How To Convert Military Rifles (Pics heavy!!)
- Thread starter greyman441
- Start date
I just don't understand how sporterizing made them better for hunting. In most cases, the sights they used were worse than the ones that came originally, shortening the stocks made them shoot worse most of the time unless you shortened the barrel too (using a hacksaw) & then it really shot bad, sling attachments were weaker & to top it all off, when the ammo ran out it was useless. You see it all the time, a 71/84 rifle with a full length barrel, bent stubby bolt, practically no wood & the cheapest lyman sight screwed to the receiver.
Easy to judge in hindsight. 
time tends to make things more scarce and appreciated. Think where we'd be if we'd parked the the cars we learned to drive in. When I was a kid, These things were available by the millions and I think everyone thought they always would be. Bought my first LE Mk. lll for 9.95 off a big pile, in a Calgary hardware store. Took it home and bubbaed it. No big deal. Look at the services Williams offered and the prices charged. Tough to resist.
Grizz
time tends to make things more scarce and appreciated. Think where we'd be if we'd parked the the cars we learned to drive in. When I was a kid, These things were available by the millions and I think everyone thought they always would be. Bought my first LE Mk. lll for 9.95 off a big pile, in a Calgary hardware store. Took it home and bubbaed it. No big deal. Look at the services Williams offered and the prices charged. Tough to resist.Grizz
I remember seeing that work of Satan in a catalog a few years ago. I suspect they are left over from the Golden age of Bubba.
I have managed to find a few and save them
No4 Mk1 Maltby Before
After
No4 Mk 1/3 Longbranch/BSA Before
After
I have managed to find a few and save them
No4 Mk1 Maltby Before
After
No4 Mk 1/3 Longbranch/BSA Before
After
i will use my grandfather as a perfect example. about 25-30 years ago out hunting his skidoo brokedown, so he grabed his lee enfield and started the 15 hour hike back to his truck in 2+ feet of snow. he had it with the original flip up peep sight that came on the rifle, and a monte carlo stock (gives you alot better grip on the rifle than the strait grip) and full wood at the end. after walking for about 10 hour strait in 2+ feet of snow, up and down hills the little bit of extra weight on the gun from the full wood makes a HUGE diference, se aparently he started cursing and he ripped the top wood and hacked the front half of the bottom wood right off the rifle and tossed it in the bush. and like he said that little bit of extra weight felt like 10 pounds after a few hours of walking in heavy snow. that is simply why i like "sporterized" guns for out hunting, as for target practice and show i prefere full wood or however that gun originaly came.
and there are millions of them so it really isnt a to big of a deal. last year i picked up 2 sporterized lee enfields for $50 and i was thinking about redoing the one with full wood but i didnt since thats the original wood on it, so by getting a new full wood stock set the rifle wouldnt be all original anymore.
and there are millions of them so it really isnt a to big of a deal. last year i picked up 2 sporterized lee enfields for $50 and i was thinking about redoing the one with full wood but i didnt since thats the original wood on it, so by getting a new full wood stock set the rifle wouldnt be all original anymore.
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the Dakota kid
CGN Regular
- Location
- London, ON
Beat me to it dude!
Yup...... and those of us who bought them were called "Nazis", "crackpots", "military freaks" and a thousand other nasty things.
If you had a Lee-Enfield with full wood, you were just plain nuts.
If you had a Mauser, you were a Nazi.
And if you had a Carcano, you were just a "crazy Oswald wannabe".
Been there, done that, got the T-shirt.
But I still haven't chopped one down.
Besides, I loaned my chainsaw out!
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If you had a Lee-Enfield with full wood, you were just plain nuts.
If you had a Mauser, you were a Nazi.
And if you had a Carcano, you were just a "crazy Oswald wannabe".
Been there, done that, got the T-shirt.
But I still haven't chopped one down.
Besides, I loaned my chainsaw out!
.
The primary benefit is vastly improved target resolution from the use of a scope, especially under marginal light conditions when a lot of hunting shots are taken. The advantages of a scope, in addition to magnification of the target, are it's light gathering properties as well as the ability to use one aiming point rather than having to resolve your point of aim with both a front and a rear sight.
I shoot at a specific point on an animal, rather than at the animal itself. Consider that the front sight on a Garand will subtend/obscure approx 8 inches @ 100 yds and the front sight on an Enfield will subtend approx 6 inches @ 100 yds versus a 1 inch recticle subtension when using a 4x scope. A scope offers a much more refined resolution of the aiming point in addition to the single point of aim and light gathering advantages. A scope doesn't make a rifle any more accurate, but it is a great help to the shooter.
Using my 3 MILSURP sporters as an example, my standard hunting load in the M98 Mauser is 1.25 MOA with a 4x scope. My M1903 Springfield will produce MOA groups, while the No5 JC (my favourite timber rifle) will give me 2.5 MOA with a 2/3/4 X widefield scope. Other advantages from sporterizing include lighter weight and handiness versus a full stocked military rifle.
Kinda true for the SKS-D right now. I know it's not a true mil-surp, but in 2001 they were $199 BRAND NEW. Now you can't find a beater for under $500.
dgradinaru
CGN frequent flyer
- Location
- British Columbia
whats with the 7.7 jap rifle? It has a William Rear peep sight and scope too? I guess its old fashion photo crop...lol
The scope I understand. The cheap sheet metal "sporter" sight with the little three elevation setting ramp, I do not understand. As for the full wood, I guess at 260lb of lard, my frame doesn't really feel the extra 2lb of rifle.
