Experimental Ross Rifle
- Thread starter MTF
- Start date
Facts
One thing that I have learned form these forums is that you had better be darned well positive of your statements that you give out. And you had better be prepared to back yourself up on what you post.
I would tend to think that GANDERITE, being a prolific poster here, does have some information as to what he posted.
Otherwise, there is going to be a barbecue, and the Goose (or in this case, the Gander-ite) is going to get flamed and served up well done.
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One thing that I have learned form these forums is that you had better be darned well positive of your statements that you give out. And you had better be prepared to back yourself up on what you post.
I would tend to think that GANDERITE, being a prolific poster here, does have some information as to what he posted.
Otherwise, there is going to be a barbecue, and the Goose (or in this case, the Gander-ite) is going to get flamed and served up well done.
.
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I have already said too much. I am suposed to shoot you now.
And if I discussed the two cases of M1 Carbine ammo sent to Savage to develop an alternative to the M1 Carbine... well... it boggles the mind.
The advantage of being an old fart is that the old farts I know are really old... and they remember so much that is not recorded.
What I said came from a guy who knows.
Some of you here know that I have done work with Savage.
And if I discussed the two cases of M1 Carbine ammo sent to Savage to develop an alternative to the M1 Carbine... well... it boggles the mind.
The advantage of being an old fart is that the old farts I know are really old... and they remember so much that is not recorded.
What I said came from a guy who knows.
Some of you here know that I have done work with Savage.
I have heard that at one time Savage had about 150 prototype "machine gun" type rifles in a vault. Not all of them were finished. But, I don't think this means they were all developed at Savage. I believe a large section of this was sold off or disposed of in the 1960's. I certainly have more questions than answers.
I have been playing with Ross Rifles now for just short of 50 years.
After reading the last half-dozen posts here, I have so many questions that I can't even put them into words.
BUFFDOG has worked with REMINGTON. GANDERITE has worked with SAVAGE.
Gentlemen, kindly Sirs, share your knowledge... at least enough that the rest of us can formulate intelligent questions.
It took over 300 years to work out Felix Werder's incredible barrels. Let's see if we can work this one out a bit quicker.
BTW: poster last page: the "brass thing" is indeed the Blish Lock, but it is not hinged. It slides up and down as required, providing retardation of the opening of the bolt only when it is under high pressure. When the pressure drops, it loses its grip, drops and allows the bolt to recoil backwards. The effect is rather like short-recoil operation except that you don't need a 2-piece upper receiver, so the finished gun is much less complicated, less complex to build. It's actually an early form of delayed-blowback operation; its grandson is the G-3 and the StG-57.
If you really wanna see WEIRD, take a look at the guts of an Armaguerra 39.... inertia-closed bolt with a horizontally-pivotted vertically-striking internal hammer beating on a semi-locking semi-block to release the semiautomatic FIRING-PIN which also provides spring closure to the bolt NOW, fergawdssakes.
THIS ONE is a relatively-straightforward Blish Lock. Only problem is that the Blish Lock is supposed to have been proven not to work.... but here the critter is, right in front of us.
Gets interesting sometimes.
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After reading the last half-dozen posts here, I have so many questions that I can't even put them into words.
BUFFDOG has worked with REMINGTON. GANDERITE has worked with SAVAGE.
Gentlemen, kindly Sirs, share your knowledge... at least enough that the rest of us can formulate intelligent questions.
It took over 300 years to work out Felix Werder's incredible barrels. Let's see if we can work this one out a bit quicker.
BTW: poster last page: the "brass thing" is indeed the Blish Lock, but it is not hinged. It slides up and down as required, providing retardation of the opening of the bolt only when it is under high pressure. When the pressure drops, it loses its grip, drops and allows the bolt to recoil backwards. The effect is rather like short-recoil operation except that you don't need a 2-piece upper receiver, so the finished gun is much less complicated, less complex to build. It's actually an early form of delayed-blowback operation; its grandson is the G-3 and the StG-57.
If you really wanna see WEIRD, take a look at the guts of an Armaguerra 39.... inertia-closed bolt with a horizontally-pivotted vertically-striking internal hammer beating on a semi-locking semi-block to release the semiautomatic FIRING-PIN which also provides spring closure to the bolt NOW, fergawdssakes.
THIS ONE is a relatively-straightforward Blish Lock. Only problem is that the Blish Lock is supposed to have been proven not to work.... but here the critter is, right in front of us.
Gets interesting sometimes.
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History
From GANDERITE, "The advantage of being an old fart is that the old farts I know are really old... and they remember so much that is not recorded."
