Remington m17

[Promo]

Also, how was Eddystone Associated with Remington?

Eddystone was a Remington plant. Guess where - in Eddystone, Pennsylvania

[Patrick Chadwick]

Since you are loaded with facts

No, it's the books that are loaded with facts! And in this case the No. 1 "must have" is "United States Rifle Model of 1917" by C.S: Ferris, published by Scott Duff, ISBN 1-888722-14-2.

From this book, you can learn (amongst a lot else) that "the US did not forsee being drawn into the war in Europe, and did nothing to increase rifle production until September 1916". Considering that the Lusitania had been sunk on May 7th 1915, this was, to put it very politely, a remarkable attitude. A Senate committee in January 1916 put it considerably less politely - the US was unprepared and had no contigency plan. Read the book and get the whole story. But the essence is that if the US had relied on Springfield to make all the rifles required by the US Expeditionary force in France, the production rate was such that a large number of soldiers would still have been waiting for their rifles some time after the war ended. The authorities were forced to approach commercial manufacturers.

Now it was a stroke of undeserved good fortune for the (non-)planners who had failed their country so miserably that 3 factories - Eddystone, Remington and Winchester - were coming to the end of the P14 production for the British. Eddystone was set up initially as a one-product Remington subsidiary for the P14 contract, so one may resonably assume that the level of know-how, machinery, tolerance levels etc were exactly as at Remington, with the added manufacturing edge that Eddystone was a totally dedicated plant. And key personnel must have initially been assigned from Remington. No flower pickers!

It was established that rejigging these 3 factories to make 1903s would have required a lead time that could not be afforded. The brilliantly simple solution was to convert the P14 from .303 to .30-06. And this rifle was then termed the "U.S. Model of 1917", known as the M1917 in the US, but very commonly referred to as the P17 outside the US, by simple analogy with the P14.

BTW, Winchester had initial quality (tolerance) problems with regard to interchangeability...TLC is no good if the parts don't fit, and an Order of the Secretary of War decreed that "...Rifles of Winchester manufacture prior to Jan. 1, 1918, will not be taken overseas..."

I could write a lot more, but it would be better if you bought the book! I finish with this quote:

"Nearly two-thirds of the rifles used by Americans in combat in France were made at Eddystone."


Patrick

[Doug Rammel]

The MODEL CF 1917 sounds like a problem with the roll stamp. Patrick I have 3 17's and 3 14's. One from each Maker. The most accurate is an Eddy P-14.

[Chuckindenver]

be it a Winchester, Eddystone or Remington they were all made the same, with the same type of steel, and heat treatment.. other then early Winchesters, parts fit gun to gun, craked 17,s arent as common as the myth says..
id say its more rare then the norm.. though very soft, the 1917 P14 are some of the strongest actions ever,..second to the Type 99 Arisaka, and Smith Corona 1903A3.
id bet lunch your rifle says model OF 1917, and it was polished during sporterizing.
9-18 is likely the original barrel, however...to stir the soup a bit,..the action was likely made well before Sept , and the 2 were mated together after Sept, by Sept Remington was slowing down production of the 1917 and i belive stopped production of new parts in Oct., and assembly of Rifles in Dec..i have the info someplace,,,just have tp dig for it.

[Patrick Chadwick]

Chuck, that sounds quite plausible. On P.25 Ferris gives some figures from which he deduces that at Eddystone the total lead time from the first machining operation to a finished receiver ready for assembly in a rifle was 31 days. In other words, if from Day X no new receivers were started, the numbers in progress would have been sufficient for another month of full production. With production running down, this number would have lasted even longer.

As the end of the war was foreseeable, and no new contracts had been issued, one imagines that the factories would have tried to avoid being caught with masses of part-finished components after the contracts ran out. Contracts may have provided for compensation for completed rifles, or completed parts, but hardly for raw material stocks (which could be used for other purposes) or part-finished components, which would be scrap.

This ties in with your thesis - that new production of components was run down in anticipation well before the contracts were terminated on 9th Nov. 1918, and the factories were already assembling rifles largely from components completed and stockpiled some time before. It would be interesting to see the source info, if you can find it.


Patrick

[040x]

Chuck your on! Also guys if your reading this post I will Pm you a link to a YouTube video I made showing you a problem I'm having with my 1917. Hopefully you guys can lead me in the right direction. Or this will give you an excuse to bring out your old hunk metal and make me a video response! Thanks in advance fellas. It's a shell ejection problem.

