Help identifying rifles

sean141544

sean141544

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alberta
I have recently purchased the below rifles from an estate sale and don't know much about them. I am looking for as much information as possible on these two rifles including their approx value.

Here is an overall picture of both rifles
IMG-20120409-00512.jpg

IMG-20120409-00511.jpg


The following pictures are the markings from the bottom rifle
IMG-20120409-00514.jpg

IMG-20120409-00513.jpg


The below picture is the only marking i could find on the top rifle
IMG-20120409-00515.jpg
 
Bottom rifle is a arisaka : korean make from the circles but I don't know if it is a type 38 (6.5x50 cal)or type 99 (7.7 jap) or one of the siam or thai rifles.

I don't have a clue about the top rifle. Smellie , buffdog , claven2 and the rest will soon post.
 
-Top one is a Type I Mannlicher-Carcano contract rifle made in Italy for export to Japan

- Bottom one is an Arisaka Type 30, same type used in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904/05.
 
JP has it nailed solid.

The one with the hook safety is the extemely-scarce Type 30 Arisaka, which came out in 1897 and lasted only until 1905 when it was replaced by the far-superior Type 38. A lot of Type 30s went to England during WWI and were issued originally to the Navy and to the Royal Marines to replace their SMLEs which had gone to the Army. Later the Navy and RMLI got Canadian Rosses, releasing the Type 30s and the few Type 38s to the Army.... which sent them to the Arab Revolt. "We received some Japanese rifles," wrote Lawrence in "Seven Pillars of Wisdom", "The Arabs, knowing their worth, promptly threw them away."

The Type "I" Carcano is a Carcano modded to handle the 6.5x50SR Japanese cartridge. They, too, are very thin on the ground in this country and are not common anywhere.

If you don't want these, you know, you COULD wrap them up and just send them to me.... I'll even pay half the postage, just to show you how incredibly nice I can be!!!!!!!

A Very Decent Score, friend.

These two are a collection all by themselves.

"Oh, I just collect very darned rare Japanese rifles; that's all."
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If you haven't got the message yet : you have two rare rifles that almost everyone on this part of the forum would like to shoot and own (myself included).

I will do one better than the people above. I will give you instructions on how to tacticool those two rifles .... all you need is a hacksaw , some bed liner, a drill to put a scope mount on , and the cheapest optic you can find ;)

Please for the love of God don't do that though....
 
All kidding aside, don't do anything to them besides rust light prevention maintenance to keep them from getting any worse.
Anything else will lower their value.
 
funny i was just thinking i'd like a Type I as i was making my coffee this morning.

the one and only Type I that i have seen was $600 in excellent condition around 6-8 years ago.
 
smellie said:
JP has it nailed solid.

The one with the hook safety is the extemely-scarce Type 30 Arisaka, which came out in 1897 and lasted only until 1905 when it was replaced by the far-superior Type 38. A lot of Type 30s went to England during WWI and were issued originally to the Navy and to the Royal Marines to replace their SMLEs which had gone to the Army. Later the Navy and RMLI got Canadian Rosses, releasing the Type 30s and the few Type 38s to the Army.... which sent them to the Arab Revolt. "We received some Japanese rifles," wrote Lawrence in "Seven Pillars of Wisdom", "The Arabs, knowing their worth, promptly threw them away."

The Type "I" Carcano is a Carcano modded to handle the 6.5x50SR Japanese cartridge. They, too, are very thin on the ground in this country and are not common anywhere.

If you don't want these, you know, you COULD wrap them up and just send them to me.... I'll even pay half the postage, just to show you how incredibly nice I can be!!!!!!!

A Very Decent Score, friend.

These two are a collection all by themselves.

"Oh, I just collect very darned rare Japanese rifles; that's all."
.
Click to expand...
so, knowing the great wisdom and knowledge you possess, what can you tell us about commonwealth/japan arms trade and interchangeability?

i understand that the rimmed 7.7 japanese round is the same as .303 brit, but i never knew why and this whole brits getting japanese rifles thing makes me want to know more. did japan get a lee-something along the line?
 
Okay, first thing to know is that Japan made THREE different 7.7 cartridges: RIMMED for their Lewis Guns, SEMI-RIMMED for their own design of (Hotchkiss-based) machine-guns and RIMLESS for the Type 99 rifle. They got the Lewises during the Great War, just a few, then a whole bunch more between the Wars, mostly for aircraft flexible guns. They liked the performance of the .303 cartridge but they recognised that it can really have troubles feeding through an automatic action. The Maxim/Vickers system had this beat completely, as did the Browning later on, but they wanted a gas-op gun for infantry use, WITH .303 performance but WITHOUT feeding problems. So they engineered the SEMI-RIM cartridge which FEEDS like a Rimless and HEADSPACES like a Rimmed round: MUCH less trouble and, in a strip-feed gun, dead reliable. But Mauser actions don't take too kindly to Semi-Rim ammo, so they cut the rim back and had the RIMLESS round for their Arisakas, which are modified Mausers. Make sense? It did to the Japanese, although it must have been one truly Gawdawful headache for their Quartermaster Corps!

The three rounds use the same powder, same amount of it and the same bullets. You can load them, any or all, with standard .303 components...... if you can score the brass.... and if you have a permit for the machine-guns.

As to rifles, there we come to another set of problems. There were no big deals or swaps, really. What happened was that Japan declared war on Germany but their war aims were a bit different than ours. Japan wanted the big German Navy coaling station and base at Tsingtao...... which was a German enclave in CHINA, a relic of the Boxer Rebellion. Germany had built it up into a huge base; it even had a BREWERY, which is why you can still get German beer, made in China, to the original German recipe, on pre-World-War-One German equipment. If you want to try it, head to your local liquor store and ask them for TSINGTAO beer: that's the stuff. But that's what JAPAN wanted.

BRITAIN wanted to boot the Kaiser's butt but they needed a truly gigantic Army to do it. And a lot of work at Enfield had gone into the P-13 rifle, very few Lee-Enfield rifles being made just prior to the War. Britain was fighting at sea and on the LAND...... and needed lotsa rifles. JAPAN was fighting at sea almost exclusively.... and they HAD lotsa rifles. Especially, they had a large number of hook-safety early Arisaka Type 30 rifles. So when Britain needed rifles, Japan was happy to "help out" by shipping every Type 30 they could scrounge up and a few Type 38s.... and sent them to England. England was very happy and the Japanese were paid for the rifles in gold, which is always nice stuff to have lying around. So Japan got rid of the rifles they didn't want and got the cash to build the rifles they did want, Britain got a bunch of rifles which were ALREADY MADE and just had to be transported..... while Enfield ramped-up their production and BSA got into high gear and the Americans started building that lovely P-13 rifle but in .303 instead of .276 and now calling it the P-14.

And that's what happened.

Hope this helps.
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Likely it's the closest you will ever come to having a beer with Korvettenkapitan Karl von Muller. Emden coaled at Tsingtao before starting her incredible career as a raider. Being a German ship, they doubtless took on beer at that time, German ships running on beer much as the RN ran on Nelson's Blood and the Americans on coffee.

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