Chamber damage

[scout7]

Reading the threads about the damaged barrelled receiver reminded me that I have a 1915 No 1 that has a damaged chamber right at the shoulder. There has had corrosion or cordwear or something that ate out the chamber in the area between the neck and the shoulder of the case. It seems to shoot ok, but the brass is distorted at the neck. The bore is in good condition, so I have thought about trimming the shoulder, spinning the barrel in a turn and then recutting the chamber. Has anyone here done that? Will it make the rifle look strange at the nose piece?

I would like to keep the original barrel with the receiver if possible, and I know a budding young machinist who is itching to learn about gunsmithing. This would be something relatively straightforward that would make him think, and it is simple enough that I could walk him through it safely.

Should I leave it alone, wind it in a turn or just find another barrel?

I will be interested in hearing your comments!

Information

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[JBS]

This one is not easy to do right if you want to maintain original appearance and keep the original barrel with receiver, and it will be costly. You will need to find a Master Gunsmith / Machinist. He will remove the barrel from the action. The chamber will be bored to a depth of the throat. He will then turn a chamber blank out of 4145 or 4150 ordinance steel so that it is a very tight press fit into the bored out chamber, and we are talking pressing it in with an arbor press. He would them dress the chamber mouth and extractor cut and then ream a new chamber. You are talking a lot of money to do it right and as said it is a job for a Master.

[jmoore]

Turning the barrel back one thread really isn't an option, unless the rifle is no longer in full military furniture (i.e. sporterized). JBS's suggestion will work in many cases, but SMLE barrels just don't have a lot of excess meat on them, esp. towards the front of the chamber. MIGHT could be done, but I think a re-barrel is the far better option. Just keep the old one in storage.

[BushyFromOz]

Some time ago it was illegal to own a rifle in military calibre, so people were rechanbering smelly's to anything after the war. A lot of places put out their wildcats 25/303, 22/303, 270/303 etc. Another thing that was done was they did indeed take a thread of the back of the barrel and created what some refer to as "303 short" (cant remember the metric spec). The government i believe tried to bring charges against the fellow doing it.

One of my mates inhrited one of these smelley's from his father, and recently had the chamber reamed out so she now shoots bog standard .303 british, and quite well i must add.

the down side is that this is done to sporters..

Of the chamber really is shot, why not have it sleeved to .22 and pick up another .303 barrel.

[tbonesmith]

It seems to shoot ok, but the brass is distorted at the neck.

If it shoots, and extracts, why not leave it alone until it plays up? Could save some problems and hassle.

[scout7]

This is all good input. So far, I am thinking most about either leaving it alone or putting a replacement barrel on it. It is not really needed for shooting, as I most often shoot #4's anyhow. The suggestion to reline it to .22 also interests me, as that could be a good exercise for my budding gunsmith. I just hate to trash the good rifling.

Another thought occurred to me that I just might try. I have some chamber adapters that can be used to convert .303B rifles to .32 acp, .32S&W or .32 S&W Long. I may just fiddle with those for a bit to see how it shoots with one of those cartridges. If it does well, I could try to affix the adapter in place semi-permanently and modify a spare bolt head to see if I can get it to extract. I would probaby have to make a new extractor, but that would be a good exercise to work with my young machinist on. When I got done I would have a kind of unique single shot centerfire plinker that would work just like my .22 Enfield. If I can get it to extract .32 acp, that would be a bonus because I already reload that cartridge (and it is still one of the cheaper centerfires here in the US anyhow). And the whole project would be reversible, without any permanent modification or damage to the rifle. Is this crazy? Or do I just have some "cabin fever" as it is winter and I would like to get out to shoot?

Converting the rifle to shoot a pistol cartridge would also allow me to shoot it at our local indoor range, which could be a boon in the winter.

[RobD]

New SMLE barrels are freely available at a reasonable price (at least in the UK they are), so why not have it re-barrelled for shooting and keep the original barrel for originality?

[scout7]

Well, you guys talked me into it. Set it up on the bench, took the wood off, took off some other bits. Put the barrel in the fixture, tried my #4 receiver wrench on it, next thing I knew the barrel was off. Since that seemed to me to be the hardest part, went looking and found someone that had a #3 takeoff barrel complete with sights. It should be on it's way soon.

Question for you. Have had #4's and #5's apart and know how to align the receiver and barrel. I am sure that I can figure something out, but is there any trick that will make it easier to align the receiver and barrel on a #1? As a side note, it was really interesting to see the difference between the #1 and #4 receivers. The #4 appears to be significantly more substantial!

[tbonesmith]

The last couple of No1's I've done, that had sights on the barrel, I laid a straight edge on the flat on the top of the receiver and visually aligned it with a straight edge laid across the know form. When I was at Lithgow SAF last year,I was told they did it/ do it by eye. ie, they screw it up until the sights look right.

[Peter Laidler]

NEARLY there TBone. But you can do it with TWO straight edges or ONE sheet of glass Instead of using vee blocks and a bar through the rearsight axis pin holes and the foresight block/protectors as on the No4, just use the vee blocks and bar through the backsight axis pin holes on the SMLE barrel against the known flat on the top of the body. When there is no rocking motion, it MUST be square.

I can't believe that the factory would do it by eye.................... We align our SA80's by eye against two accurate (?) datum marks. The broblem is that the datum marks are separated by a spacer! So alignment is a bit, er....................

Another problem about doing thingd by eye is this. To become expert, you need to practice. And what happened to all the rifles you practiced on?