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1903A4 Drill Rifle Recovery

Looking forward to the next post

I'm in standby mode at the moment as I have parts off for refinishing. 1903A3/A4's that you come across that have all the metal parkerized are 100pct rebuilt rifles. The barreled action, bayonet band and towards the end, trigger guard/bottom metal were the only things parked on factory rifles. The barrel bands, swivels, screws, mag cutoff, follower, bolt assembly and trigger parts were all blued to the point of being black with a hint of blue when delivered to the gov.

I figured that I wouldn't be "undoing" military history since I'm starting this from scratch on a recovered receiver so I might as well finish as it would have been delivered from Remington. I've got everything to finish out the 1903A4 except for the Redfield 3/4" rings for the Weaver 330 scope. I also traded my brother an early "S" stock for the scant stock and it turns out that this rifle, being an early build, would have had the pistol gripped "C" stock. The A4's were supposed to have the "C" stocks, but supply issues had them getting the scant stocks from August/September of 1943 onward. My biggest priority is finding the rings, but I'll need to get the correct stock at some point as well.

I'm waiting on my Smith Corona barrel to get here to finish putting together the 03A3.

I'm pretty excited at this point and can't wait for everything to come together.

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I think I've looked at the drill rifles on dupages website at least a dozen times since you've started this thread, along with searching for the other parts needed.
 
I think I've looked at the drill rifles on dupages website at least a dozen times since you've started this thread, along with searching for the other parts needed.

Drill rifles are low priority items for Dupage, so they only get put up when they get the time to go through them. My advice is to check daily for them to come into stock as I know they have plenty to go through still.

I'm still waiting on some parts to be refinished, so no new news regarding the 03A3 and A4 builds. I did finish building out my USMC 1941 Sniper rifle last night though. This was also built from a recovered drill rifle. Again - the rifles have already been "messed up" when they were welded on, so I didn't feel bad about ruining any collector value by drilling and tapping this. If anything, I've increased value by turning it into this configuration.

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The 1903 receivers are more finely machined than the 03A3 receivers, so it requires a really delicate hand to clean them up. The top 2 pics are of the receiver on this rifle. You can see the weld marks that were there that didn't take the parkerizing. I'm still contemplating refinishing it with MolyResin - to at least cover the weld marks, but I'm digging the used look otherwise. The bottom 2 pics are of an unmolested 03 receiver just to compare my work against what Springfield Armory put out in 1918. Again, with many of these - a lot gets hidden by keeping the mag cutoff in the "on" position (flipped up). I don't think I did a horrible job.

Barrel removal process is the same as it is with the 1903A3 barrels, except that you want to be careful cutting the weld between the barrel and receiver. The weld on the 03 barrels is between the receiver and rear sight mount - you may have to salvage the rear sight mount, so try not to mess it up.

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Update on the 1903A4 build. The draw between the reference marks on the receiver and barrel was pretty wide - almost a 1/2" from hand tight. I just wasn't getting the leverage I needed to be able to close that gap, so I had to break out the big guns. Vee blocks and a 12 ton press. Fortunately my friend had them.

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After anti-seize and several cycles of loosening/tightening, I was able to get it right where I needed to be. I was just about to give up too, thinking that the barrel shoulder would have to be turned to get it into position. Barrel positioning is important on these as you need to make sure that the extractor cut is lined up correctly.

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Mainly because I'm lazy and impatient, I did refinish the base and barreled action in MolyResin. Unfortunately, their Dark-Gray Moly-Resin isn't dark enough and I didn't add enough black to get the color right. When mixed sufficiently and baked at a higher temp for longer duration, the Moly-Resin gets a really nice green tint to it, as is seen on a lot of these older surplus guns that were parkerized. Unfortunately I didn't add enough black to the MolyResin, so everything looks Gray-Green instead of closer to the "really dark" gray-green that I was going for. Fortunately I sourced a set of the right rings and they should be here in the next day or so. Since actual rings were parkerized, I'll beadblast and refinish those - so I might as well wait until I have everything on hand before I break out the airbrush again. I did get everything else though, so once I get the parts MolyResin'd again, it'll be ready to put together.

I finished up another Covid projust this weekend as well. This one is also a recovered 1903 drill rifle that I built up as a USMC WW1 (and to a very limited extent, WW2) 1903-A5 sniper rifle. The serial number of the receiver has it being built in 1918 and is just barely high number - close enough to threshold that it may or may not be "safe" for those of you that worry about stuff like that (I don't) and the bolt code matches the receiver timeframe. The barrel is a Criterion. I had it around and thought that it would make for finishing out the rifle nicely. While the mag cutoff area of this rifle cleaned up nicely, there were weld marks that were clearly visible that didn't take the parkerization that was on it, so I had it refinished in Midnight Blue Cerakote. Everything on this rifle would have been rust blued and I figured the Midnight Blue would approximate it well while covering up the weld spots. It's also a hell of a lot cheaper to have something Cerakoted versus rust blued these days. Of course I put everything together and realized I forgot to get a dang front sight. So I've got to get one of those now before it's officially "done".

The scope is a correct Winchester A5 scope and has the Mann-Neidner adjustments and mounts. While there's no way to verify if this is an actual USMC scope from WW1, given the limited amount of Mann-Neidner adjustments produced - there's a good chance that it is.

