Ideal rifle for ww2?

The Basket said:

The P14/ M1917 was considered by some to be the best rifle of ww1 and one of the best bolt action rifle a ever made.

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Well, you know what they say about opinions. Now in fairness to General Hatcher I don't know it what context he made the statement about the M1917 being the best rifle of WW I or what his crtieria was. I will say that I doubt he could see into the future and declare the M1917 one of the best of all time. Where that comes from I have no idea.
The M1903 has a rather overblown reputation, at least as far as WW I goes, and one can very well make an argument that the M1917 was a better rifle. Many of the pre 1918 1903s had receivers of rather dubious heat treatment and some failed in service with as few as 252 rounds fired. It took quite a while to sort out the problem/s and even longer (into the late 20s or early 30s) to get all the early guns out of service. How much this influenced the regard of the M1917 I don't know.
The M1917 may have also been easier to manufacture, a key point to an ordinance man. There is little doubt that the M1917 had the best rear sight put on a military rifle at that time (at least service rifles and not experimental).
The P13/P14/M1917 was a very good gun of it's time but that does not mean it was one of the best of all time, especially now that all time spans another 100 years after it's debut.

The decision to remove the magazine was taken by the designers and the small arms committee and not by me. Again the fact it was removed was for the reasons specified.

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It wouldn't be the first time, or the last, that a committee made a retro grade step or a poor decision.

There was a general feeling among some officers and upper class that most troops were bone heads that were lucky to be able to march in formation, chewing gum at the same time might lead to falling out of step and making uncommanded turns. Small arms were to be a simple as possible to keep the troops from damaging them. New troops were cheaper than new rifles (an exaggeration).
The P13 and cartridge were designed with a bit too much input from the target range and target shooters. There also seems to have been a bit of one ups manship going on. AS has been noted before, the easy way out of the problems they had in South Africa would have been to adopt a spitzer bullet (done before the P13 made it to trials) fit the MK III with a bit heavier barrel (done on the NO 4 rifle) and fit a better back sight (also done on the No 4).
Instead they tried to out Mauser the Mauser. A bigger receiver to hold a bigger cartridge and aside from the back sight, no real improvement over a pre 1898 Mauser.
Some people are too smart for their own good. Winchester in the late 1950s and early 60s introduced a bunch of new cartridges, many of them flopped in short order. Remington, in the same time period, simply made factory versions of cartridges that wildcatters (amature experimenters) had been working with for years and went from sales success to sales success. Winchester had told some of their employees that there weren't interested in 'old thinking'. and it was just about this time (1964) that the 'new thinkers' just about crashed the company.

BTW "the fact it was removed was for the reasons specified." you have only given one reason, the fact that the magazine could possibly be damaged. How many more reasons are there?

I have seen the video on "Forgotten Weapons" in which the forward locking lugs of the P13 are held to be superior to the rear locking lugs of the Lee-Enfield.
In theory they are. In actual practice it is much harder to prove the difference assuming equal ammunition, equal barrels, and equal heat treatment of the recievers. The forward lugs may prove to better for very high intensity cartridges, but the .303 was not that high intensity, operating at around 80% of a mauser or 30-06 and by 1938-39 the US rifle cartridge was operating at about 80% of the pressure it was in WWI.

The Basket said:

A magazine can be in service for many years and can be dropped, stolen, trod on or even simply worn out. The fact you have a pristine example in factory condition doesn't tell anything.

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Hello The Basket,
It seems to me that the reasons you stated here are just to be argumentative rather than following any kind of logic.
What failures of a removable magazine that you have listed cannot also be applied to the bolt of a rifle?
The difference is that if a bolt is damaged, it isn't that easy to replace while a magazine generally isn't fitted to the gun and is pretty easy to replace.

Shortround6 said:

I have seen the video on "Forgotten Weapons" in which the forward locking lugs of the P13 are held to be superior to the rear locking lugs of the Lee-Enfield.
In theory they are. In actual practice it is much harder to prove the difference assuming equal ammunition, equal barrels, and equal heat treatment of the recievers. The forward lugs may prove to better for very high intensity cartridges, but the .303 was not that high intensity, operating at around 80% of a mauser or 30-06 and by 1938-39 the US rifle cartridge was operating at about 80% of the pressure it was in WWI.