[trooper554877]

Thanks for the warning! I took a good look at my Eddy, and whaddyaknow - there is a hole in the barrel - all the way down, from end to end!
Despite this obvious sign of sloppy manufacture and an inspector who must have had his eyes shut when he whacked on the flaming bomb, I have managed to come a respectable BDMP 3rd in Hessen with it. Maybe the TLC that I invested helped a little, who knows?

OK, joke over, let's get a bit more serious:

Call it B-S, scuttlebutt, codswallop, hearsay or whatever, according to which flavor of English you prefer, but nobody is helped by the retailing of unfounded prejudice and industrial fairytales that cause unnecessary worry and uncertainty for newcomers. For what follows, do not believe me, but check up with Ferris, Stratton, Poyer, Hatcher etc. as I do not claim to have a photographic memory - and why shouldn't the doubters and knockers do some checking themselves for once?

1) Even if it pains '03 fans, it was early 1903 Springfields that had trouble with cracked receivers when made, because the factory had not yet mastered the hardening of nickel steel, NOT the M1917.

2) Even if it pains Winchester fans, it was Winchester, NOT Remington or Eddystone, that had quality trouble with the first P14s.

3) Cracked M1917 receivers appear to be traceable to overstressing when inserting replacement barrels. ChuckinDenver is our resident expert for this, I believe. I see no reason to be worried about an original M1917 with original barrel in good condition, especially NOT an Eddystone.

Why especially NOT an Eddystone?
- Because when they switched over from P14s to M1917s, all 3 factories had experienced production lines with a high productivity, way out in front of Springfield, and a very high rate of parts interchangeability between factories. But Eddystone was a single product factory. They made nothing but P14s, and then nothing but M1917s, They concentrated on one product, without any distraction from other products, achieved the highest productivity of all 3 sources, and I have not yet seen any evidence (as opposed to prejudice) whatsoever to suggest that the quality was any different to the other manufacturers.

In fact I will now make an extravagant claim, and invite all to prove me wrong through documented statistics, not hearsay:

Of the 4 manufacturers mentioned, the actual order of quality and reliability over the complete production run of the rifle types mentioned was the exact reverse of popular prejudice, to wit:
Best - Eddystone
2nd - Remington
3rd - Winchester
Worst - Springfield

OK hearsay retailers. You have been challenged. Now prove me wrong with documented statistics. But don't take it all too seriously. Keep calm and keep the blood pressure down! Nobody's honor or professional reputation is at stake here! Just please check the sources before shooting me down!

I eagerly await enlightenment.


Patrick

P.S: I have never seen TLC as a parameter in any quality control documents.

thank you patrick
i think the reciever issue is non-void as I ask why where they so sought after for 1. conversion to 308 for target rifle shooting and 2. re-barrel and chambered for larger cartridges for bug game shooting?
because i think they are one of the strongest receiver actions around, even when compared with modern actions.

What are your thoughts chuck?
cheers
Ned
sorry my post was posted after the others and there fore out dated, but thanks chuck.

[Chuckindenver]

couple points....you know, iv never looked at CS Ferrises book lol...Nick is a great guy and good friend, almost asked him to give me a signed copy of it when i saw him a couple weeks ago, like i have of the RIA book he put out, im told he has pictures of a few of my rifles, and parts in that book as well, i say...if it helps the collectors...im all for it.
most of the info i have is based on my observations and expericance with rebuilding and working on them...when need be, i do some searching for the answer, the Remington collectors website is a great place to read...all the book out are wonderful, but take them with a grain of salt, they were writtin by men just like us, looking for answers on the things we enjoy, and they do make some mistakes, and thats ok, i praise these people that have taken the time to put out great books with awesome info and pictures for all of us to argue over.
now...heres my take on the whole 30-06 to .308 conversion???why... your not gaining anything..your loosing more. ammo cost more, the balistics are pretty darn close. and youll have more feeding issues then its worth... i love the .308 and have a few rifles in that cal. Remington 700,s H&K,s and M1A...couple are my favorite shooters..
on the bigger cal, for hunting? hmmm, the 30-06 will kill anything on this planet, with the right bullet, and a well place shot.. the big plus with 30-06.. you can get factory ammo in any hardwear store, Kmart Walmart ect...
now...im all about taking a already ground on, sporterized 17, and building a beast.... im duing a 577Trex build with a 17 action as i type.. the 17 action is very strong,,,however, you can make a prettier hunting rifle with a 1903, K98 or a Remington 700...dont grind it up....leave it as it is, shoot it, enjoy it,,, youll find the 1917 is a learned love, though big and clunky, shooting them grows on you...i learned to love the 17...kinda like that crazy women you dated in Highschool, they kinda grow on you...and then your hooked lol.
like i always say... if it aint broke...fix it till it finally is..

