Question on the Bren Blank Fire Barrel

[Peter Laidler]

Does all this indicate that Canadian BFA's are RED?

[csmarcher]

Most of the Blank Barrels I have come across, with the exception of one, have been all over red. The yellow one, is a picture of Kevin's that I use for showing what BFA barrel I'm referring to, as there are several.

I have used thousands of the blue L10z wood tip blanks with the solid BFA's and have had great success with them. I had tried to use the short blanks, but the aperture was far too big, and consequently there was nowhere near enough pressure to operate the action.

Before we discovered the wood tips, I actually went so far as to make some of the spacers for the mags so that they would feed the short blanks, and in conjunction with a regular Mk II barrel , which we had internally tapped and used a threaded restrictor, had some success, but were plagued by inconstant loads.

The aperture squeezes down from .311 at the rifled end down to .276 so as to prevent a solid wood bullet from exiting the barrel, although with the powder load behind it, it burns up pretty well before it exits the barrel. I have shot several at some paper targets within 10-20 feet, and there is virtually no debris going beyond 20 feet. As far as flash, well you can see by the picture.

The wood tips along with the solid BFA's have been the best result. As the picture shows.............

[Peter Laidler]

I would guess that these BFA's and barrels are from India but that's just a guess. If you're using crimped blank BFA's then you could just drill a 1/4" hole through the barrel, down across the foresight block. Then insert a 1/4" bolt. locked with a nut. This was another alternative we used for our 7.62mm guns.

On the other hand, I suppose you COULD try a similar bolt trick across the bore to smash and shred the wooden bullet. I'd start with a 3/16" high tensile Allen bolt first. The thread should aid in shredding the wood.

There was big trouble in the 80's or so when some units had zillions of rounds of bulletted blank and the big workshop at Catterick (?) made a couple of bulletted blank barrels by welding a masher/deflector across the flash eliminator of a few old Mk3 Bren barrels in the absence of the real McCoy. They worked for a while but the energy of the wood bullet hitting the masher/deflector part just sheared the taper pin that retains the flash eliminator and bllew it off down the range............. followed by a load of 'real' wooden bullets. Apparently it was like being shot at with pencils!!!!!!!

No real damage was done and it was all done in good faith and the result on the paperwork was that '.........suitable advice should be given to those concerned.....' which in Army language means that such advice won't appear on your record but will indicate a degree of ars* kicking!