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Hello Shorround6,
I don't really agree with you on this aspect of rifle design.
As I see it, the rear locking lugs has the advantage that there is less space that is difficult to access for cleaning (locking lug recesses).
The forward locking lug has the advantage that less of the receiver and bolt need to be stressed to contain chamber pressure and that with force applied over a much shorter distance, there is less flexing of the receiver / body.
Even though the chamber pressure is pretty low with the .303 British, there is a lot of force being applied through an irregular cross section of receiver between the bolt head and the locking lugs which would result in lateral force through the receiver.

- Ivan.

Ivan1GFP said:

Hello Shorround6,
I don't really agree with you on this aspect of rifle design.
As I see it, the rear locking lugs has the advantage that there is less space that is difficult to access for cleaning (locking lug recesses).
The forward locking lug has the advantage that less of the receiver and bolt need to be stressed to contain chamber pressure and that with force applied over a much shorter distance, there is less flexing of the receiver / body.
Even though the chamber pressure is pretty low with the .303 British, there is a lot of force being applied through an irregular cross section of receiver between the bolt head and the locking lugs which would result in lateral force through the receiver.

- Ivan.

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I have a converted No 4 rifle in .308 with a hammer forged Enfield barrel like they used for just about all the British and Canadian (and maybe australian? I don't know) conversions that has been speed locked and mounted in a one piece stock. I use a 150 grain Serria match bullet and reduce the powder charge from my palma rifle by 10%. On a 4 position course of fire (10 shots prone, 10 sitting, 10 kneeling and 10 standing) on the standard SR 200 target I averaged over 20 Xs per match over a summer season of 5 matches, 3 in diameter X ring. All the bad shots were called before the target came back up. There were NO mystery shots (how did that get there!!!) so there is no blaming the rifle for a bad score.

No, I wouldn't use it for championship shooting but the gun will out shoot over 95% of the shooters on the line. It is a little light in the barrel and a little short in the stock to be a good fit which makes it a bit harder to shoot in long prone matches (my heart beat makes it bounce a bit more) than some of my heavier guns. But I sure can't Blame the action or any lack of theoretical stiffness of the action for lack of accuracy.
I tried it once at 300 yds on the MR-52 target (600 yds reduced for 200yds but we shot it at 300yds) 1.79in X ring and 3.79 in ten ring. I had a 196 out of 200 (20 shots) one eight and two nines, all called when the gun went off and over 10 Xs. If the gun puts them where I point them I can't ask for more than that accuracy wise.

I know what the theory says. I know what that gun does. ( and for well over 200 rounds so it is not a 3 shot or 5 shot or 10 shot fluke) You need to be looking at a much higher standard of accuracy than military rifles shoot at using military ammo before the position of the locking lugs makes any practical difference.
How the locking lugs fit and other details can make a difference. Many match rifles have their locking lugs lapped in to make sure they are making equal contact. A refinement that NO standard military rifle had.

Shortround6 said:

I have a converted No 4 rifle in .308 with a hammer forged Enfield barrel like they used for just about all the British and Canadian (and maybe australian? I don't know) conversions that has been speed locked and mounted in a one piece stock. I use a 150 grain Serria match bullet and reduce the powder charge from my palma rifle by 10%. On a 4 position course of fire (10 shots prone, 10 sitting, 10 kneeling and 10 standing) on the standard SR 200 target I averaged over 20 Xs per match over a summer season of 5 matches, 3 in diameter X ring. All the bad shots were called before the target came back up. There were NO mystery shots (how did that get there!!!) so there is no blaming the rifle for a bad score.

No, I wouldn't use it for championship shooting but the gun will out shoot over 95% of the shooters on the line. It is a little light in the barrel and a little short in the stock to be a good fit which makes it a bit harder to shoot in long prone matches (my heart beat makes it bounce a bit more) than some of my heavier guns. But I sure can't Blame the action or any lack of theoretical stiffness of the action for lack of accuracy.
I tried it once at 300 yds on the MR-52 target (600 yds reduced for 200yds but we shot it at 300yds) 1.79in X ring and 3.79 in ten ring. I had a 196 out of 200 (20 shots) one eight and two nines, all called when the gun went off and over 10 Xs. If the gun puts them where I point them I can't ask for more than that accuracy wise.

