Someone here has a Lee Enfield riflevand wants to install a scope on it.

The receiver is hardened, and we were wondering what you gentlemen use to drill it with.

Full instructions please, it is for Walter!

Carbide!

Drilling is not too difficult, but the taping is a real problem. I have used a small tip on the O/C torch to anneal the small area of the hole and also a small carbon rod with a 12 volt battery on small areas to soften the area. This carbon rod was used years ago and it is effective.

Redirect. Canadian made no drill sidemount.

If it's for Walter, just put the scope on with Bungee cords or duct tape. Will make a great video!

Poor Walter.

The thing is everyone is taking the micky out of him.

Here a couple of stories.

As you all know, Ruger stocks all look the same!

He was adjusting the trigger on a long action rifle.

It just so happens that I had a medium action Ruger right there.

I took the stock of it, and put it where Walter had the long action stock.

He finished the trigger job, and was trying his best to install the action in the stock!

He tried.
And tried.
And tried.

Did not work.

Suddenly he started looking for wood work tools, to open up the stock to fir th action.

The owner of the rifle went ballistic!


Those who have worked with Hall actions and Jewel triggers will appreciate this.

The trigger sits in a sort of a shoe.

You can fit it either way, but the trigger only works one way.

I put in the trigger th wrong way, and asked him to adjust the trigger.

The sear never engages in this position.

He spent ages trying to get it to work, which of course it never did.

I told him he should take a break, and get himself a coffee and a cake.

He went around the corner to do this, and I changed the trigger shoe back.

And adjusted the trigger.

He still does not know what happened.

Get some cheap, carbide drills off of ebay Saeed. These will probably work fine.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Solid...qeh85v73b3qa0-_XFV8w

Then buy a half dozen really good, HSS taps from Brownells or your local supplier. I just bought a whole bunch of Reiff & Nestor 6x48 and 8x40 and so far they have been very good. With care and good lube they should cut without needing to anneal the receiver. I've already done a couple of very hard Savage 99s and those taps just laughed at them. Proper tooling takes all of the fun and adventure out of jobs like that. Despite the higher tooling costs your profit margins will still be higher for what you save on fucking around and trying to make shit work. Actually, carbide drills are as cheap as HSS now.

I have drilled several Lee Enfields, both #1 and #4; and none of them were hard at all..
But for truly hard receivers, drilling them with carbide works, then getting them tapped is the hard part but a new tap for each hole works most of the time.. Spot annealing is the only way if it doesn't.

someone who can Give and Take practical jokes is a blessing in a group. Walter seems to be that guy.

Try an old scope block that fits, or just a piece of steel about that size. Heat cherry red and place it atop the received and let it cool.

Never seen this fail to draw JUST enough to drill and tap

A piece of carbon rod , wrap with solid copper wire , insulate , connect to 6 volt lantern battery or wet cell . Don't keep it connected too long . It will get real hot and spot anneal your spots .
I'll try to find the old illustrations , either in the 1st Brownell gunsmith kinks or an old book .
It works , I modified the procedure a bit but I have a supply of carbon arc rods .

Have drilled and tapped dozens of SMLEs, they were not hard, just used decent branded HSS drills and taps (P&N). Back then used BA #4 screws in the receiver and #6 (smaller) for the rear charging ramp with Parker Hale one piece bases.

The hardest receivers I have drilled and tapped was the Ruger Mini 14 for which I bought Brownell drills and taps specially made for doing these pricks.
I have drilled and tapped for many other rifles that weren't already factory done and apart from the Ruger didn't find any others a problem.
The Mini 14 will sure grab and snap taps if you are not careful and using a good lubricant.

quote:

Originally posted by Gary MacDonald:
A piece of carbon rod , wrap with solid copper wire , insulate , connect to 6 volt lantern battery or wet cell . Don't keep it connected too long . It will get real hot and spot anneal your spots .
I'll try to find the old illustrations , either in the 1st Brownell gunsmith kinks or an old book .
It works , I modified the procedure a bit but I have a supply of carbon arc rods .

Since batteries no longer have carbon rods in the center, this method seems to have fallen out of fashion. Acquiring the carbon rod seems to be the limiting factor.

quote:

Originally posted by z1r:

quote:

Originally posted by Gary MacDonald:
A piece of carbon rod , wrap with solid copper wire , insulate , connect to 6 volt lantern battery or wet cell . Don't keep it connected too long . It will get real hot and spot anneal your spots .
I'll try to find the old illustrations , either in the 1st Brownell gunsmith kinks or an old book .
It works , I modified the procedure a bit but I have a supply of carbon arc rods .

Since batteries no longer have carbon rods in the center, this method seems to have fallen out of fashion. Acquiring the carbon rod seems to be the limiting factor.

Really cheap on Amazon . Only needed a few , ended up with a dozen or more . Did I mention real cheap on Amazon !
I actually have an old Mac or snap on 12 volt electric arc pencil for marking metal ,works really good for spot annealing .

I can't find the listing on Amazon . I'll have to wait till my wife gets home to look at old purchases .

I'll just add that I always start with a 90° carbide spotting drill...

https://www.homesciencetools.c...14ad29fab4819d08c0e1

Carbon rods

Have I missed something, since when did SMLEs ever have hardened receivers? Ordinary HSS drills cut them like butter, well they used to?
Genuine question.

