1950 DP Long Branch

dimon

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I came across this rifle yesterday, a beautiful DP stamped 1950 Long Branch. It looks like it's in excellent firing condition, and it's dead accurate, much more accurate than my 1941 LB. There is no issue with head spacing; the only thing I noticed is that I have to apply force when extracting the casing. It comes out 1/4 of the way out easily, and then it gets stiffer to move the bolt back. The serial number was obliterated and replaced with one that had an A suffix (fitted with non-interchangeable parts?). The number is obliterated on the bolt handle as well, and there is no number on the barrel (is it supposed to be there on a 1950 LB?). Most parts, big or small, are marked with LB; however, I'm not sure about the wood. Knowledgeable folks, please enlighten me. Anyway, it is DP stamped, and I fired it; it is dead accurate with a 5-groove barrel. Did anybody else fire their DP rifle?
 

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The pegs in the sides of the forend are a modification often seen on target rifles.
The extraction issue you describe suggests an out of spec. chamber. Maybe that is why the rifle was DP'd. There will be a reason that an apparently serviceable rifle would be given this status.
 
I don’t know why they were marked DP but that looks like one of the recent Italian navy surplus No.4 rifles. Many of those were DP. They came in with a lot of Italian service SMLE rifles a few years back.
 
The principle is Drill Purpose rifles become stand ins for real rifles so soldiers can do drill, run obstacle courses, jump out of airplanes and sometimes have something heavy to carry around as a punishment. There is some debate which rifles get selected and why, but in theory a drill rifle is unsafe to fire because it failed too many inspection points to be salvageable. The bad chamber is probably why yours got set aside. Since you've examined it closely and found notes left by the RCEME weapons tech explaining his decision somewhere, we are left to trust his judgement. You are warned!
 
That said, some armies made large numbers of DP rifles for various reasons. The British produced the L59 series DP rifles from serviceable ones because they were obsolete. It’s likely the Indians also converted perfectly fine SMLE rifles because of the vast numbers they wanted to produce.

Sometimes you just never know.
 
^^^ Yes. In Canada, my understanding is that many Lee Enfields became DP'd when the Army switched over to the FN FAL in the 1950's. It made the bolt action LE redundant aside from Cadet Drill. Perfectly serviceable rifles were DP'd to Cadet Corps (who are DOD) all over Canada.
 
^^^ Yes. In Canada, my understanding is that many Lee Enfields became DP'd when the Army switched over to the FN FAL in the 1950's. It made the bolt action LE redundant aside from Cadet Drill. Perfectly serviceable rifles were DP'd to Cadet Corps (who are DOD) all over Canada.
Nowadays, cadets in Canada are civilians and the movement is not a DND organization. The corps are affiliated but not under command. Their instructors are in essence loaned to the cadet movement. The Code of Service Discipline does not apply to civilians but it does to their instructors. It is hard to consider sending a 15-yr old to detention barracks, even if they deserve special attention from trained professional custodians. Nope, they get RTU'd in disgrace or released by their corps chain of command.

The Drill Rifles I schlepped around in the 70s were Cooey .22s with no bolt and an FN C1 walnut pistol grip attached. We were still shooting our No.7s.
 
Terry that’s because you did your basic with Jesus and still have your short sword with you on tours LOL
From the irritating CIMIC driver LOL
 
In the 1980’s my air cadet corps had some deactivated/DP no.4 rifles, as well as deactivated M72 tubes (for instruction), and a few deactivated hi-powers in white parade holsters for senior cadets “on watch” during overnight stays in barracks.

Still had the CNo.7 for shooting.

This was pre-C7, so we had no FAL rifles around, they were still in use by the CAF.
 
Terry that’s because you did your basic with Jesus and still have your short sword with you on tours LOL
From the irritating CIMIC driver LOL
You are irritating indeed!

There were some legends on my Basic - Carl Gustav, Herman Nelson, Juan Juan-Too, and so many others.
 

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I had a good range time with this rifle today. It has a stiff extraction not only with spent casing, but also with the live round. So I tried swapping the bolt, and the problem went away. So, I figure that the problem is with the bolt/bolt head. It also has an occasional FTF, doesn't matter which mag I use. Maybe that's why it is stamped DP? Other than that, there is nothing wrong with the rifle. I fired a bunch of 1944-dated ammo, including old Imperial stuff and IVI, all grouped well—no head spacing issues. The best group I've got is from my handloads. 40gr of Chinese surplus powder pulled from 1970s dated 7.62x54 ammo and 174 gr Sierra Match King bullet, loaded to 3.075" COL. 6 shots landed very well at 100m despite my aging eyes.
I was pretty indifferent to Lee Enfields, but I started liking them.
 

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Hi dimon. Appears that the 1950 rifle has been made up of parts. Canadian and British. More than like;y a Canadian DP
from recent times. I remember picking up my mentor one day to go to a Gun Show in the 70's. He was sad as the M&D
informed him that all the No.4s on his charge in the local armoury were slated to be withdrawn to be converted for DP use for cadets. Regardless how good they were they were going out the door. FNs and No.7s stayed. We picked up 2 crap barrels at the show and tried to remove the nice barrels on some of the soon to be DP rifles. No luck at all with our basement tooling as Long Branch barrels were put on by machine and we simply couldn't manually provide enough torque. So they all left and never came back. A sad day. John
 
A sad day for sure, John. Which parts are British? An upper wood? A grooved upper hand guard is not typical for a 1950 LB. Is there supposed to be a serial number on the barrel of the 1950 LB? My 1941 one has it.
 
In the 1980’s my air cadet corps had some deactivated/DP no.4 rifles, as well as deactivated M72 tubes (for instruction), and a few deactivated hi-powers in white parade holsters for senior cadets “on watch” during overnight stays in barracks.

Still had the CNo.7 for shooting.

This was pre-C7, so we had no FAL rifles around, they were still in use by the CAF.
This November 11th, have a look at what the kids standing vigil at Cenotaphs all across Ontario are using (Still DP'd No4's ;) ).
 
Hi Dimon. The body is Canadian Arsenals (manufacture mark visible) but the serial is not Canadian - probably Brit, The Fore
end has 2 wood dowels laterally placed in as a common Canadian bedding procedure for target use. The front handguard is British origin. Obviously for me to do a total assessment I need the rifle on my work bench. The scrubbing of the serial number of the bolt appears done in Canadian fashion but no serial stamped indicating a 'spare' bolt. Only the 1941 rifles had a serial number hand stamped on the barrel. Date of barrel manufacture is on the right side as (ex) '44 for 1944. Some 6 groove C Mk IV 1958 barrels had the full date on them but in wartime only the abbreviation was done. With the lack of pics Its hard to make an assessment. John T.
 
Not sure why it has a forsetock with target bedding, but everything else about this rifle fits perfectly with the Eurocrats batch of ex-Italian no.4 rifles brought in a few years ago.
 
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