No. 4 "T" - strange conversion, strange scope

[vintage hunter]

With the rear pad not being secured to the body I see no way to it could be zeroed to any degree of usefulness, elevation wise at least.

[Peter Laidler]

Good point VH. VERY good point in fact

[Ridolpho]

The rear pad appears to have been soldered or glued on to the body plus won't the strong clamping by the rear screw tend to hold it in place? Peter- you mention in your book that the rear pads don't tend to be damaged by firing unlike the front one. But, of course, the proof of the pudding..... Promo- does your friend and owner of the gun shoot it and if so how well does it work? My real reason for responding is to ask the experts: why did H&H almost ubiquitously prepare their T's with a machined flat hard up against the receiver ring for the front pad? Most or all? of the No. 4 manufacturers machined a rectangular flat but, like the gun in question, it didn't extend right up to the ring. I assume these were in anticipation of mounting of a scope? Were they simply not well enough aligned with the bore? Many homebuilt replicas, of course, make use of the factory machined flat- some with adequate results.

Ridolpho

[vintage hunter]

The rear thumb screw might hold it in place, until the the first shot is fired anyway. Vibrations will move mountains.

[Promo]

The scope pad on the rear has been glued to the bracket, the scope screws directly into the receiver. It shoots great, but of course always at the same distance at a shooting range. Would the reticle be replaceable/restorable?

€dit: I've attached the pictures once more, the one at the beginning were in small size and of bad quality. So here they are.

I still keep wondering why only the rear top ring of the bracket has a serial. Was that common among early scopes?

[rgg_7]

The scope bracket caps are mismatched. You can see the numbers have been removed from the lower portion of the bracket. The front has over sized screws and are breaking out of the side of the cap....definitely some issues. I believe that the reticule was damaged and replaced with one from a No42 scope. It most likely non adjustable at this point. Not the first time I've seen this. The pads look home made. i don't see any markings on the rifle to confirm H&H sniper conversion. Looks like an assembled sniper however I could be wrong.

[Lee Enfield]

Your rear cap is probably off a british set of rings.

Long Branch scope caps were/are not numbered in the british manner.

Early ring caps are marked for front and back, but the late 90Ls are not marked at all.

[jmoore]

The scope pad on the rear has been glued to the bracket

Glued or brazed? If it's not brazed then why the discoloration on either side of the rear leg? Surely looks like it's had a torch applied to me!

As far as being offset, one would treat it like any other offset scope (M1C, M1D, Type 97, Type 99, SMLE with Winchester A5, etc.) Just zero with the POI to the right of the POA the same amount (as close as possible) as is found on the rifle. In some cases drift at extended ranges will work with you, but it's probably not intentional.

The offset surely can't be all that much on this No.4 Mk.1/2. Not like one would find on one done on purpose:

[vintage hunter]

The pattern of the heat marks suggest to me that the rear portion of the cradle has been heated to aid in removal of the screws, or their remains after wringing off.

[Lee Enfield]

The pattern of the heat marks suggest to me that the rear portion of the cradle has been heated to aid in removal of the screws, or their remains after wringing off.

I believe that you're wrong.

Look again at the backside photos. A clearance has been ground on the inside of the bracket to clear the charger bridge...resulting in the heat discoloration.

This was neccesary probably due to the thinnes of the rear pad.