I know what the theory says. I know what that gun does. ( and for well over 200 rounds so it is not a 3 shot or 5 shot or 10 shot fluke) You need to be looking at a much higher standard of accuracy than military rifles shoot at using military ammo before the position of the locking lugs makes any practical difference.
How the locking lugs fit and other details can make a difference. Many match rifles have their locking lugs lapped in to make sure they are making equal contact. A refinement that NO standard military rifle had.

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Hello Shortround6,

Note that for conversion to .308 Winchester / 7.62 NATO, the No.1 rifles simply were not suitable.
The No.4 rifles had to be individually inspected before conversion. This suggests that the strength of the receiver does not have a lot of margin for the pressure of a .308W. I don't know whether the L42A1 were built from No.4 actions or new manufacture actions.
It is also interesting that the Ishapore 2A rifles which in appearance are No.1 Mk.III* actions had no issues when manufactured in 7.62 NATO but I have also heard that they used a different metallurgy.

Now you have me wondering how one goes about putting a No.4 action into a one piece stock. Does the receiver still have the socket?

We are obviously approaching this from different viewpoints. You shoot for score. I shoot for group size.
Can you tell me how well your gun does from a MOA perspective off a rest?
Shooting for score in a competition environment hints at a rifle doing well but too much depends on weather conditions, sighting equipment and the shooter and because of that, I don't believe it tells nearly as much as an average group size.
I shoot a lot of military rifles, but I have more of a Benchrest shooter mentality.
If you think about it, 200 out of 200 is a great score but you don't need better than 2 MOA accuracy to shoot a clean score and 2 MOA isn't particularly great accuracy for a target rifle.

When doing load development, the kinds of things I was seeing when firing with a scope would not even be visible if I were not using a scope. I can't see a 1/4 MOA difference in group size and probably can't even see a 1/2 MOA difference unless I am using a telescopic sight. Another issue is that if you are shooting that far out, unless you are in a tunnel range, the wind conditions may make things a bit less than reliable for comparison.
A few of my friends who were shooting in the local service rifle matches just picked a recipe and cranked out their loads. When asked, they would claim sub-MOA accuracy but I am certain they never really knew how well or poorly their guns were actually shooting.
I also learned a few things about the methods of some rifle builders. Some folks really impressed me. A few did not and reputation was often not an indication of how well they actually knew their craft.

Now, I won't argue that a No.4 Lee Enfield is sufficiently accurate as a military rifle and perhaps with very few modifications is quite suitable as a sniper rifle, but I will argue that if you are starting with a blank piece of paper, you try to design in as few accuracy compromises as possible unless it buys a serious advantage elsewhere. Production is certain to introduce other factors to degrade performance.

Regarding Group Size versus X count, there was an article (I believe in the American Rifleman) many years back.
It described loading match ammunition with Lapua 168 grain bullets as compared to Sierra 168 grain bullets.
The Lapua bullets generally had the higher X count but the Sierra bullets had the lower extreme spread.
Which would you choose?

- Ivan the Opinionated.

I figure that since most of the Xs were picked up in prone and sitting ( a couple of ten x strings) that the combination of gun, ammo and me (with iron sights) was good for under 1.5 minutes of angle at 200 yds.

I have posted these before but.......


There is no magazine, just wood showing when the bolt is open.
I fired exactly 5 rounds off the bench for load development. Got 5 shots all touching each other at 100 yards with the first load tried and figured that was good enough.

I would go with least extreme spread, a score of 199 with 14Xs loses to a score of 200-11Xs.
I have had a few rifles that showed a difference in scores. My 6.5 x 308 could shoot 800s ( two strings of 40 shots prone at 300yds on the 600 yd reduced target) but I could never get more than 6 Xs in a row even though I was getting 50-60 Xs per day. The 6.5mm Rem benchrest gun (cartridge not style of gun)

once shot 24 consecutive Xs on the same target. 2.85 in X ring but if you land a bullet touching the outside of the scoring ring it counts. 5 round groups could be tiny relatively speaking at 300yds. Like landing 3-4 shots on one side of the X ring and putting tow clicks windage on the sight to shoot up the other side.
But Remington 700 actions, Hart barrels and pillar bedding are a far cry from service rifles. Due to the weight of the grey stocked rifle it wasn't quite as easy to shoot off hand as the No 4 and the scores weren't much different.

