I have one that was my grandfathers, there barrel is marked ".311-308 Norma mag, it's a M-17, I think it is an ERA with a non original barrel, despite all the cons to working with an eddystone, I have a .375 barrel blank I'd like to have put on it one day and chambered to .375 RUM. I'm not in a hurry to get it done, so I'll have time to read the P-14/M-17 threads to find out if it really is a bad idea.
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Question on receiver contouring a P14 Enfield/ M1917
- Thread starter Archibald
- Start date
I have one that was my grandfathers, there barrel is marked ".311-308 Norma mag, it's a M-17, I think it is an ERA with a non original barrel, despite all the cons to working with an eddystone, I have a .375 barrel blank I'd like to have put on it one day and chambered to .375 RUM. I'm not in a hurry to get it done, so I'll have time to read the P-14/M-17 threads to find out if it really is a bad idea.
Drilling the Enfield receivers isn't a problem if you have a Forster drilling and tapping fixture.I use straight flute carbide drills.Tapping is a problem however.I drill and tap one hole before drilling the next hole.The toughest one I've done was a Winchester.I used around four new taps per hole.When a tap broke I switched bushings and drilled the tap out with the carbide drill,cleaned the hole and started again.It is possible to spot anneal the holes with the biggest old fashioned soldering copper you can find.Work the tip down so it will go into the hole to be annealed.Heat the copper with a welding torch as hot as you can.Let it cool with the tip in the drilled hole.Enfield receivers tend to have hard spots in them.One hole may easy,the next less so.
I suspect cracked receiver rings are caused by barrel removal.I always used a relief cut on the barrel.Some rifles have probably had a cracked ring since they were rebarreled in arsenals for WW2.A newly installed barrel doesn't have to be a tight as the issue barrel was.
I suspect cracked receiver rings are caused by barrel removal.I always used a relief cut on the barrel.Some rifles have probably had a cracked ring since they were rebarreled in arsenals for WW2.A newly installed barrel doesn't have to be a tight as the issue barrel was.
Off all the Military bolt actions, the P-14, M-17 have the best metallurgy by far. Eddystones are not to hard to work, BSA did thousands of them. BSA conversions are contoured to a Rem. 700 pattern. I had a Churchill conversion that was contoured to a Parker Hale 1200 contour.
Many EDDYSTONES are in fact way too hard, I know this from personal experience and I wouldn't bother with another one. They run over 60C rockwell for hardness and a carbide burr is about the only thing that will remove any amount of metal before dulling. Drilling requires spot annealing with a torch and even then tapping is a nightmare.
I have personally never tested a P-14 or M1917 of any make that was that hard.Most I Rockwell tested were in the RC 30 plus range.I built a number of magnum rifles using DP P-14 actions that came out of India.The only one I had that really hard to tap was a Winchester.
