No4 mk2 target rifle

[Peter Laidler]

Bid NOW SSJ. You know it'll sound cheap tomorrow! Like the great man on this site used to say. Everything is cheap - yesterday

[CINDERS]

Buy now sort it later as if it gets away you will always ponder crikey I should have brought it.
I was bidding years ago at an auction gave up because I was scared of spending the money the chap who won the bidding from me received a Lithgow Hooked Quillion with Lithgow WWI Scabbard for $175.00/AU try and get one now for under a grand good luck!!!

[Bruce_in_Oz]

The Canadians, both the Defence types and in the form of the DCRA, did a lot of work squeezing performance and consistency from their No.4 "target" rifles. Part of the procedure was a bit of creative dowelling.

From C-71-111-000-/MM-000

Attachment 61017

Hope this link works.

I vaguely recall that an extract or the complete document was available as a file near here.

[ssj]

Ah.......

8><----

*believing that if a standard correct fore-end fitting/setting was proven in trials to be the best configuration for accuracy AND for the No4T sniper rifle, then it was good enough for me. But maybe that's just me.........

I have taken your comments to heart by the way. On the Parker Hale gun target gun I got my hands on a no4 mk2 unfitted lower fore end and I have set it up as as-issued. So now I will try the PHale setup v the as issued setup and see how they do, the only difference is the fore end though it maybe a winter job before I get time.

[Peter Laidler]

That's interesting BinO. I used those dimensions against an old slave action and the TOP dowel will act on the bodyside. But not if its much lower. I suppose that if the inside of the dowels werre cut accurately, it would stop the body moving left/right within the fore-end. Mind you, a tight front trigger guard screw pulling a round barrel into a round trough would have the same effect. As would careful shimming of the rear insides of the top of the fore-end

[ssj]

" a tight front trigger guard screw pulling a round barrel into a round trough would have the same effect"

I assume this is the re-inforce of the barrel?

yet it is "recommended" that that support on the sides is removed for accuracy,

first pic un-issued/un-used no4 mk2 stock, second pic the recommended pad.

Wow it gets fascinating. So we have Peter's traditional setup which pre-ww2 was determined as best. Then a lot of "playing" since. I use the term playing as I am wondering as Peter said what is Parker Hales imagination and what is tested and true. I see so many different mods on these No4s that I am left wondering what the heck is going on.

I can see I need to test what looks like "old wives tales" myself.

Sadly the gun went for more that I could bid right now so I couldnt get win it.

[ssj]

The Canadians, both the Defence types and in the form of the DCRA, did a lot of work squeezing performance and consistency from their No.4 "target" rifles. Part of the procedure was a bit of creative dowelling.

From C-71-111-000-/MM-000

Attachment 61017

Hope this link works.

I vaguely recall that an extract or the complete document was available as a file near here.

It is.

Note however that the canadians had no4 mk1*s while we are talking no4 mk2 which has a transverse screw you can tighten up which clamps the two forks of the rear foreend against the mk2 type trigger support bracket. With the mk1* the steel anti-spreading tie plate and riveted brass rod would I assume prevent this. Here in NZ I have seen a few mk1's and mk1*'s converted to a screw with a big external brass pad either side by the way.

[Peter Laidler]

I know where you're coming from SSJ. Everyone in the Commonwealth who sold No4's in the 50's had their own way of setting up the rifles for better accuracy. Some with rubber pads and springs that I look at with absolute dispair and this that and the other etc etc. But I am of the old school based on the absolute FACT that in 1949, to improve the wartime standard of the No4 rifle - and the T incidentally, the Small Arms School at Hythe and the proving ground at Pendine tried every known method, including George Fulton who was an advisory member of the board, and no method constantly out performed the standard method of stocking up when it was properly done.

I remember reading these reports as it named the REME Armourer S/Sgt as S/Sgt Cooper from Hythe. I mentioned this to one of my old bosses who went to a file and showed me a photo of said S/Sgt Cooper with George Fulton drinking a cup of tea during the trial! I just feel that however well thought out (or badly thought out, depending on your point of view of course.....) and well meaning some of the so called 'tuners' or 'accurisers' were/are, they didn't have the inside knowledge that the original designers had. And that includes the all important harmonics of that hollow tube we call the barrel. Just my view and opinion of course.

When I was younger and keen..... I was the engine builder and engineer for a small MODSPORTS racing team. At races I used to see all manner of 'modifications' to cars and suspensions. Some were worth copying while others were a good looking frill - if not a complete fraud that would never stand close mechanical scrutiny

[Mk VII]

I am reminded of a letter I saw recently from Lt-Col Ransford, the Director of Small Arms & Ammunition at the British Purchasing Commission in New York about a proposal submitted to him by a Mr A.K. Stroud of the Automatic Appliance Corporation to convert M1917 Enfields into light automatics for Britain.
"The design of the conversion is unsound. It has been carried out by someone with little experience of rifles and machine guns, and less of service requirements. In its present state I consider the rifle dangerous to the firer. ... in any case we are more concerned with obtaining rifles to proved design than we are with converting those that we already have. ... I have arranged for the weapons to be submitted for detailed examination at the Inspection Department, New York, and subsequently for a brief firing trial to be carried out. I think there is no doubt that no further action is necessary and that we need waste no more time on these persons"

[ssj]

When I was younger and keen..... I was the engine builder and engineer for a small MODSPORTS racing team. At races I used to see all manner of 'modifications' to cars and suspensions. Some were worth copying while others were a good looking frill - if not a complete fraud that would never stand close mechanical scrutiny

Same here, hill climbing minis and 240Zs.