool-proof. Clever eh!

Oh, yes. What SHOULD we call it? It is the automatic sear. Or is it the secondary sear. Or the upper sear? I'll tell you what it's not........ A safety sear! But I sing from the same hymn sheet as the other Armourers and call it the safety sear.

Are you still awake at the back of the class........

[Gil Boyd]

Peter,
You make I laugh
Hope you have all this written down for the future generations of L1A1 lovers. The SEAR was always a talking point in NI in the hours of boredom........"Now what does it take to make this little beauty fully automatic". Not a lot came back the answer, but needless to say, we never tinkered about with the rifle, it was brilliant as it was, none of this sticky back plastic Blue Peter answer or was it silver foil!

[mrclark303]

You can quite see why the ATF have an issue with auto/safety Sear recivers. It' just way too easy to make them Rock and roll!

The ex law enforcement examples that change hands might be fine, but, could potentially get you a prison sentence if some officious little Hitler decided to nail you to the wall and declare it a Class 3 firearm.

---------- Post added at 06:37 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:33 PM ----------

Just a superb rifle Gil, only with the adoption of the L119 7.62mm AR have the army had a comparable rifle.

I had a chat with a guy who carried one in Afghanistan, he couldn't praise it enough.