I discovered this morning that my BSA & M is an original carbine. I thought someone had shortened the barrel but no, the foresight mount is integral with the barrel just like the original MLE's and Lee Medford's were. This one's bore is not rust damaged but has seen plenty of use - used as a target rifle, I believe - ending up as a tapered bore which is very good for my paper patched boolits I started using in it.

Hi 303Guy , don't you think it may have had a cabine barrel fitted later ?

Do the numbers match ?

Looks like it could be a cool little rifle , I love those old BSA's , carbine's rear sight is different to , I think ?

Cheers

PS Did you get it off Gunworks

I got off our local internet auction, TradeMe . It likely was rebarreled. The numbers do not match and the bolt handle is not the cavelry carbine style but the bolt number does not match the receiver either. The fore-end is different to any references I have seen and has the extreme sight cut out so would have been from a Long Tom most likely - the action has the extreme sigh mounting too. The action is old enough to have been a carbine. I should compare the rear sight to some samples I have, one of which is known to have come off a Long Tom.

303guy ,is it marked "LEC" ? the carbines never had the provision for the volley sight on the receiver, I would like to see a good photo of the LH side of the receiver.

Hi darwinmauser.
It's been a while since I have been on-line on this site. I have retrieved the rifle and having a look it does have the normal volley sight facility. There is no 'LEC' that I can see. It's quite possible that a carbine barrel was fitted to LMLE action to restore it. The barrel and action numbers do not match.

It's now wearing a sporter but piece I picked up. Much nicer and lighter.

Pretty much certain to be an MLM / MLE action ,most of them around this part of the world seem to be about 1900/1901 vintage . The rear sight looks to be the correct one for an MLE although it could well be a carbine one ....I'm not sure of the difference. Overall it looks like a nice old rifle and if it shoots well enjoy


Looking at it again..the rear sight is to far back for an MLE so I would say it is the LEC sight .The MLE had a hand guard behind the rear sight the LEC didn't.