No. 5 Mk I question

[Vincent]

A friend has a No. 5 Mk I "Jungle Carbine" with a 4 over-stamped with a 5. Anyone have any information on this?

Information

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[browningautorifle]

That's more of an engraving. Does it have the classic #5 lightening cuts and characteristics? Or is it a cobble job in disguise?

[madcratebuilder]

Interesting, the rest of the EP work looks legit. Lightning cuts?

[Peter Laidler]

Come on Vincent, answers to the relevant questions needed

[Vincent]

Yes, it has the lightning cuts.

Sorry for not getting back sooner. I've been away from the computer. Had to say goodbye to an old friend.

[browningautorifle]

Sorry to hear about your friend.

Maybe it's time for a full expose`on this #5...then maybe we can help.

[twistie]

looks like a field conversion performed by RAEME Royal Ausrtalian Electrical & mechanical Engineers. I served with RAEME for 6 years as an armourer.

[Patrick Chadwick]

Acoording to Stratton, Vol. 2, P. 166, no No. 4 Mk1s had been observed that were dated 1945. And 9-45 would have been long past wartime requirements. Strattons's conclusion was "in all likelihood, Fazakerley did not make No. 4 rifles during 1945". This info may now have been superceded by later discoveries.

I do not think this is a fake. A faker would surely have removed the 4, not overstamped it. The single-letter number seems plausible for a 1945 Fazalerley No.5. Field conversion is possible, but that would imply that there were No.4 Mk1s from Fazakerley completed and issued as late as September 1945, and the Fazakerley No.4s had two-letter serial numbers.

My guess: a leftover No.4 MK1 receiver from Fazakerley, used up in the course of early No.5 production. Regardless of collector's often exaggerated ideas of "correctness", factories do do such things, in order not to waste perfectly good components.

Patrick

[Dr. Strangelove]

Could it just have been a drunk/tired/angry about football Scouser making a mistake?

[Peter Laidler]

Where were you Twistie. I was a RAEME Armourer with 4,8 and 1 RAR and Bandiana for 3 years or so.

Anyway....... Nope......, you haven't convinced me. I've dealt with simply hundreds and hundreds of them and never seen anything like this. We did re-body No5 rifles with No4 bodies at 40 Base workshop on the Crown Agents programme but didn't lighten the bodies.

Without any doubt, unless we see other photos to the contrary, that body is a No4 body that someones made into a No5. I could be wrong........

Here's my first observation. Why, during the production line manufacture of the No5, would the pantograph scratchy-pen operator switch the number '5' for number '4'........ then go back and correct it? Where are the other mistakenly etch engraved rifles.

This'll be the same as the Savage No4's without the US PROPERTY myth. All No5's were made from No4 body castings