No. 4 Mk1/2 Sear lugs bedding

[Gnr527]

Accurising my ersatz No. 9 (– similar to No. 4 but only looking for about 1/2lb up pressure on muzzle rather than 3 – 7lbs).
The barrel, as previously stocked, had about 11lbs pressure at muzzle (too much even for .303) with butt and sear lug face bearing and other bearing at bottom of sear lugs and around the knox form. Little bearing at front of action or at the reinforce.
Having followed previous threads on this forum rebedding has reached a critical point and I am looking for a bit of guidance before I go too far.
I have good bearing on the butt socket and the sloping faces of the draws. I have relieved the foreend under the sear lugs to lower them and reduced the main screw collar length from .503” to .470”.
This has had the effect of giving me good fit and bearing to butt socket, sear lug faces, sear lug bottoms and the start of good bearing at the front of action around the screw and at the reinforce and ‘irregular/heavyish’(!) bearing at the muzzle.
Should I now:-
a) Gradually lower the sear lug bearing (possibly in conjunction with screw pivot/collar bearing) to increase bearing at screw and reinforce with a consequential reduction in muzzle bearing down to circa 1/2lb.
b) Insert a wooden bearing block at the foreend muzzle to give a 2” long bearing. I can play with the thickness of this to give ‘best’ pressure.
c) Check that I have full .020” clearance to the whole of the barrel other than bearings.
d) Grease, assemble and shoot.
TIA
John

Information

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[bow]

I beg your perdon, what is an ersatz enfield?

[Gnr527]

Wikipedia:-

'substituting for, and typically inferior in quality to'

Sorry Bow - my not very funny joke.

A number of No.9s were produced 'officially' - see rifleman.org

There were also an unknown number produced by 'the trade' - undoubtably considered by many to be not genuine and therefore inferior.

I believe my No.9 has some 'history' - it is not one of the official ones but, apart from the numbering, is fully to No. 9 specification.

I think these are fabulous .22 rifles to shoot and as fullbore becomes ever more expensive and politically frowned upon, are easier to own and shoot - anything but inferior!

Regards
John

[bow]

Ok Gnr527. I So itìs a .22 LR rifle. I have seen in the past No.8 rifles. They're beatiful! With my short knlowledge of enfield world i didn't know No.9. Fore end is the same of No.4 .303 caliber rifle? I have worked only a few No.4 .303 caliber. Here some people could say very interesting things about bedding your rifle. What did you use to re-bed your rifle timber or epoxy?

[jrhead75]

There's a great deal more expertise here than I have, but in my humble opinion, this is about the point I'd cinch things up and go see how she shoots.

[muffett.2008]

If it's still in .22 configuration, there's a lot of fuss over nothing.
There is insufficient barrel whip to require the bedding procedures of the larger calibre.
I'm with Jrhead, go and shoot it.

[Gnr527]

Jrhead/Muffett
I’m happy to accept your advice is sound/sensible/practical - to fool about with a.22 training rifle based on a battle rifle designed to hit a football sized target at 300 yards is, perhaps, a sign of a clown with nothing better to do ;-(
I’ve come to this exercise from several years with the Anschutz anoraks and was hoping to achieve three broad objectives:-
a) Principally to understand the dynamics of how, for example, ‘shaving a gnats knacker’ from underside of sear lugs leads to an uplift of ??.000” at muzzle
b) secondly to practice how to correctly set-up a Nr. 4 on a first time basis, with a reasonable degree of competence (with a minimum of trial and error)
c) thirdly to confirm, or otherwise to my own satisfaction, that it is a pointless exercise to put a lot of effort into trying to get greater accuracy out of a ‘standard’ .22 Lee trainer, than that achieved by A J Parker and company in the 60’s and 70’s.
I’m still unclear on a), hopefully getting somewhere on b), and still out on c).
I will shoot it this weekend but was hoping to get a bit better/more even bearing at screw, reinforce and muzzle without regressing.

Keep it coming please
Thanks all
John

[muffett.2008]

Now is this boy having a go at Peter, or what?

[Gnr527]

Naughty boy Muffett - it's largely Peter's articles set me off on this bloody track.

[Peter Laidler]

I stayed out of this because right from the start I couldn't understand how the lower edge of the sear lugs that form the draws could touch the fore-end sufficient to have to chisel out to create clearance. I don't think I have ever encountered this. The body of the rifle can only ever sit down on the fore-end.