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Update on the 1903A4 build. The draw between the reference marks on the receiver and barrel was pretty wide - almost a 1/2" from hand tight. I just wasn't getting the leverage I needed to be able to close that gap, so I had to break out the big guns. Vee blocks and a 12 ton press. Fortunately my friend had them.

50380682007_d063253297_b.jpg


After anti-seize and several cycles of loosening/tightening, I was able to get it right where I needed to be. I was just about to give up too, thinking that the barrel shoulder would have to be turned to get it into position. Barrel positioning is important on these as you need to make sure that the extractor cut is lined up correctly.

50380504451_6f404aaea7_b.jpg


Mainly because I'm lazy and impatient, I did refinish the base and barreled action in MolyResin. Unfortunately, their Dark-Gray Moly-Resin isn't dark enough and I didn't add enough black to get the color right. When mixed sufficiently and baked at a higher temp for longer duration, the Moly-Resin gets a really nice green tint to it, as is seen on a lot of these older surplus guns that were parkerized. Unfortunately I didn't add enough black to the MolyResin, so everything looks Gray-Green instead of closer to the "really dark" gray-green that I was going for. Fortunately I sourced a set of the right rings and they should be here in the next day or so. Since actual rings were parkerized, I'll beadblast and refinish those - so I might as well wait until I have everything on hand before I break out the airbrush again. I did get everything else though, so once I get the parts MolyResin'd again, it'll be ready to put together.

I finished up another Covid projust this weekend as well. This one is also a recovered 1903 drill rifle that I built up as a USMC WW1 (and to a very limited extent, WW2) 1903-A5 sniper rifle. The serial number of the receiver has it being built in 1918 and is just barely high number - close enough to threshold that it may or may not be "safe" for those of you that worry about stuff like that (I don't) and the bolt code matches the receiver timeframe. The barrel is a Criterion. I had it around and thought that it would make for finishing out the rifle nicely. While the mag cutoff area of this rifle cleaned up nicely, there were weld marks that were clearly visible that didn't take the parkerization that was on it, so I had it refinished in Midnight Blue Cerakote. Everything on this rifle would have been rust blued and I figured the Midnight Blue would approximate it well while covering up the weld spots. It's also a hell of a lot cheaper to have something Cerakoted versus rust blued these days. Of course I put everything together and realized I forgot to get a dang front sight. So I've got to get one of those now before it's officially "done".

The scope is a correct Winchester A5 scope and has the Mann-Neidner adjustments and mounts. While there's no way to verify if this is an actual USMC scope from WW1, given the limited amount of Mann-Neidner adjustments produced - there's a good chance that it is.

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That's some next level cool imo. The scope thing wouldn't be a concern at all if it were me (but I'm a little below novice haha). Welds showing= If you have someone in mind to pass this rifle down to? it would probably mean a lot to'em if you left the welds showing? I know it would me. my2 . A 1903 has been on my list since shortly after joining the site but I keep buying tacticool , just in case the sky falls. Looking forward to the day when I can focus on MilSurp. Awesome Posts , I've done a lot of technical/tedious welding over the years and always enjoyed the challenge . Thank you and please continue Sir.
 
That's some next level cool imo. The scope thing wouldn't be a concern at all if it were me (but I'm a little below novice haha). Welds showing= If you have someone in mind to pass this rifle down to? it would probably mean a lot to'em if you left the welds showing? I know it would me. my2 . A 1903 has been on my list since shortly after joining the site but I keep buying tacticool , just in case the sky falls. Looking forward to the day when I can focus on MilSurp. Awesome Posts , I've done a lot of technical/tedious welding over the years and always enjoyed the challenge . Thank you and please continue Sir.

I'm glad your enjoying the progress.

Regarding the welds showing, I suppose everything will go to my kids some day, but for now it's for my enjoyment. The welds, depending on how bad they are, really don't bother me - but if I can cover them up, then I will. Some welds are a lot worse than others. I really like bringing back these drill rifles and while they don't have any real collectable value, one would be a fool to think that a shooter grade 1903 Springfield won't appreciate like any other MIL-SURP rifle. It's worth more today as a shooter than it ever was as a drill rifle.

I think that the MIL-SURP world is a good part of our hobby to get involved in. They all have history and there are definitely scarce collectables out there. The thing is, these things aren't getting any cheaper. I remember when I was younger, you'd peruse Shotgun News and see M1 Carbines for $125 and M1 Garands for $299. All. Day. Long. I was too young to buy them then, but I'm taking advantage of every opportunity I can afford at this point.
 
I'm pretty stoked as my rings showed up yesterday, which allowed me to get everything refinished today. I think I nailed the color this time on the parts that were supposed to be parked - I compared it to an unmolested bayonet band and it's about spot-on. I baked the barreled action at a higher temp and for longer duration than I did the scope base and rings. I wanted that tinge of green to the barreled action and the optics accessories to not have that tinge.

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I put everything together and it went together with no issues. I need to get a few coats of oil on the handguard though as it's a touch lighter than the stock. Again, the scant stock isn't correct for this particular build date, but it's what I have on hand and will do for now. I've got the scope mounted up, but fully anticipate having to take it apart and add a shim to the front of the mount - they almost always required them. Initial windage is set with the large screws on other side of the rear scope ring.

The overall cost into this rifle is just under $600, that included optics, mounts, everything. Not bad for a legit 1903A4 right?

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