While you’ve probably never heard of him, James Henry Burton is one of the – if not the most – influential gunsmiths of the 19th century. Under his direction, millions of arms made in three countries on two different continents played an essential role in the [Read More…]
By popular request in the comments to his earlier video on the No.4 here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=huh7kEKS3xY Mike takes you through what he looks for when buying a Lee-Enfield SMLE (AKA Rifle Number 1 Mark III), and why the stocking up is how it is. 🔫🔫 GUNS IN THIS VIDEO 🔫🔫 Lee [Read More…]
Back in the days of the fighting bolt action rifle, clever small arms designers came up with a number of minor but ingenious features to make the soldier’s life a little less hard when trying to cycle their rifle’s action by hand as they faced down the [Read More…]
Ok, the title is just a hair “click-baity”, but the quality of the information and work put into by C&Rsenal is well worth one’s time. Over the last two years, Othias and Mae have been working to catalog the absolute plethora of weapons used in The [Read More…]
What do you get when you combine what’s widely regarded as one of the best rifle operating mechanisms ever invented, an innovative and promising concept, and a factory with over 150 years of history making some of the finest small arms in the world? If you said [Read More…]
On Saturday we looked at one British “contender” which could have in some alternate reality become the NATO standard round, and today we’re going to look at another: The 4.85x49mm. After the United States adopted the .223 Remington round as the [Read More…]
Today on an extra special episode of Historical Intermediate Calibers, we’ll be taking a look at one of the most controversial experimental military rounds, one that many believe should have become the standard for the Western World at the beginning of the Cold [Read More…]
The Gevær M/53-17 is a rifle that you and I would likely not recognize if we saw the name in print or heard someone talking about it in the gun shop. What you don’t know is that the Gevær M/53-17 is nothing more than a slightly modified M1917 Enfield, often [Read More…]
We introduced you to the concept of locking in a previous one of our 201-level posts on how firearms work, and today we’re going to talk about what has become the most common locking mechanism for rifles: Rotary locking. If to lock an action, you need to create [Read More…]
C&Rsenal is at it again, continuing their coverage of World War I weapons turning their attention to the British Pattern 14 rifle. With over 1.2 million built, the rifles served the Empire admirably and would later go on to serve as the inspiration for the US M1917 [Read More…]
The paradigm was established by the 1870s: Future infantry combat would focus on a combination of entrenchment, and long-range concentrated fire from well-drilled units to defeat the enemy beyond his own effective range. The arms race for a smaller-caliber, [Read More…]
The nations engaged in World War II all fielded one or more main infantry rifle, and in this episode of TFBTV, we take a look at five that we believe to be the best. Remember this is a list of rifles, so submachineguns, machine guns, assault rifles, and so on are not included. Transcript … [Read More…]
The gear of the US infantryman during World War I was some of the best in the period, from the ammunition pouches, to the uniform, and the rifles. Ian McCollum of Forgotten Weapons has taken a reproduction uniform and an original M1917 rifle and M1911 handgun out to the [Read More…]
In the comments section of my recent article on the YouTube Channel Bloke on the Range, the subject arose of the AIA M10 Enfield series, one of which is used by Bloke in one of his videos. These were Australian-built rifles made roughly to the extremely venerable [Read More…]
(This is Part 2 of the TFB Rifle Weight Omnibus. You can read Part 1 here.) In October, I traveled out to see my co-writer Alex C. to collect data on the weights of different long guns and some of their components. Over that weekend, I weighed 58 rifles and submachine [Read More…]
Proto-Ordnance makes some interesting gun modifications and builds. In this video, they finalized their Jawa blaster. For those of you who are Star Wars challenged, the Jawas are a race of midget sized aliens that scavenge the desert planet of Tatooine for scrap metal [Read More…]
In about an hour’s time we will be publishing a TFBTV video about the Pedersen rifle, which was chambered in the .276 Pedersen. Almost three decades later the British developed the .280 British round, very similar to the .276 Pedersen, and an experimental [Read More…]
A while back Steve issued the TFBTV Mad Minute Challenge to try and see which of TFB’s readers is the handiest behind the mighty Lee-Enfield rifle. Read Steve’s blog post to learn about the history of the “mad minute“. Inspired by historical accounts of soldiers of the Empire [Read More…]
To fully immerse yourself in history, sometimes you have to go out and make some yourself. With this in mind, we at TFB are announcing our Mad Minute Contest. Rules will for the contest will be laid out below, but first what is a Mad Minute? For that, we turn to Matt of Historical Firearms: [Read More…]
Joshua wrote … I recently moved to the city for college, as a result I bought a handgun for the apartment. It’s old but I have good faith in her, she’s an old Enfield No.2 Mk.1 built in 1938. Some holster wear, plus some new speed loaders for a [Read More…]
We first blogged about Canada replacing the Lee-Enfield rifle, used by the Rangers, a reserve unit that patrols the far north, back in 2011. It seems the Canadian Army is still talking about replacing the aging rifles but not doing a whole lot of actual replacing. [Read More…]
This photo, that appeared on the Telegraph’s website, shows the Head Armourer of the paramilitary Home Guards in Ahmadabad blessing thier Enfield rifles. Ahmadabad is India’s fifth largest city. [ Many thanks to Whaleoil for the tip. ]
Since their formation in 1947, the Canadian Rangers, Canada’s Arctic defense/surveillance militia, have been carrying .303 chambered Lee Enfield rifles. Today, more than 60 years later, each Ranger is still issued with a Lee Enfield No. 4 rifle and each year are [Read More…]
The above photo is of a new rifle from Indian Ordnance Factories. Enfield aficionados will recognize it as the Ishapore Enfield Rifle 2A1 with a modern sniper stock, scope and bipod. The Ishapore Rifle 2A1 is based on the Lee-Enfield SMLE Mk. III and is chambered in [Read More…]
Yes, you read that title correctly 🙂 Special Interest Arms, best known for their .45 ACP and 7.62x39mm Enfields, are doing limited runs of .50 AE and .45-70 Enfield conversations. These rifles are so cool that I am declaring them the TFB Gun-o’-The-Month even [Read More…]
R. Lee Ermey, armed with his trusty Springfield, takes on an Enfield armed Brit. [ Many thanks to jdun1911 for emailing me the link. ]
The action in this rifle is an inverted Enfield M1917 (or maybe Enfield P14). It was done so that a lefty could use it! [ Hat Tip goes to Max Popenker for finding this bizarre creation. ]
Prexis plans on selling a US made kit version of the Enfield L85 / SA80. The PL85 kit contains all the parts needed to build the rifle. The catch? The lower receiver which will require bending into shape. I have no word on pricing or when this kit will be on sale. Refer [Read More…]
Since the last time I wrote about the Australian International Arms M-10 Lee Enfield clone the company has expanded their product line, secured a EU importer (Polish firm LD Diana) and may be exporting to the US in the near future. I was very surprised to learn that [Read More…]
Piet, a South African, emailed me information about a wildcat he shoots. The .416 Strauss aka. the 416-03 Strauss in named after the inventor, a friend of Piet. .303 British (left), .416 Strauss (middle, loaded with a 350 gr Speer bullet in a Norma case) The parent [Read More…]
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