No4 T grooved hand guards.

[CINDERS]

Peter can use the recovery vehicle to get his MGB out of the mud when he bogs the sucka!!!!

[Peter Laidler]

I used to be an MGB GT and a BGT V8 owner but then I saw the light!!!!!!!!!

[Vincent]

1953 Centurion recovery vehicle. Not a gun tank

Wow! Very cool!

[browningautorifle]

Having a centurion anything would be neat...

[CINDERS]

And I must ask just how big is your garage er! hangar Peter would be nice to see some celluloid of your ARV......

[chosenman]

Remember the grooves (dropped as a manufacturing expedient) were there as an aid to bayonet fighting which hopefully the user of No.4T would not need to resort to.

How come the grooved hand guards remained during the L42's life and were produced new during the L42 program in beech?

[Beerhunter]

How come the grooved hand guards remained during the L42's life and were produced new during the L42 program in beech?

Who knows. Maybe people liked the look of them. They certainly do these days. My 4T looks good in them. :-)

[chosenman]

I think its probably got something to do with the fact grooves offer grip during the carrying of the weapon whilst stalking. Oh and they do look good!!

[Peter Laidler]

It's because the L42 was done on the cheap. And I mean the REAL cheap. The handguards were simply converted from stocks of No8 handguards which were shortened and re-profiled to suit. That's why you'll see that the grooves go right to the end. Well, they would go right to the end but due to the savage internal and external reprofiling the wood was pared down to zilch which made them weak, just like the fore-ends. A nightmare for Armourers to patch. Hence the need for new replacements which were still thin but weren't grooved.

Armourers were instructed to sentence the L42 rifle Z/Base/Ordnance repair when spares were dues-out for 8 weeks or more and that meant Z a rifle for want of new handguards or fore-ends. It didn't work that way so they were relegated to make do and mend and patch beyond what was realistic. That's why there are sooooooo manby patches on them! At 18 Command that serviced the West of the Country they just made 'new' handguards by splicing No4 upper and lowers together with a neat wood insert glued between the two and..... and....... and..... But very time consuming.

Accurate, yes, tough, yes, hardy, yes, everything else, yes but badly provisioned for I'd say........

I think I went through the dire situation/saga of L42 and 39 fore-ends and handguards in an article '.....wot I ritt....' for the forum a couple of years ago