Meet My Money Pits

[LowSpeed]

Attached are pics of Winston and Maggie, I'll let everyone figure out which name goes with which rifle. The L1A1 is (believe it or not) a Century Arms build. It's on a very nice receiver that's unmarked, from the quality and machining I believe it's an Imbel that's unmarked. I've shot close to 800 rounds through it and have never had any trouble that wasn't my fault. The original parts are all from 1959 or 60 and all came from Birmingham rifles. I honestly lucked up big time to get such a slick functioning rifle from the home of garbage guns but I did.

The Lee Enfield is obviously a No.4 mk.2 1955 vintage unfired after it left the factory. I do intend on firing it when time permits me to do so properly instead of just popping of a few rounds.

I bought both for a total of $450.00 and feel like I did very well with both. I actually bought the Enfield to meet the timeline of British service rifles.

Information

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[browningautorifle]

Both nice looking rifles...

[LowSpeed]

Thanks. When finances permit I want to get a better black pebble set of furniture, this one has lived a hard life, makes the rifle look legitimate but not very pretty. I'd like to have both rough and used as well as parade ground new. I'd also like to wring some ones neck for not retaining the flash hider, something else that'll have to be fixed. Overall though I'm happy with my little lot.

[browningautorifle]

If it's still threaded, these guys will have an FH somewhere.

[LowSpeed]

If it's still threaded, these guys will have an FH somewhere.

Unfortunately it's not, there's only about .3 of a groove left on the bottom of the barrel, it's sad to look at, I try not to.

[browningautorifle]

Unfortunately it's not

Can you thread it up again?

[LowSpeed]

Yep it could be, no one locally does that, I did consider speaking to a local guy who has a pretty high tech, high quality machine shop but then thought better of it. It's one of those ideas that floats in and out if you know what I mean.

[browningautorifle]

You should check out BDL Ltd then. Brian is a member here and can do what you want. He's very familiar too...you'll have to ship it but it'll be done right.

[Brian Dick]

The Century Arms rifles were produced during the Clinton era "Assault Rifle" Ban so the barrel has been cut off removing the threads completely. I suppose it could be threaded again but that would leave it a bit on the short side. It would need to be replaced in order to repair it properly IMHO. Finding decent original SLR barrels at a reasonable price has become pretty difficult. You're lucky that the receiver is Imbel as it was made in Brazil under license from FN and is excellent quality. The later CAI assembled rifles with terrible cast Hesse receivers were real pigs. I fixed a bunch of them over the years as best I could including one that was a post sample MG.

[RazorBurn]

$450 for both of those rifles was a nice score indeed. I wouldn't have thought twice about buying them for that price! Congratulations from a fellow Mountaineer!