I once had a man tell me that the steel used in his building was extremely hard as it was extremely difficult to drill..........it made no sense.....so I asked to see his drills.....they were not even high speed drills but carbon drills used for wood. High speed drills are marked HSS....for high speed steel

I know that some of the 1917 eddystones had case hardened receivers.....and I mean glass hard.....but I'm not sure the Lee Enfields are hardened.

Double check your drill bits to see if this is the case.

Gary & Bobster, thanks for the links. It would be nice to have on hand, just in case.

With Carbide or good HSS bits, drilling isn't really the issue, tapping is or can be.

I remember a friend drilling and tapping some vz24's in a Forster fixture. The rear bridge was essentially through hardened and you could see the action flex as he mashed down on the quill feed lever.

quote:

Originally posted by eagle27:
Have I missed something, since when did SMLEs ever have hardened receivers? Ordinary HSS drills cut them like butter, well they used to?
Genuine question.

Some of the American Enfields, can be hard and tough. The British Lee Enfields are soft as butter. I have drilled and tapped hundreds of the British guns and scores of the American ones. They are not the same guns.

If this is for Walter, Brownells sells a no-drill scope mount that looks interesting:

https://www.brownells.com/opti...4-no-5-prod1502.aspx

I'd encourage him to buy one, so then you can tell me if they are worth getting or if they are junk and don't bother.

The drilling is the easy part

Tapping is often not......if it is indeed hard

Chromeclad taps for the tuff stuff

quote:

Originally posted by speerchucker30x378:

quote:

Originally posted by eagle27:
Have I missed something, since when did SMLEs ever have hardened receivers? Ordinary HSS drills cut them like butter, well they used to?
Genuine question.

Some of the American Enfields, can be hard and tough. The British Lee Enfields are soft as butter. I have drilled and tapped hundreds of the British guns and scores of the American ones. They are not the same guns.

Are we talking of the same rifle here. Saeed asked the question of the "Lee Enfield" which is the British made SMLE. The Enfield P13, P14 or American M17 is a different beast not that I ever had problems drilling and tapping those either but all the SMLEs I ever worked on were soft.
Didn't know that SMLEs were ever produced in the States, but can live and learn.

Cobalt spade drill.

As I said above, neither the #1, nor #4, Enfields are hard at all. They will drill with a semi sharp butter knife.
As for being made in the US, Savage made hundreds of thousands of #4s for England during WW2, and Long Branch in Canada made them.
No #1s were made here but they were made in Australia and India. As late as the 60s, in caliber 7.62 in India. Those aren't hard either.
The OP is not talking about the 1914 or 1917 Enfields, as I read it.

quote:

Originally posted by dpcd:
As I said above, neither the #1, nor #4, Enfields are hard at all. They will drill with a semi sharp butter knife.
As for being made in the US, Savage made hundreds of thousands of #4s for England during WW2, and Long Branch in Canada made them.
No #1s were made here but they were made in Australia and India. As late as the 60s, in caliber 7.62 in India. Those aren't hard either.
The OP is not talking about the 1914 or 1917 Enfields, as I read it.

+1 from me.

quote:

Originally posted by dpcd:
As I said above, neither the #1, nor #4, Enfields are hard at all. They will drill with a semi sharp butter knife.
As for being made in the US, Savage made hundreds of thousands of #4s for England during WW2, and Long Branch in Canada made them.
No #1s were made here but they were made in Australia and India. As late as the 60s, in caliber 7.62 in India. Those aren't hard either.
The OP is not talking about the 1914 or 1917 Enfields, as I read it.

Yes knew the Longbranch Canadian SMLE, and the Aussie Lithgows, have rebarreled a lot of SMLEs with the Lithgow barrels. India did also do them. Haven't come across a Savage unless they are not marked Savage.

I too think if referring to Lee Enfield the OP does mean the SMLE rifles and not the P13/P14.

I've just never come across a hard SMLE receiver to drill so thought there might have been confusion. I am aware the Eddystone P17 could be like glass, I think some of them actually cracked like glass too.

I thought that the subject was on military actions in general being hard to drill.

Here is a tip that I learned from Al Knight, gunsmith that started his shop in Ft. Worth in 1935. I was the first outside of family that was hired in 1965. He would say Kid let me show you something on drilling that hard Enfield 1917. Get some Hoppe's 9 and use it for lube and use the HS 31 drill. The trick was to have someone turn the drill press belt by hand very slowly and making sure that it is turning in the correct direction when you are applying the down pressure. We had lots of military actions to drill and tap in the 1960's when they were $15-25 dollars each. We used small grinding stones to break thru some of the case harden receivers just enough to drill the holes for scopes.

Taps can be sharpened by hand with uneven starting cutting edges. This will allow for less friction on tapping the hard receivers.

Saeed asked about Lee Enfield, specifically.
Later on, someone mentioned Pattern 14 and 1917 Enfolds, which have nothing in common with Lee Enfields, and are never referred to as a "Lee", since they are not a Lee design; they are an Enfield design. Lee was an American and sold the rights to his rifle to the British Government. First company to produce a Lee rifle was Sharps, and when they went under, Remington. The original Lee design has a one piece stock. (Which I make) It was the British who put the two piece stocks on it, for strength. The Pattern 14 was a British development from the start. . Later, someone mentioned SMLE, which is how the #1s are marked and stands for (Rifle) Short, Magazine, Lee Enfield. Only the #1 series is marked like that; the #4s are not. #1s and #4s are totally different rifles; about the only thing common is the butt plate screw.
As for Savage #4s, they are common as they made 1,2 million of them. They are not marked "Savage"; they are marked with a squared off "S" and "US PROPERTY" as they were lend lease.