But the point was that the rear locking lugs are not the handicap for service rifles that many people believe.

If I am going to shoot 1000yds in serious competition I am taking this rifle

and not the No 4
Just using it for a frame of reference. I was quite surprised by the No 4 and did not expect it to shoot as well as it did.
But being obsolete or out moded in international competition (pink sticker on the bottom gun was from the Canadian national matches) is still a whole different catagory than military rifles.

We had the perfect weapon in our hands but the penny pinching of MacArthur killed it.

T3E2 in .276 Pederson


View: https://youtu.be/AwntZVIoPpI


Smaller, lighter, 10 round clips, everything good about the M1 plus more. But MacArthur using the same amount of intelligence he would bring to his disasters in the PI & later in Korea forced the Army to stick to the .30-06 in the rifle instead of relegating it to MG only use as it should have been. While not a true intermediate cartridge, the .276 would have been a huge step in the right direction and would have prevented the .308/7.62 NATO foolishness in the 50's.

As for bolt action rifles, in my opinion, the gold standard goes to the Mauser K98. To be clear, I think the SMLE pattern rifles are excellent, and very good shooters, but the K98 has the edge in combat ruggedness. The M1903 was a copy of the Mauser design (the U.S. was impressed by it during the Spanish-American war), and in fact, a U.S. Patent Court found that the Army had violated Mauser's patents and required the U.S. Army to pay the manufacturer, Ludwig & Loewe/DWM, patent royalties until war with Germany was declared.

Hello Shortround6,
Thanks for the eye candy!
That No.4 Lee Enfield has me a little confused. I see it has a one piece stock but I also know that the receiver like other L-E's has a socket at the back where the back piece of the stock fits. Did someone cut that socket off and if so, then what acts as the recoil shoulder now?

There is no doubt that you and your gun are doing well, but that one group for testing reminds me of a Black Powder Sharps I had.
The first two shots fired on paper at 50 yards were touching and a couple of my friends on the range (who always seem more interested in Black Powder stuff than modern stuff) were congratulating me on really good shooting with a good rifle. I wasn't that confident.
That particular rifle never shot that well again. In fact, it could not keep 5 shots on the paper at 100 yards with any of the bullets and powder loads I tried. The next BP Sharps was not nearly so difficult, so there apparently was nothing really wrong with my bullet casting, lubes or powder selection. Although they were nominally the same caliber, the actual bore diameters with a bit different but that should not have made that much of a difference except in the moulds I used for casting.

Here is a photograph of the gun I have probably worked on the most over the years. The scope on top is a Leupold 6.5-2 EFR.
The ejected cases don't really clear the cover for the Windage knob so there are several layers of bicycle inner tube wrapped around it to avoid the unsightly dents. The right side of the stock shows a zillion little dents up close from ejected cases, but that is how these guns operate.



- Ivan.

200 to 300 yards is not a big factor in the smaller diameter round. The Squad automatic weapon used today is 5.56. good for 500 to 600 yards effective range. More important to put twice as many small diameter bullets down range. I agree with the posts on explosive bullets, I would rather have the extra power in the cartridge for higher shock damage.

Interesting comment on the M1 Garand, but isn't a Garand with a clip essentially a BAR?

How about a FN-FAL in 308 reduced to 6.5mm? Fast, light, and relatively low recoil!!! The FN-FAL came out in 1946 using the STG 45 round (7.92x33mm), so the technology was there during WWII

The ~6.5mm seems to be hitting the swet spot when talking about automatic rifles. The FAL in the intermediate calibre sounds great.
A necked-down 7.92mm Kurz necked down to 6.5mm would've also provided flatter trajectory, while being even more controlable than the Stg-44.

FN was occupied so I doubt they wanted to make new designs for the Germans.
The British certainly post war had a bizarre thing for bullpups which puzzles me but must have had a strong personality who loved them.
FAL is too late for ww2 but the FN-49 isn't.

The Fedorov Automat using the 6.5mm Japanese cartridge seems incredibly futuristic for 1915. Bolt action rifles should have been obsolete by 1940 but huge stockpiles and limited funds and money better spent on more important weapons meant the development in self loaders happened post war.