1918 Lee Enfield No1 MkIII SHTLE, Markings ? Bluing?

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goodkill11

New member
Location
Montreal, Quebec
Hey everyone!

I recently came into possession of a Lee Enfield No1 Mk3 SHTLE,

I've had no problem finding information on 1918 SMLE rifles, however I cannot seem to find anything on this particular SHTLE marking. (I believe it stand for Short Lee Enfield, but I'm really taking a stab in the dark here)

I really hoping someone on here is an Enfield enthusiast and has some more information that could be helpful for me?

I acquired the gun without any of its original furniture.

The bore seems to be in decent shape, I've been slowly removing parts and cleaning them, Im currently looking into rebluing the barrel, I've attached some pictures to show you the original condition when I received the gun and some progress pics.

Oh and Also, does anyone have any experience cold bluing a barrel?

I've heard mixed things about quality/finish when compared to Hot bluing, and I'd rather not blow my budget by having to send the gun out to someone who will Hot blue it for a couple hundred bucks and figure since I'm not in a rush to finish this project i could afford to take the time to do quality prep work myself to assure a proper cold blue finish. Thoughts?

((Note; the receiver and barrel was only degreased and once over 000 steel wool polished))

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Welcome indeed. May I suggest you copy and paste your entire post into the Milsurp section? You'll get a lot more response that way.

That said, you'll probably get told you should only have lightly steel woolled the metal bits, but the wrist/butt socket area turned out well. If the barrel turns out as well with a bit of steel wool, I'd do that and call it good. The problem with a rebluing job is that it's going to look like a rebluing job: ie, the metal bits should show some signs of wear, and if you do a really great job of rebluing, it'll stand out like a sore thumb from others of it's vintage.

I'd like to see another pic of the top of the knox form (the flat area where the barrel joins the breech)- it looks like there's a star there, but it might be two broad arrows facing each other- a "sold out of service" mark. If it's a star, it could indicate rust in the bore.
How's the muzzle? Are the lands/grooves clear and reasonably sharp?

I ask because I have a Lithgow SMLE (short, magazine, Lee Enfield) that had rust in the bore and a badly worn muzzle/crown. It's since been rebuilt from a sporter configuration, and now shoots very well indeed.

As always, the more pics the merrier!
 
many thanks!, I will definitely post this in the Milsurp section,

To reply to your questions, It does appear to have a star on the top of the knox, there are a couple spots in the bore I can see but they dont seems too bad, the worst is about 3 inches from the end of the muzzle, I tried to take a photo of it but its not easy to take pictures of a rifle bore. the rifling seems in okay condition, im no specialist though.

IF this means i have rust in the bore, what could I do to help (possibly fix) this situation?

the muzzle end of the rifling does not seem to be super sharp though.

By the way I didn't steel wool the buttstock, (that little piece of wood in the previous photo was the only remainder of the stock that was on the gun when I got it.)

I wasn't planning on restoring this gun entirely to its former out of the factory glory, I was considering a project/learner sporter styled rifle, I am still trying to use No and Mark appropriate parts though. Thanks!















 
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