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1916 RSAF Enfield ShtLE MkIII* with alloy butt plate.
Picked up this rather neglected 'Smellie' today. She needs a couple of parts, but otherwise all there. I was, however, curious about the butt plate. Instead of brass, it's alloy. It actually looks as though it was made for this rifle. Did some MkIII*s feature an alloy plate? I've only seen brass. Have a look!
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03-29-2014 09:44 PM
# ADS
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Found an interesting mark on the bottom of the barrel..V.S.M. Vickers Sons and Maxim. Don't think I've ever seen that before.
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Legacy Member
Looks like a No.4 butt plate to me.
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Advisory Panel
Thats a No4 buttplate.
Alloy No1 buttplates do exist, both with and without oil bottle traps.
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No4 butt plates were a perfectly acceptable and authorized replacement on No1 rifles and Lanchesters
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Legacy Member
Unless it's been fitted properly (which this one has) it usually looks like a pimple on a pig's backside. Easiest cheat is to use a No.4 butt as well.
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We were permitted to do that as well.,
No4 butt plates were usually quite a simple fit to No1 rifle butts if you took a bit of wood away from the centre of the butt plate area and rounded the recess in the heel of the butt for the rounded part of the butt plate overhang. The trouble was that we usually/always used new butt plate screws which stripped the threads in the butt. So a bit of drilling out and glueing in new pegs was the order of the day
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That's what was kind of throwing me. It does look as though it was made for it. It's the first MkIII* I've seen around here with an alloy plate. I didn't know if it was some sort of rare/scarce thing or not!
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Legacy Member
Just out of curiosity, why would this rifle have been fitted with an alloy butt plate? Seems that it would have been easier to just stick on another brass one, instead of going to the trouble to make a No4 plate fit.
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If you're in an Armourers shop and a No1 rifle needs another butt plate and you ain't got one, you take a No4 butt plate out of the tray or from a box on your bench. And if it happens to be alloy, then guess what one gets fitted...............? That's how life in an Armourers shop was then and probably still is now
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