Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Rebarreling an old war horse - lots of pix, improving the cartridge

I was going to put this in the improved cartridge thread, but there are a lot of pix, and the improved cartridge is going away for a "less improved" cartridge.

This is the rifle. It's a 1942 Savage made No 4 Lee Enfield. Have a little respect. He's going to be 74 and he's a veteran.



I converted this rifle from 303 British to 303 Epps about 20 years ago. You cannot see the chamber or the single stage trigger that's in it. But both are there. Here is a 303 British beside two 303 Epps cartridges.



A 180 gr. bullet fired from a No 4 Lee Enfield in 303 British manages approx. 2450 fps. The same bullet fired from a No 4 rifle chambered in 303 Epps manages approx. 2600fps. Pressures were the same for both, so improving it made a No 4 Lee Enfield into a 308 Win.

But there were a couple of things that bothered me about the conversion. The first was bullet availability. There aren't too many .311/.312 bullets around. And .311/.312 bullets are undersized for the barrel anyway.

The second was the magazine. As with most improved cartridges, when you blow out the case wall, the improved cartridge does not sit properly in the mag and feeding can be a problem. I had feed issues with all my Epps rifles.

So I decided to do this.



This is a Shilen 308 barrel. It's a 1 in 10 twist, 6 groove tube, which I have already cast a spell upon in order that it will be a hummer. Spell casting aside, I choose to rebarrel it to 30-303 because I can use .308 bullets, the mag will feed properly again and I can use my 303 British dies and accessories.



So it's still improved, just not as much as before. But it's definitely more user friendly. The new barrel is .006 smaller which will not affect reloading recipes for 125, 150, 175/180 or 200 gr. bullets. I will get to use 165s and possibly try some .308 copperized monotonous type bullets too. I was even thinking about 220s, if they fit properly.

To end this post, here are some other pix of the rifle. I put a scope mount on it years ago, made from 90 degree bent steel, made a 5 rd mag for it and installed a cheek rest to bring my face up to where the scope is.