Lee Enfield no4 mk1 questions.

J

Jeepliberty

Inactive
I recently picked up a Lee Enfield no4 mk1, and was wondering if I could have a little help with it. It's missing the buttplate and cleaning tools, I have found the buttplate, no luck on cleaning tools. Also I was curious as to what ammunition is good to use. The rifle has the stock cut down, but the wood although a little scratched looks quite nice. The bore is excellent. No pitting or rust. Everything operates well. The receiver is marked No4 MK1 F (FTR) G312XX. I will post a picture if needed. Thank you!
 
If the rifle is "sporterised" I'd suggest having a smith check the chambering to confirm before buying anything.
Assuming it is still chambered for .303 British try the Prvi Partizan ammo its a good brand & a great price.
The cleaning kits pop up on e-bay all the time, but don't ever, ever use the wire mesh even once! Its strictly a collector's piece at this point in time.
 
Genuine WWII-vintage cleaning kits for Lee-Enfields are widely available from a variety of sources. The kit consisted of an oil bottle and a pull-through, which was a length of rope with a brass weight at one end. The soldier, sailor, or marine would tie knots in the rope, oil it, drop the weight through the barrel from the breech end, and pull it through to clean the bore. Cleaning rods were not used, hence the lack of cleaning-rod fittings on the rifle.

Here's one source:
http://www.ima-usa.com/nation/briti...itish-enfield-rifle-brass-oiler-wwi-wwii.html

The oiler and pull-through fit in the hole in the butt and are covered by a spring-loaded trap door. The spring is flat and is held down by the buttplate, so make sure you get all 5 parts (buttplate, door, spring, and 2 screws). FWIW there were 3 materials used to make the buttplate: cast brass, pot metal, and oil-blackened steel. Almost all British-built LE's originally used brass, but since many of these rifles were rebuilt (including yours, more below), an alternate buttplate could have been substituted, so there's really no "incorrect" material to use as a replacement.

The "F (FTR)" stands for Royal Ordinance Factory Fazakerly (Factory Thorough Repair). This signifies that your gun was totally rebuilt using parts from various other guns and a new serial number was applied; this work was most likely done immediately postwar. Some collectors view FTR rifles as somewhat less desirable than all-original Lee-Enfields, but they usually shoot equally well. :)
 
The "F (FTR)" stands for Royal Ordinance Factory Fazakerly (Factory Thorough Repair). This signifies that your gun was totally rebuilt using parts from various other guns and a new serial number was applied;
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Sorry Chris but this is not correct ...

FTR does mean Factory Thorough Repair, but FTR did not mean rifles got a new serial number during this process. The marking of FTR was stamped or engraved upon the receiver or butt socket with the date of FTR, but the original serial number was in nearly all instances retained.

FTR'd rifles were repaired with new existing spare parts supplied by the various feeder factories, not old parts cannibalized from other rifles. You may have this type of Factory repair work confused with a completely different program in which some quantities of rifles known as "dispersal", were assembled from mixed parts and spares that were pooled from stripped or cannibalized obsolete rifles.


Best, Tiki.
 
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Thanks for the info, I greatly appreciate it.
As far as the rope cleaner, could I make one? And if so what should I use?

I'll get the oiler as soon as I get the buttplate. I'll make sure I get all mentioned pieces.


Again, thank you for the info!
 
Just buy a cleaning kit and pull through off Ebay, they are common as muck. FTR has zero bearing on the performance or value of the rifle, FTR is purely subjective among collectors and means very little in the grand scheme. Cars get serviced for a reason, so did rifles.

BTW - Don't ever use the pull through to clean your bore - you can easily damage it - stick to modern cleaning rods.

Tiki.
 
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The soldier, sailor, or marine would tie knots in the rope, oil it, drop the weight through the barrel from the breech end, and pull it through to clean the bore.
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I've never heard of the pull through being used that way, where did you hear that technique?

As far as the rope cleaner, could I make one? And if so what should I use?
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There is a bit more (but not much) than a piece of rope involved. Sure there is rope but it has splits & loops formed in it to hold cleaning patches (commonly called four by two's) which were torn off of a roll & used to swab the bore. There is also a HORRIBLE piece of metal screen mesh wire that can be wrapped in a figure-8 shape to destroy, err, scrub the bore ( Kind of like a modern bore cleaning brush, but way more damaging). Like Tiki said get one for the sake of completeness, not for actually cleaning.:eek:

As for oil bottles, get a brass one, yep they are a few dollars more, but they work much better than the plastic ones which crack & leak pretty much always.

Cleaning rods were used, but not on a day-to-day basis, or by the individual soldier, the armorer had a thing called a "T-Handle" which was used to push, never pull, a detachable brass jag which was wrapped in (guess what) more TwobyFour.:D The jag was not threaded & was never attached to the T-Handle it could only be pushed through the bore that way. It was also used to clear bore obstructions from the breech end, should they occur as a pull through can't push, just pull.
Here's my kit.
DSCF6510.jpg


The "T-shaped" handle with a notch is a striker( firing pin) wrench, not normal issue, but handy to have & the Brush is an extra (but authentic) accessory. The brass jag is in 2 sections with a pivot in the join which allows the head to rotate as it is pushed through the rifling. The Charger ( never "stripper clip") holds 5 rounds of reloaded Softpoint ammo.
 
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The kit will be solely for the sake of completeness. I'll order the parts as soon as funds allow. I'll pick up a cleaning rod as soon as I can too. I only paid 70 for the rifle. I guess I didn't do too bad even though it's missing those few things.

And again, thank you for the help. I'll post a picture of it as soon as I can.
 
For not too much of an investment, you could restore that rifle to its original military configuration. You would need an original forearm, the two handguards, and the two barrel band assembiles, all commonly available on eBay or through surplus parts dealers. All of those parts could probably be gotten for less than $100.00.
 
Looks like that rifle well return to military trim with little work. You need a fore-end, both hand guards, upper and lower bands. The pull through and cleaning kits are for display. Use a modern cleaning rod and supplies.

kit01.jpg
 
I plan on restoring it sometime soon, having some plumbing problems in my house now. Figures after I got the rifle something would go wrong, murphys law I suppose. Haha. Thanks again for all the help and information! I greatly appreciate it.
 
Given all the joeks floating around about the strangeties of British plumbing I am no surprised that the nemesis of plumbing hit you after the purchase of the quintessential Brit rifle.....

K.
 
i have a no4 mk1* just like yours (sporterized) extremely accurate.
prvi partisan makes affordable .303 ammo. there are reloading dies available as well. i've reloaded the prvi cases up to 5 times without any issues.
have fun!
btw, all .303 milsurp is corrosive.
 
btw, all .303 milsurp is corrosive.
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I'm afraid not :eek: Let me clarify a bit.
All British Mk7 (or Mk VII) is corrosive, not all surplus is corrosive. British MkVII(z) is non corrosive, Greek HXP is non-corrosive, South African R1M3Z is non-corrosive, Prvi Partizan/ Igmann (PPU or "MMY" in Cyrillic characters) is non corrosive & so on.:cool:
 
Given all the jokes floating around about the strangeties of British plumbing I am no surprised that the nemesis of plumbing hit you after the purchase of the quintessential Brit rifle.....
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If you think Brit plumbing is odd you should see how we wire automobiles!
"Lucas, Masters of the Dark!":)
 
Or a Morris 1000 on "Welsh dual-carriageways"*.................at night,......................after leaving the Pub:o

*(For the uninitiated that's 2 narrow strips of blacktop, one for the left wheels & another for the right. There is a grass "median" passing under the sump.) Or was it a sheep?:D
 
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