mk3 bren 1949 Birmingham proof house number LB39190 ALL MATCHING NUMBERS plus correct magazine very good condition. Sorry no photos as camera at property in Spain.
It’s probably cobbled together with sections taken from more than one cut up body.
When there a big gaps in a cut up body it’s common to use “filler” or sections from another body to close the gaps before welding. A big gap will have more shrinkage when welding.
Some of these “re-welded” bodies are made by using overlapping sections from several cut bodies to reduce the gaps between sections as much as possible.
It doesn’t matter if the sections come from a Mk1, Mk2 or Mk3. People just use the bits that fit and weld them up.
Another possibility is the “Enfield” etc were engraved by the builder. Those marks around “Enfield” look like porosity. Those are the bubbles you sometimes see in a poor weld. The "Enfield" looks like it was done by hand.
The receiver section was definitely stamped with the Enfield crown and 1940, the rear chunk was, i'm almost positive, from the same demil job. As Vincent says, we have to sometimes overlap the sections, especially when they are torch cut. Many of the early demils were saw cut which makes them far easier to restore. I'll go look at the serial again in case i've got a case of early onset alzheimers.....
The greatest LMG to ever see service in the British Army...........................
Peter, there is a very interesting series of videos on youtube by a poster called ProjectGuns. There are 4 parts so far, but they detail how he rewelds cut up receivers and has to fill the gaps with scrap pieces.
The link to the first video is here:
If that doesn't play, do a search within youtube for "ProjectGuns Bren Build"
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