Gas Trap Garand

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SW28fan

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There is a fellow member of my gun club who is a major Garand Guru. He came into a 1940 dated Garand receiver that did not have the modifications done to the feed system that was done to most of them when they were converted to the gas port system. He decided to rebuild it as Gas Trap. He just finished it and he brought it to the range Saturday while I was RO. He got it zero'd and yes he let me shoot it. Of all the days not to bring a camera with me.
 
You could have bought quite a few cameras with the $$$$ that were spent to restore that rifle to it's original gas trap configuration. Parts are now so scarce that some of the unique ones are now being reproduced at considerable cost.
 
Don't know how early the number makes it, but when I was working at the shop in Wainwright, I sold an M-1 made by Springfield. Seemed to be a 1943 rework, going by the barrel date, but the s/n was 38###. Earliest one I have seen.

Is that old enough to have made it a gas-trap rifle originally? I have no idea how many were built.

Thanks much.
 
The problem with recreating a gas trap is that most of the original receivers were welded internally and re-machined to a later drawing pattern. The OP is saying an unmodifed receiver was found, which in itself is rare.
 
"...old enough to have made it a gas-trap..." Nope. The whole gas trap idea was found not to work reliably and required much more cleaning. So it was dropped before the rifle was put into full production. Roughly 1938-39ish. Not at home to check.
SW28fan's guy has ruined a perfectly good rifle. Assuming anybody ever cared about what I think. A 1940 dated rifle would be worth a pile of money Stateside. Not that it'd be legal to take it there. No Lend/Lease at that time, but there's no reason to think the rifle wasn't part of a later shipment.
 
sunray said:
"...old enough to have made it a gas-trap..." Nope. The whole gas trap idea was found not to work reliably and required much more cleaning. So it was dropped before the rifle was put into full production. Roughly 1938-39ish. Not at home to check.
SW28fan's guy has ruined a perfectly good rifle. Assuming anybody ever cared about what I think. A 1940 dated rifle would be worth a pile of money Stateside. Not that it'd be legal to take it there. No Lend/Lease at that time, but there's no reason to think the rifle wasn't part of a later shipment.
Click to expand...

By 1940 the total number of Garands actually manufactured was in the region of 2500 - 5000 guns.

The gun did not functionally exist in issueable quantities until 1942
 
Lee Enfield said:
By 1940 the total number of Garands actually manufactured was in the region of 2500 - 5000 guns.

The gun did not functionally exist in issueable quantities until 1942
Click to expand...

Well I did some research, and I was incorrect.

As of March 4th 1940, 30,694 garands had been manufactured
123,963 as of Feb 14, 1941

As of March 3, 1942 they were discussing drilling a 1/16" hole in the (receiver?) cam surface and adding an oil wick because the guns did not function in the rain without extra lubrication,

On March 13, 1942 Springfield Armoury was in favor of and testing a felt oil pad glued on the OP rod cam plate
 
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