Longbranch?

Longbranch was the canadian manufacturer/licensee(?) of the various Lee Enfield rifles used by the Canadian military (they also made stuff for other countries primarily commonwealth) possibly government owned iirc.
Lithgow in Australia, Ishapore in India would be their countries equivalents...
 
Long Branch (two words) is an area of west Toronto/Mississauga along the shore line of Lake Ontario. It is where one of the arsenals was built that manufactured our military firearms during WW2, the other being up the road a bit at the Inglis factory. It's name was changed to Canadian Arsenals Limited shortly after the war. As you may have noted, the LB name was stamped onto our Lee Enfield rifles, Stens guns, and in turn CAL was used.
The pictures below; street and area signs in the neighbourhood, what is left of the arsenal site (nothing but the water tower) and the concrete butt that is still is full of bullet holes where various types of firearms were test fired, Ie. Sten guns.
longbranch.jpg
 
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Why is it people always looked older 'back then'......those chicks are probably 19 + - but look more like mid 30's ?!?!?!?!?!?!??!?
 
Growing up during the depression? Hard to get food, had to work like a dog for pennies. That and everything was run the Mexican president; you know Manual Labour?


**edit**

Sorry reread my post, it could be taken offensively. It was ment to be semi-funny
 
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Yeah, they knew what life was really about. How do you think the current generation of Torontonians would do if they had to face down Hitler? Makes me ashamed.
 
"...Current generations..." The CF is full of "Current generations" troopies doing a thankless job with what they have been reluctantly issued in fun places like Bosnia, Afghantistan and other crappy places. I don't think we older people have much to worry about on that score.
Long Branch is a place. The Canadian Arsenals plant was at the foot of Dixie Rd in Mississauga. Not only were No.4's made there, but also all the C1A1's. Trudeau closed it as soon as the C1A1 contract was finished in 1975. Then sold off all the machinery. It had the only precision deep hole drilling machine in Canada. Last I heard the machine was making street light poles.
 
When I went to high school here in Hamilton(Glendale ) in the machine shop was a huge metal lathe a La blanc if i recall correctly now on the side of this puppy was a little metal plaque property of the Ross rifle company then under that was Canadian arsenals ltd ,Long Branch this machine was massive the 4 jaw chuck was around 20in in diameter and I was the only guy who liked to use it .
 
I should be a crime to let this stuff go to crap like this...a whole generation of Canadian sacrificed what they could for every rifle built, and every bullet made. Damn Trudeau! :mad:

BTW: Thanx for the pics and the info. :)
 
Calum said:
I should be a crime to let this stuff go to crap like this...a whole generation of Canadian sacrificed what they could for every rifle built, and every bullet made. Damn Trudeau! :mad:

BTW: Thanx for the pics and the info. :)

I agree...:D
 
Look at the rifle VERY closly and see if I'm mistaken but it looks like a No4 Mk1 not a Mk1* with a waisted foresight protector and a cruxiform bayonet also the low cut forestock for a mag cutoff it would be nice to see if the bands were hingde (sp) it also looks like it has the early cocking piece
 
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Intrepid said:
Hey thanks for posting those photos! There sure is a lot of history there...

BTW, check out that beautiful weld job on the Sten mag housing!



Intrepid
If you are talking about the 43 Long Branch sten housing, the reason the weld looks so good is because it isn't there. The 42 Long Branch housings were rough welded, and the welds were even cleaned up on most of the first 500 or so. After that the welds were left alone until around the 3L series, when the housing was made from a stamped and rolled sheet, vice the rectangular tube welded onto the round tube. I have had a 5L and a 7L series sten with the rough welds, but these were oddballs (someone reached the bottom of the parts barrel) and not the norm.
Along with the rolled housings, the receivers were also spotwelded on the later stens, vice the rough welds seen on the 42 dated guns.
 
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