Or is this a sign of a post-war repair/refurbishment?
It is a sign of 'post damage' repair.
The rifle could have been dropped the day it was delivered and the butt splintered, it could have had too much 'square bashing' or it could have had damage any time whilst it was in service, but, it is unlikley that it got that sort of repair in civvy-street.
Mine are not the best, but they are not too bad. I can think of lots of Enfields I'd rather have but instead of constantly striving for more, sometimes it's good to be satisfied with what one has...
Both dead right. It was a common repair and I've done hundreds of them We would do them by hand of course but if there were a lot to do, we'd take them to the machine shop and they'd run a 60 degree cutter across to cut out the dovetail. Then we'd cut the patch and glue.
You can always tell whether it was done by real Armourers because of the two angled-in oak pegs. REME workshop and not factory. They wouldn't waste time on minor time consuming repairs
Bit of a sequel to this. The HEEL patches - as shown here - were either quite shallow thickness, as in this case, because the screw hole was still intact. If the screw hole/thread was stripped, then we would cut a deeper patch and re-drill the but plate screw hole. Mk 5 Sten guns were the worst. For some reason they always needed the deeper more time consuming patches
I think Daan the armorers as long as the gaps were not to horrendous and the repair brought the rifle back into service then it would hopefully pass inspection.
I am sure PL and his like of the old school days would have pride in their workmanship and done a very neat job, besides it could be a Monday or Friday repair jobby!!!!!
Last edited by CINDERS; 01-27-2024 at 09:21 PM.
Reason: gramma
Seems like quite a gap in the wood around the butt plate.
Extract from Peter Laidlers lecture on "Fitting a Butt"
.............. Next, the butt plate. All the EMER’s state is that the butt plate should be ‘…evenly seated with the edges below the level of the wood surface of the butt’. In other words, it must be of a smaller silhouette than the butt. I say, with an approx .100” or 3mm gap around its edge and the edge of the wood. As for the fit of the butt plate, then, once again, I say evenly, by taking wood from underneath the butt plate to get an all round even bearing at its edge. If there was a 010 - .015” (ten to fifteen thousandth) that would be acceptable but no more
Mine are not the best, but they are not too bad. I can think of lots of Enfields I'd rather have but instead of constantly striving for more, sometimes it's good to be satisfied with what one has...
It would seem that would cause it to chip? I don't have the extended experience but in the all ones I've seen and handled in the store of private ownership, never seen a chip or crack in the butt.
It would seem that would cause it to chip? I don't have the extended experience but in the all ones I've seen and handled in the store of private ownership, never seen a chip or crack in the butt.
One of my Savage No4s has the same repair (allbeit without the Oak pegs)
Mine are not the best, but they are not too bad. I can think of lots of Enfields I'd rather have but instead of constantly striving for more, sometimes it's good to be satisfied with what one has...
PM
Originally Posted by Ctman82