How very true! Today, History has taken on a much more important aspect of life in our new Information age. With the Internet providing almost an answer or reference to almost anything, we tend to think that there should be a lot of documented items. However, the Internet is not an infallable source of information and much of what is found on it comes under the "Garbage In equals Garbage Out" classification. Because this GIGO gets repeated, it is accepted by many of our younger generation as FACT. Typical of this is the Ross Rifles. Also, things tend to get looked at in modern day conditions, and the Social, Political, Economic and other factors that were present AT THE TIME are ignored.
However, being an old fart at 70+, (and I will include SMELLIE, GANDERITE and several others in this "old fart" category,) a lot of these experiments and ideas were simply done, and records of them were not kept in detail as seems to be done today. There were only a few published Magazines or Periodicals available, and although many articles were submitted, because of space limitations, only a few were printed. And because of the bother, expense and space taken up of keeping paper correspondence, records and such stored, old and apparently outdated or useless written records were regularly purged from the Companies storage, and burned or discarded. Today, we would give almost anything to have access to these destroyed records, and thankfully a few of them are still found and come to light. Otherwise, we have to rely on first hand accounts of the people who were there.
Today, we have factory built rifles that have accuracy that was unheard of, and only dreamed about back in the 1950s and 1960s. A rifle that shot a one inch group at 100 yards was treated like the Crown Jewels. Our present rifles have evolved from experimentation, particularly from the Benchrest and Reloading Crowd. I have a set of reloading tools in .308 Winchester, made by Seeley Masker, that are made for ONE particular rifle. This rifle will shoot 5/8 inch groups all day long if you do your part, and was a fantastic target rifle back in the 1960s. Today, a 5/8 inch group is "ho-hum---I can do that with my factory Savage Varmint rifle."
But, a few words of advice here. NEVER, EVER, NEVER make a bet on a statement that SMELLIE makes about Ross Rifles, Maxim Machine Guns, or a Historical event or occurance. You might as well take out your wallet, hand him the amount you bet, and learn from the experience, because YOU WILL LOSE.
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From GANDERITE, "The advantage of being an old fart is that the old farts I know are really old... and they remember so much that is not recorded."
How very true! Today, History has taken on a much more important aspect of life in our new Information age. With the Internet providing almost an answer or reference to almost anything, we tend to think that there should be a lot of documented items. However, the Internet is not an infallable source of information and much of what is found on it comes under the "Garbage In equals Garbage Out" classification. Because this GIGO gets repeated, it is accepted by many of our younger generation as FACT. Typical of this is the Ross Rifles. Also, things tend to get looked at in modern day conditions, and the Social, Political, Economic and other factors that were present AT THE TIME are ignored.
However, being an old fart at 70+, (and I will include SMELLIE, GANDERITE and several others in this "old fart" category,) a lot of these experiments and ideas were simply done, and records of them were not kept in detail as seems to be done today. There were only a few published Magazines or Periodicals available, and although many articles were submitted, because of space limitations, only a few were printed. And because of the bother, expense and space taken up of keeping paper correspondence, records and such stored, old and apparently outdated or useless written records were regularly purged from the Companies storage, and burned or discarded. Today, we would give almost anything to have access to these destroyed records, and thankfully a few of them are still found and come to light. Otherwise, we have to rely on first hand accounts of the people who were there.
Today, we have factory built rifles that have accuracy that was unheard of, and only dreamed about back in the 1950s and 1960s. A rifle that shot a one inch group at 100 yards was treated like the Crown Jewels. Our present rifles have evolved from experimentation, particularly from the Benchrest and Reloading Crowd. I have a set of reloading tools in .308 Winchester, made by Seeley Masker, that are made for ONE particular rifle. This rifle will shoot 5/8 inch groups all day long if you do your part, and was a fantastic target rifle back in the 1960s. Today, a 5/8 inch group is "ho-hum---I can do that with my factory Savage Varmint rifle."
But, a few words of advice here. NEVER, EVER, NEVER make a bet on a statement that SMELLIE makes about Ross Rifles, Maxim Machine Guns, or a Historical event or occurance. You might as well take out your wallet, hand him the amount you bet, and learn from the experience, because YOU WILL LOSE.
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I think the points made in the last two posts are excellent ones. The rifle manufacturers lost or discarded massive amounts of records and I'll bet they would be surprised had they known how valuable and important these would be down the line. It still may not have changed their behaviror - their focus was profit and staying in business. I think the need for documentation has never been greater however. Large numbers of buyers of collectable firearms are routinely defrauded. For example, the percentage of antique/vintage Colt single action revolvers that, "aren't right" has reached an astounding level. There is a great deal of money at stake in collectable firearms and the percentage that have been altered to improve their value is troublesome. So, purchasing based on, "opinion" without documentation is ill-advised. In the case of the subject rifle of this topic, the seller is of the opinion that the rifle was made at the Ross factory as a prototype. I am of the opinion that purchasing this rifle based on this assumption would be very ill-advised, particularly if the rifle were priced accordingly. I realize many here believe it more likely this rifle was made at the Savage Utica plant. I agree that is more likely, but whoever buys it will have no way of proving that.