[trooper554877]

couple points....you know, iv never looked at CS Ferrises book lol...Nick is a great guy and good friend, almost asked him to give me a signed copy of it when i saw him a couple weeks ago, like i have of the RIA book he put out, im told he has pictures of a few of my rifles, and parts in that book as well, i say...if it helps the collectors...im all for it.
most of the info i have is based on my observations and expericance with rebuilding and working on them...when need be, i do some searching for the answer, the Remington collectors website is a great place to read...all the book out are wonderful, but take them with a grain of salt, they were writtin by men just like us, looking for answers on the things we enjoy, and they do make some mistakes, and thats ok, i praise these people that have taken the time to put out great books with awesome info and pictures for all of us to argue over.
now...heres my take on the whole 30-06 to .308 conversion???why... your not gaining anything..your loosing more. ammo cost more, the balistics are pretty darn close. and youll have more feeding issues then its worth... i love the .308 and have a few rifles in that cal. Remington 700,s H&K,s and M1A...couple are my favorite shooters..
on the bigger cal, for hunting? hmmm, the 30-06 will kill anything on this planet, with the right bullet, and a well place shot.. the big plus with 30-06.. you can get factory ammo in any hardwear store, Kmart Walmart ect...
now...im all about taking a already ground on, sporterized 17, and building a beast.... im duing a 577Trex build with a 17 action as i type.. the 17 action is very strong,,,however, you can make a prettier hunting rifle with a 1903, K98 or a Remington 700...dont grind it up....leave it as it is, shoot it, enjoy it,,, youll find the 1917 is a learned love, though big and clunky, shooting them grows on you...i learned to love the 17...kinda like that crazy women you dated in Highschool, they kinda grow on you...and then your hooked lol.
like i always say... if it aint broke...fix it till it finally is..

I only mentioned the 308 conversion because target shooters over this side of the world liked the actions because they where strong, stronger than the lee enfield that was being converted at the time and there where a few around which made them cheap. All sorts of buggery was done on them, some are restorable some are not. I agree in terms of ballistic with you chuck that you gain very little if anything in changing from 30-06 to 308. I think the 30-06 has more of a record and higher standing than the 308but that was what the rules state that only 7.62 or 303 or 5.56 are allowed for target shooting.
I had a pristine eddystone in original configuration that I shot for awhile and fell in love with but as the family grew and the needs outweighed the wants it went. I noe have a nearly all matching apart from the stock(remington marked) and a strangely marked bolt handle(weird number) it is all eddystone and still has the red paint band around the fore-end and looks like it was done yesterday. The barrel is like new, haven't gauged it yet but when I get some gauges it will be done for prosterties sakes, but has some cord wear on one of the lands at the muzzle.
Shot it last wekend and at 100 metres with a handload of 48.5 grains of AR2208 or Varget in the states, behind a 155gn HBC HPBT match projectile(made here in Australia) i got a group of 38, 44 and 40mm groups. Can't be happier !!!
Cheers
Ned

[Chuckindenver]

7.62 is just the bullet itself... 7.62x54R 7.62x39 7.62x55 {30-06 7.62x51 {308 win} so your 17 in the original .30 1906 should be legal.
the 303 {.311} is used in many..7.7 Jap, 7.65 Arg, .303 Brit, ect.
5.56 is .{.223} or {.224} used in many many rifles, from .22 Hornet up to .22-250..i would look a little more into the rules they have set..
i know that in many European countries they have banned the ownership of rifles chambered in any military cal..so many shooters have made them in wild cats../30 gibbs, 6.5-06 ect..
if your loading your own, then your can load the 30-06 pretty hot, and pretty darn accurate.. the long magazine box on a 1917 makes feeding a shorter round pretty tough unless you modify the folower, spring and box.