That's my kind of book burning!
Reminds me of the old articles showing how convert your USGI 1911 into a target shooter.
-Steve
Blech! Seeing all those 1911s with the Bo-Mar rear sight mounted high and overhanging the back of the slide or one of those awful ribs makes me sad. It wouldn't be so bad if the end result was at least something nice. The same can be said for the rifles. Griffin & Howe, Sedgeley, Pachmayr, and many others have built some absolutely lovely rifles out of military actions, but most of the ones in that Williams book are pretty gruesome, especially where the subject is a particularly unfortunate choice, such as the Carcano.
That's my kind of book burning!
Reminds me of the old articles showing how convert your USGI 1911 into a target shooter.
-Steve
Yep, I've got 2 1914 Colt Commercial Models, with the serial number range in those of the WW1 Canadian Contract, that some moronic IPSC wannabes tried to turn into "race guns"
I know, I know, they look much better cut down eh?
Some dont actually look half bad, its just the historic value is butchered.
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There has been quite a shift in the "Historical" values of objects in the last 50 years or so. The SKS and Mosin Nagants today are the Enfields, Mausers, Springfields and the otheres that were available by the barrel full after WWII and into the mid-60s. We still have a similar situation, as the Russian stuff has become available after the "Cold War" and collapse of the Russian Communist Empire.
These guns were plentiful, and could be sold for good hard cash after WWII. Sound familiar with the Mosins and SKS rifles today?
SMELLIE dug through barrels of them at Lever in Vancouver, and found some really rare ones. I dug through barrels and racks of SMLE rifles and still have some Commercial BSA SMLE rifles and others. I paid $9.95 each, and took my pick of them.
And those neat little Australian .310 Martini Cadet rifles at $9.95. No ammo available, but you could chamber and fire a .32 S&W pistol cartridge in them. Blew out the case a bit, but who cared at $1.59 a box? Many of them were converted by Elwood Epps in Clinton, Ontario, to fire 30-30, 32 Winchester Special, .357 Magnum, and even .44 Magnum cartridges, making these handy little rifles useful. And I don't think anyone would consider old Elwood as a "Bubba."
And today we have people buying the Mosins and SKS rifles, and hanging all kinds of "Tactical" goodies on them. No matter what we think, not all of the people who buy these rifles are concerned with preserving the originilaty of them, and what is a treasure to us is merely a starting point for someone to make his "dream rifle."
But some of the stories make you want to cry. In the early 1990s at an Edmonton Gun Show, a guy came by and saw some Lee Enfieldsl on my table. He mentioned that he had one at home, and he had cut it down for hunting, but it was not as accurate as before. Then he asked if they all had Cork inside the wood in the barrel area. I asked him if it has something like "Regulated By --------" stamped on it. He said, "Yes, Regulated by Fulton. What does that mean?"
I told him it means that he took a $600 very accurate target rifle and made a $35 Sporter out of it.
.
There has been quite a shift in the "Historical" values of objects in the last 50 years or so. The SKS and Mosin Nagants today are the Enfields, Mausers, Springfields and the otheres that were available by the barrel full after WWII and into the mid-60s. We still have a similar situation, as the Russian stuff has become available after the "Cold War" and collapse of the Russian Communist Empire.
These guns were plentiful, and could be sold for good hard cash after WWII. Sound familiar with the Mosins and SKS rifles today?
SMELLIE dug through barrels of them at Lever in Vancouver, and found some really rare ones. I dug through barrels and racks of SMLE rifles and still have some Commercial BSA SMLE rifles and others. I paid $9.95 each, and took my pick of them.
And those neat little Australian .310 Martini Cadet rifles at $9.95. No ammo available, but you could chamber and fire a .32 S&W pistol cartridge in them. Blew out the case a bit, but who cared at $1.59 a box? Many of them were converted by Elwood Epps in Clinton, Ontario, to fire 30-30, 32 Winchester Special, .357 Magnum, and even .44 Magnum cartridges, making these handy little rifles useful. And I don't think anyone would consider old Elwood as a "Bubba."
And today we have people buying the Mosins and SKS rifles, and hanging all kinds of "Tactical" goodies on them. No matter what we think, not all of the people who buy these rifles are concerned with preserving the originilaty of them, and what is a treasure to us is merely a starting point for someone to make his "dream rifle."
But some of the stories make you want to cry. In the early 1990s at an Edmonton Gun Show, a guy came by and saw some Lee Enfieldsl on my table. He mentioned that he had one at home, and he had cut it down for hunting, but it was not as accurate as before. Then he asked if they all had Cork inside the wood in the barrel area. I asked him if it has something like "Regulated By --------" stamped on it. He said, "Yes, Regulated by Fulton. What does that mean?"
I told him it means that he took a $600 very accurate target rifle and made a $35 Sporter out of it.
.
YUP, bubba with more then a grade six education...meaning they can read.
In the era surplus gun were just that...surplus guns. If they were too heavy, just cut off some wood and make them lighter. Plus they were CHEAP...at the time.
