Bren, L4 series barrels

[Peter Laidler]

RIGHT......., stand by your beds you 'orrible little shower...... Who was the one who asked me about the 7.62mm barrels for the L4 series of guns? Here's the answer, taken straight from the EMER - and how to identify them.

L4A1 gun ONLY and not authorised for use on any other gun:
VAOS number MG92A which is marked on the rear left side of the barrel. Has a bore diameter of .299". Not chrome lined anywhere and the plug gauge .299" must run freely through the bore. The breech end, up to the carrying handle is the old .303" Mk4 barrel diameter of approx .960". The flash eliminator (MG-186-SA) of this barrel is distinctly cone shaped at the front and was notorious for splitting. For this reason it was not permitted to use this barrel in the BFA role (quite why not is a bit of a mystery to me..., but there you go!)

The L4A2 gun. On the introduction of the L4A2 gun, a new barrel was introduced. This being numbered C1/1005-99-960-0227 with a bore diameter of .297" and a chrome lined CHAMBER only. The plug gauge .297" must run freely through the bore. Two of these barrels are fitted to each gun. The rear ir marked with the number 0227. The new flash eliminator 960-0288)is strengthened and distinctly more snub nosed than the old MG 186 type. The rear section up to the carrying handle reverts to the stronger and heavier Mk1 and 2 Bren diameter of approx 1.175" in order to dissipate the heat more effectively. Upon the introduction of this barrel, the old L4A1 type MG92 SA barrel is declared obsolescent. Thus barrel can be used on the L4A1 gun and the L4A1 designation does not change.

For the L4A4 'single barrel' guns a new barrel was introduced and this barrel is fully chrome lined. This is the MG 20 MA barrel, and is marked MG 5526 on the rear diameter. The introduction of this barrel rendered the early 0227 barrel obsolescent and the earliest MG 92A barrel obsolete. The bore diameter is .295" in view of the fact that it is fully chrome lined. It is identical in every other respect to the external diameters of the 0227 'twin barrels' for the A2 and 3 guns.

This barrel can be used on the L4A1 guns and when so, changes the gun designation to L4A6. When used on the L4A2 gun, the gun designation changes to MG 43 GA and L4A4.

There, taken straight from the EMER and the parts lists

Information

Warning: This is a relatively older thread This discussion is older than 360 days. Some information contained in it may no longer be current.

[Peter Laidler]

Incidentally, there were quite a few miscellaneous and modification instructions for the L4 guns too. Anyone want them too.............

[Aussie48]

"stand by your beds you 'orrible little shower"

Your a dag Peter I haven't heard that since my recruit training in 1972.

[Peter Laidler]

Where were you in training Aussie48? Kapooka?

[Lee Enfield]

Incidentally, there were quite a few miscellaneous and modification instructions for the L4 guns too. Anyone want them too.............

Yes please, as long as there is no vegemite involved....

[Aussie48]

Oh yes Peter Silver City Kapooka the last bunch of Recruits to use it, the National Service intakes had the nice brick Barracks we were relegated to the Hill.

[Brit plumber]

Thanks for the info Peter, this is a nice illustration of the MG5526 number on a L4A3.Attachment 55535 Attachment 55534Attachment 55531 Attachment 55532Attachment 55533

[Peter Laidler]

That's the one........ Now, according to the practice, that body should now be modified to read L4A3 With 3 barred through and 5 engraved alongside. MG 37 GA barred out and re engraved MG43 GA re-engraved.

But according to the theory we reverse the order of natural selection and progression and ............... But bear in mind that these were in Navy service (having already been approved for use by the MoD) and if they fitted a later barrel, the nicities of EMER's and BR's weren't uppermost in their minds.

Because Enfield held the IPR to this 7.62mm conversion process and wouldn't allow it to be carried out elsewhere, in order to keep the workforce at Enfield fully and gainfully employed, some nations, especially Africa - Ghana being a large player - who took advantage of a costed Military Aid or Crown Agents programme just sent the gun bodies to be converted. They - Ghana and Sierra Leone being a prime examples - sent over, say, 500 heaps of pure shot-out, worn out sxxxe Mk2 bodies and got back 500 virtually new FTR'd 7.62 Mk2 bodies, single 5526 barrels and 5000 magazines. Courtesy of you, the taxpayer!

Under the Crown Agents Programmes (the CAP's), certainly in my limited Simgapore 40 Base Workshop experience, if the nations sent in 500 of something and 100 were crap, as were hundreds of their No4's, 5's and Brens, then they would still get the same quantity back, made up from UK stockpiles.

[nzl1a1collector]

Peter, were you at 40 Base Workshops in 1968?

[Peter Laidler]

Yep, that's one of ours. We still had hundreds of FN's floating around and some of those were used by the trade test courses to do just this sort of thing. John Dudley (QLD), Dave Lee (Ipswich) and Lauri Taggart Castlemaine) other RAEMEArmourers at 8 RAR from QLD/ was doing these as part of their 1st Class and advanced machine shop phase. They also did some of the captured VC early AK47's and GBF's* too

*GBF's is the name we called those superb RPD's which stood for Great Balls of Fire!!!!! As good as any M-60 but not as good as the L7 and the later PKM's