Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Front Sight Screwdriver for Enfield No.4 Mk1*

For reasons yet unknown to me I recently bought a pretty decent Savage-made Enfield No.4 Mk1* rifle, complete with spike bayonet and "US Property" marking. I want to shoot this rifle a bit, using light loads with cast bullets. Windage adjustment is done by moving the front sight. The front sight is locked in position by a screw below the fron sight, on the muzzle end of the front sight's mounting block. That screw uses a transverse bar on its head, not a slot or socket. This use of a bar on the screw head prevented anyone but an armorer from moving the front sight.

I have read that a fellow in New Zealand makes a special screwdriver for this screw. It may be part of a combination tool. Anyway, the tool, whatever it is, once listed for about US$40.

Does anyone know where I can buy such a tool, or who makes it or any other information about that tool?

Thanks in advance!

There are special screwdrivers for these, but you can make one from an old screwdriver or driver bit if you have a Dremel tool.

Cut off the blade or tip, then cut a transverse slot in the end with a cut-off wheel in Dremel. You may need to turn down the shank to fit; it will need to be about .210"

Stuart

You can get repro. Lee Enfield armourers tools, including this one, from www.arrowmark.com.au

Stuart and daniel:
Thank you for your responses. Now I have to find a friend with a Dremel and start saving pennies to buy that front sight moving tool. At last I know what to start doing to make that No.4 Mk 1* a usable rifle!

TwentyTwo,

$40 for a simple sight tool? Well, it IS much nicer than mine, made from an old hex-shank screwdriver bit:



Borrow that Dremel and get slitting!

Stuart

I found a tire valve core removing tool. Not the small ones for a car or pickup but one for bigger tires. Has a screwdriver handle. NAPA or one of the other parts houses should carry them. I got mine from work. I got tired of trying to use needlenose pliers.

Dremel..........one of mans great inventions.......a few years back the wife told me her parents wanted to know what i wanted for Christmas.....surprised me cause her mom doesnt like me.....i asked how much are they looking to spend....she says doesnt really matter to them so i pointed out a good sized Dremel kit....the wife asked me why in the hell i wanted that, i said they are handy.....she just shook her head thinking i was nuts asking for that lil dinky thing instead of some bigger power tool.....first time we needed it(few weeks after Christmas)i broke it out and used it....used it on a few more projects and the wife said "i had no clue it would do all that"............its prolly the most used power tool in our house........

x2. I'm sure Dremel. Inc. have been getting feedback like this since they began back in the 1930's. And if you find you wear the thing out and need something more industrial, there's always Foredom. More tools = more fun!

Stuart

i made one like stuart years ago when i was fooling with those fine british rifles, 'cept i did it the hard way with hacksaw and tiny flat file ...

Kind of like the Weaver base tool I made out of a large flathead screwdriver, hacksaw and a file.

Yes, it's amazing the stuff we can come up with to avoid paying commercial prices! (And sometimes they even work as well as the commercial stuff.)

Stuart