Pawn shop find/Enfield rescue/restoration project

[RJW NZ]

Awesome project, well done.
If you need more stuff take a look in enfield resource.com

[Sht_LE]

Busy day at the shop, but now have wood work in hand. Had a little time this afternoon and tried the fit.... YES! And its INDIAN! With no Ishy Screw!!! It looks like the draws are going to be good and tight and the butt stock as well. I would now like to insert a Thank You to Peter Laidler for his wonderful articles, they are a great help. I printed them all a year or so ago and have them saved in a three ring binder at the gun shop with my other gunsmithing texts. It should not take too much work to get her bedded correctly. Nose cap could/should be here tomorrow... or maybe Saturday.... come on USPS. Now, should I put a stacking swivel on her??? Any opinions?

[Sht_LE]

End result.... Ended up spending $175 on the rifle. $21 including shipping on the nose cap from Springfield Sporters and made a trade for the stock. The rest of the bits and bobs I had except for a couple of screws and one spring which a friend gave me. I think she looks good for a $196.





Decided to go with the solid Indian nose cap, which from what I could tell would be correct for this period (1919 rebuild date). Plus I don't have a rifle with that kind of nose cap.


I spent the five extra dollars to get the one that had been refinished and had no serial number.


The stock I traded for also was no serial numbered.


After clean up. The original date is difinatly 1908.


My able helper.

[Roy]

Very nice rebuild. Cats are great helpers when working on rifles, if yo drop something on the floor they'll go under the bench and sniff it, so you know exactly where you dropped it.

[Peter Laidler]

I can hear the incoming flak already so I'll put my steel helmet on in advance. But to me, cats and wasps are the two thing in the animal kingdom that seem to serve no useful purpose whatsoever.................

[xa-coupe]

Looks great, another rescue from Bubbaville ! When you take it out, make sure you let us know how it performs.
Peter, Peter, Peter .. I liked you up until now

[Sht_LE]

I will give a range report as soon as I get a chance to shoot her. The only concern I have is the forearm has a slight warp in it, with a matching warp in the hand guards. Perhaps that is why I got such a good trade on it. If you look at the close up of the muzzle you can see this where the front sight base is over to the right sight protector ear. Nothing is touching, so I am hoping it wont affect accuracy. The rest of the bedding is fine.

Peter, a few points:
She is a great hunter, I have no mice or snakes
She is very cute and fluffy (not to mention friendly)
Winston Churchill loved cats...... Adolf Hitler hated cats. Need I say more?

[jmoore]

What an odd nose cap! Haven't seen one w/o "windows" before.

Cats are not like dogs in that you never know what sort of personality they'll have. Some are worthless, others mad, and others are just amazing good friends. I enjoy most "hunter" cats, but they usually aren't too people oriented, or are only comfortable around one or two folk that they know well. My last cat was VERY anti-social, but would come running when one of my vehicles pulled into the driveway, and was generally smarter than my last two dogs. Excellent pals for 15 years, we were.

[RCS]

Attachment 24794Attachment 24795Attachment 24796Do you still have the original BSA barrel or was in replaced with a barrel made in India ? when they replaced the original barrels with new barrels, they were serial numbered to the receiver but not dated on the early rebuilds. Here are some photos of the replaced barrel

[Sht_LE]

The barrel is Ishapore, not dated but serial numbered. The nose cap does look odd, at least if you are used to seeing the ones with "windows". It is on page 99-100 in Charles Stratton's book British Enfield Rifles, Vol.I. He says it was "manufactured by Ishapore from 1918 until the early 1920s." I have found some other information that says it was produced from 1917-1919. At any rate it was in use when my rifle was converted to a Mk.I** India Pattern so it is plausible that it could have had one on it after conversion. My best guess is the lightening slots were omitted to speed up production, much like the solid piling swivel on WW2 Ishys and Lithgows.