I threw this pistol in to the mix as it is a great example of how factory markings can make a huge difference. And it is a major reason I reject that the rifle under discussion was made at the Ross plant. However, although this pistol was made at the Ross plant, by the same Ross employees who made the fine sporting, military and target rifles we are all familiar with and is marked Ross Rifle Company, it is not a Ross product! I say that in the sense that Sir Charles had nothing to do with it. As many know, after the Ross Rifle Company went out of business the plant was vacant. It did not sit idle long and North American Arms leased the plant from the Canadian Government for the purposes of fulfilling their contract with the US Govt. to build M1911 .45 pistols. Production never really got under way and probably less than 100 pistols were assembled. This particular pistol is thought to be the prototype pistol for the NAA's .45. It is the only one marked Ross Rifle Company. It is also marked, "1918" which tells us for sure it has nothing to do with Sir Charles. When NAA took over the former Ross plant, several Ross employees were brought back to do what they knew how to do - build firearms. One of these was former plant manager/chief draftsman, Fred Porter and his stamp is also found on this pistol "FP". The picture in my first post shows the Springfield Eagle stamp so we know that either this pistol made it to them for inspection or perhaps they stamped the frame and sent it up for assembly of the initial prototype gun. This pistol is featured in, "Canadian Military Handguns 1855-1985" by Clive Law.
Well, first off...congrats on having not merely one of the rare-as-pope-condoms NAA 45Autos...no,no,no... you actually own the PROTOTYPE for the bloody things!
My "collection" truly pales... but I digress.
So what am I hearing about the OP's rifle?
Is it indeed the weapon refered to in the RRStory? I.E. : " the problem however, was overcome when Payne and Eickhoff modified a 1910 action Ross rifle to attain a true and successful Blish application...
Didn't these two gents work for Auto Ordnanace? Savage did produce the Thompson, but did either of these lads have a coinnection to Savage? Ganderite seems to be pretty certain of the Savage connection... and Smellie gives the idea a little credence...
Great thread... too bad there are no visible markings on the photos provided... need someone to tear it down, for sure.
My "collection" truly pales... but I digress.
So what am I hearing about the OP's rifle?
Is it indeed the weapon refered to in the RRStory? I.E. : " the problem however, was overcome when Payne and Eickhoff modified a 1910 action Ross rifle to attain a true and successful Blish application...
Didn't these two gents work for Auto Ordnanace? Savage did produce the Thompson, but did either of these lads have a coinnection to Savage? Ganderite seems to be pretty certain of the Savage connection... and Smellie gives the idea a little credence...
Great thread... too bad there are no visible markings on the photos provided... need someone to tear it down, for sure.
That probably refers to the rotating bolt Blish rifle.
Savage produced a lot of Thompson guns - but that was during WW2. They made a lot of '28 Thompsons under licence, but this was manufacturing a mature design, not developmental. The Blish lock of the '28 and earlier Thompsons was abandonned with the M1 and M1A1 guns.
The rifle in this thread is earlier, when there was still the thought that the Blish system had a lot of promise.
Perhaps a mis-reading of information?
I had a phone conversation with the present owner shortly after this thread appeared. A very pleasant and entertaining gentleman.
The 80 hours referred to was time he spent in looking at the rifle, figuring out how it worked, doing some adjustments, and trying to convince the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobaco and Firearms that it was actually a SEMI automatic rifle, and not a machine gun. In doing so, he rescued an interesting rifle from certain destruction.
So, he actually did not spend 80 hours getting it into the shape it is in.
We also have to remember that during the time the United States entered WW1, they were desperately short of Military rifles. 20,000 1905 Ross Military Mark II rifles were purchased from the Ross Rifle Factory. The remainder of the 280,000 Remington made M-91 Mosin Nagants were purchased when Russia backed out of the 1915 Contract. The serviceable remnants of 160,000 Krags, and a number of "French" rifles were used. Beginning in 1919, these rifles, along with excess M1903 Springfields and M1917 Enfields were sold off to the Civilian public. (Krags were $6.19 for an unissued one, $16.17 for a Springfield and $30.00 for an Enfield. Enfield prices were later reduced to $15.00 and then to $7.50.)
Between 1920 to 1940, Springfield Armory was still tooled up for the M1903 Springfield, and produced 2500 M-1903 Sporters and 26,000 National Match rifles. You could buy a new National Match Rifle for $53.10 in 1936.
