This oldie crossed my radar awhile back and was hard to pass up since I'm a devout .405 fan. Doubt there's many of these around, how many bolt guns have any of you seen chambered for .405 Winchester ?

Checkering is flawless,bluing is beyond excellent however with the 26 " bbl & large action its a tad hefty !

Lots of history goes with the MK 14 action in its military or sporting config , think I'll hang on to this prize !

A rare and desirable find indeed. Good thing I didn't see it first! I'll be looking forward to your range report! Beautiful rifle

Grand Old Rifle.

I would have snatched it up too. But I would love to get one in original style with the original sights and the deep belly stock. It would end up a 0.458" shouldered 400 Whelen. Lots of fun there. Load to 405 or a little bit better. Use hawk 400 gr Rn with .050 jackets for the bigger stuff. 235 gr FP with .025 jacket for small stuff. Fun to dream about. I haven't seen a '14 or '17 when I had some money or even trading material. Another fun dream. Be Well, Rustyzipper.

Having owned a 7-1/2 pound Belgian double rifle in .405 Winchester, I think you'll find that the heft you describe adds substantially to the pleasure of shooting the rifle. The one I owned hurt, even with a recoil pad. 300 grains at 2250 is nothing to sneeze at.

When last heard from, that rifle was keeping a salmon fishing guide company in Alaska. Apparently some of the furrier fishermen up there object to sharing a stream and need to be reminded of their manners.

It is a tad hefty but only a half # heavier than my TR 1895 chambered in .405.. A glass topper will add more but recoil has never been an issue for me, one just needs to pace themselves because it will bite you later if you get too carried away !

Very nice. I have a 30 Express in 30 Remington, a buddy has one in 35 Remington. They definitely have a cool factor about them.

Don't want to rain on anyone's parade but I don't think Remington ever chambered the 30 Express for 405. I am FAR from a Remington expert. Either way that would be a great combo.

They didn't. As per the OP, it's a custom.

Cock on the closing?
Didn’t they go to cock on the opening with the 721/722 series?
Wonderful old rifle! I really like the stock egros...........

They were built after WW1 from "leftover" US M1917 pieces/parts. Never heard of an MK 14 action.

Thats not a 721/722. Not even close. Its a rifle made from leftover WWI rifle parts from M1917's. It also not a "MK14" either, as the op suggested, no such animal. Basically a factory sporterized m1917 that remington worked over way back in the day. Think 1926-1940. However, this rifle is custom. It's a very nicely done custom with its custom barrel and stock with very nice bluing. Whoever put it together did some nice work. It looks like it still has its military trigger. I'd install a Timney and then check the ejector and make sure it's an upgraded coil spring ejector. If not, it's going to break on you when you least expect it. Its inevitable. Cock on closing or cock on open makes no difference to me. They are both just fine, but cock on close may be a little weird for some guys to get used to.

They went to the cock on opening somewhere in the mid 30 s. Mine had the factory trigger, went with a Timney, big improvement .

Pattern 14 not Mk 14 is what I was referencing ..

nice rifle, i have a real nice 30 Express too ,i had mine rebarreled to a 257 Roberts.

Sweet find FlyboyFlem!

Correct. Pattern 14 and I'll submit NOT a 1917 if for one other reason the P-14s were in 303 British (a rimmed cartridge as in the 405) and the 17s were in 3006, meaning an entirely different feed rails, follower configuration.

That was my original thought after extensive research on the Brit chambered 303 action vs the 17,,The empire had to enlist US companies to fill their void so Winchester,Remington and Eddystone picked up the slack producing the Pattern 14 { MK-1 W}...{MK-1 R} &{ MK-1 E}.variants...All tooling for US companies was owned and provided for by the Brits..

I believe that the US government purchased the tooling from England when the US entered the war and needed more rifle. The US companies would probably have kept the tooling that made the Pattern 14 303 caliber specific parts, after things were converted to the M1917 30-06 model. The 405 Winchester and the 303 British have basically the same rim diameter, so it was probably not to difficult to modify a P14 action to 405 Winchester.

I agree, the Brit loan of tooling was actually for production between wars from the info I've gathered..good point

May have used a P14 bolt in the 1917 ?

Very possible I guess with the headspace addressed, however as jorge pointed out the different case dimension issues would make me think otherwise with regards to proper feeding alignment.

Only had a vintage Var-X-11 3x9x40 AO laying around so mounted it up for some load testing.. 300 gr TSX over 61 grs of 4895 produced a 5 shot string avg of 2429 from the 26" bbl...This is pushing it a tad according to the books but miked cases show no

excessive pressure,extraction was easy and case growth was zero..These actions are good to 70,000 so doubt I was even close..More fun to come on targets later with a decent WX window.

.

Great find!!

That is the coolest custom rifle I have seen in a long time. Supposedly Remington made a few 30 Express in 7X57MM, but Im probably wrong

Model 30 chamberings:

25 Remington
30 "
32 "
35 "
257 Roberts
7x57
30-06

A "cousin" of the Model 30:

http://www.nramuseum.org/guns/the-g...ington-model-720a-bolt-action-rifle.aspx

Awesome rifle! You couldn't wear that out in 20 lifetimes.

My Remington 30 Express in 30-06 had the same receiver as my Mod 1917 Enfield in 416 Rigby. We did use a P14 bolt. My Enfield did not have the ears or duckpond. As near as we could search mine was never built into a rifle until I had it built.
Pictures: http://www.sdplains.com/~chico/EyeCandy/content/index_4.html Mine is the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th photo.

Man that is a super cool rifle very nicely done I love it nice find congrats!