In 1918, the Browning Automatic Rifle had been adopted, and Savage was already making a Machine Gun, the Lewis in 30-06, so they were familiar with gas operated weapons.
From the mid-1920s Pedersen and Garand were working on gas operated semi-automatic rifles, and in the 1930s, Johnson developed his semi-auto rifle that used the long recoil system. These rifles weigh approximately 10 pounds, so a 16 pound semi auto rifle holding only 5 rounds would be redundant as a viable military rifle.
Also, the fact that the trigger is aproximately 3 inches forward of the pistol grip makes me wonder. Savage had several years producing sporting rifles, the 1899 being an in production model. Their engineers would be very familiar with the ergonomics of handling, fit, comfort and utility of a rifle stock and trigger relationship. Ross had developed the bolt action Sporters and target rifles, so he knew just what a stock should be designed like. The idea of a 16 pound Sporter is almost ridiculous.
The Ross Factory was taken over by the Canadian Government in 1917, and Ross had little to do with the manufacture of Ross Rifles from there on. The last 260 HG rifles were made after Ross had been forced out, and the Mark III Ross was considered a more-or-less up to date rifle.
Like SMELLIE, I would love to find the answers to many questions about this rifle, if only from a historical or curiosity point of view. But, many things do not seem to make sense, or "fit."
I had a phone conversation with the present owner shortly after this thread appeared. A very pleasant and entertaining gentleman.
The 80 hours referred to was time he spent in looking at the rifle, figuring out how it worked, doing some adjustments, and trying to convince the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobaco and Firearms that it was actually a SEMI automatic rifle, and not a machine gun. In doing so, he rescued an interesting rifle from certain destruction.
So, he actually did not spend 80 hours getting it into the shape it is in.
We also have to remember that during the time the United States entered WW1, they were desperately short of Military rifles. 20,000 1905 Ross Military Mark II rifles were purchased from the Ross Rifle Factory. The remainder of the 280,000 Remington made M-91 Mosin Nagants were purchased when Russia backed out of the 1915 Contract. The serviceable remnants of 160,000 Krags, and a number of "French" rifles were used. Beginning in 1919, these rifles, along with excess M1903 Springfields and M1917 Enfields were sold off to the Civilian public. (Krags were $6.19 for an unissued one, $16.17 for a Springfield and $30.00 for an Enfield. Enfield prices were later reduced to $15.00 and then to $7.50.)
Between 1920 to 1940, Springfield Armory was still tooled up for the M1903 Springfield, and produced 2500 M-1903 Sporters and 26,000 National Match rifles. You could buy a new National Match Rifle for $53.10 in 1936.
In 1918, the Browning Automatic Rifle had been adopted, and Savage was already making a Machine Gun, the Lewis in 30-06, so they were familiar with gas operated weapons.
From the mid-1920s Pedersen and Garand were working on gas operated semi-automatic rifles, and in the 1930s, Johnson developed his semi-auto rifle that used the long recoil system. These rifles weigh approximately 10 pounds, so a 16 pound semi auto rifle holding only 5 rounds would be redundant as a viable military rifle.
Also, the fact that the trigger is aproximately 3 inches forward of the pistol grip makes me wonder. Savage had several years producing sporting rifles, the 1899 being an in production model. Their engineers would be very familiar with the ergonomics of handling, fit, comfort and utility of a rifle stock and trigger relationship. Ross had developed the bolt action Sporters and target rifles, so he knew just what a stock should be designed like. The idea of a 16 pound Sporter is almost ridiculous.
The Ross Factory was taken over by the Canadian Government in 1917, and Ross had little to do with the manufacture of Ross Rifles from there on. The last 260 HG rifles were made after Ross had been forced out, and the Mark III Ross was considered a more-or-less up to date rifle.
Like SMELLIE, I would love to find the answers to many questions about this rifle, if only from a historical or curiosity point of view. But, many things do not seem to make sense, or "fit."
.
I think the big controversy on this rifle was that it was originally being advertised on an American gun auction website as "an original ROSS prototype."
While a 1910 Ross rifle was indisputably used for parts, if a Remington 742 rifle was used as a basis for a working model of someone's idea for an action and system, would it be proper, 80 years or so from now, to advertise it for sale and represent it as an original, experimental REMINGTON rifle?
I think the big controversy on this rifle was that it was originally being advertised on an American gun auction website as "an original ROSS prototype."
While a 1910 Ross rifle was indisputably used for parts, if a Remington 742 rifle was used as a basis for a working model of someone's idea for an action and system, would it be proper, 80 years or so from now, to advertise it for sale and represent it as an original, experimental REMINGTON rifle?
