Thread: .303s

I have received these .303s as part of an estate. I have a couple of my own sporterised ones but know very little about them.

Anyone have much knowledge on the three below? Fairly common models? Any value?

Any info would be much appreciated!

if youve got matching bolts you have recieved a small fortune.... look on trademe.. even an old dunger fetches $5-600 and something tidy like what you have will be 3 times that. I THINK you have a mk 1 lomg tom mk3 and mk 4 but without seeing markings on wrist Im going on little I know..others on here will know for sure..some will possibly even offer to purchase.

Originally Posted by Micky Duck

if youve got matching bolts you have recieved a small fortune.... look on trademe.. even an old dunger fetches $5-600 and something tidy like what you have will be 3 times that. I THINK you have a mk 1 lomg tom mk3 and mk 4 but without seeing markings on wrist Im going on little I know..others on here will know for sure..some will possibly even offer to purchase.

The two bottom rifles have matching bolts but the other appears to potentially be miss matching.

Cheers

You really need to take a close up photo of the wrists and side of the receivers if you want more detailed info for each.

The SMLE in the middle has the rear sight protector wings on backwards. Judging from the green parkerised finish, its probably a Lithgow.

Can't tell much about the No4Mk2 on the right.

Left hand rifle




Middle rifle




Right hand rifle

Looks like the No4Mk2 is missing the ejector screw.
But the rest of looks like a typical FTR gun that has been kept well by its owner.

Pricing is hard to do via photos. You can't see down the barrel.
I've tended to use the rule of 60% of what Guncity are asking for the same gun is what they tend to go for in private sales.

My last No 4 was the same, a Fazakerley 1956. Mine was tricked up by Fulton. My wood wasn't as good as yours.

I'd have thought they'd be worth at least $1000 each. The last long tom I bought was $1000 and it didn't lookas nice as that one. Does that one (top/left) have the lobbing sights on the left hand side of the rifle? A dial with a small arm down on the fore stock, and a slightly longer arm with a little aperture at the back near the stock socket?

Originally Posted by TLB

The two bottom rifles have matching bolts but the other appears to potentially be miss matching.

Cheers

I wouldn't be too concerned if it was missmatched, it wasn't uncommon for them to ship with a different serial on the bolt sometimes
My rifle has the serial out by only 5 on its bolt.

Originally Posted by Old_School

I wouldn't be too concerned if it was missmatched, it wasn't uncommon for them to ship with a different serial on the bolt sometimes
My rifle has the serial out by only 5 on its bolt.

Nope….they were never shipped with non matching bolts.

Originally Posted by omark

Nope….they were never shipped with non matching bolts.

I believe you are right Omark - mix up at a dealer somewhere maybe

If value is part of the information you are looking for, don't be misled by covid era high pricing, values are going back to where they were before 2019. ie No4's well under $1k.
Catalogue from last Teds auction and prices realised here;
https://www.wellingtonantiquearms.org.nz/auctions/

If the No4Mk2 is in good order without any barrel damage and it's in full military trim still, it's quite desirable for a service shoot class rifle. Having said that, the issue at the moment is we are now in registry country and who knows what the market is doing as a lot of potential buyers just won't at the moment due to the hassle factor.

The No1Mk3 is Aussie manufacture, but has been apart after it left the military so it would make me wonder what else has been reassembled weird or changed if the rearsight protector is snafu. Lesser value to the No4 here, more of them around.

The Long Lee is an interesting one, in this trim they are getting harder to get hold of and it could be the most valuable of the lot to the right buyer. For value to the right person, I'd say over the sales counter around $3k the lot some more than others on an individual value basis? I'd caution using prices from ED Rogers and Carvells as a true guideline for value, as some things are not cataloged correctly (yes even Ted misses obvious things) and they go for well above estimated prices and others which aren't rare or are bitsers get passed in well under what they set as reserve.

Originally Posted by omark

Nope….they were never shipped with non matching bolts.

Ok, I was reading a post on another forum that suggests it doesnt mean much at all.
My rifle has a 4 digit number, no letters in front at all like most appear to have, the number is the same on the barrel and action but the bolt ends with a different number to the rest, thats pretty close a number to the rest of the gun, its only out by 4. That seems a bit co incidental to get mixed up with a bolt that is still only the 4th rifle stamped after this one. Could likely have been shipped with a different bolt, if thats what the armourer installed.

https://www.gunboards.com/threads/ho...numbers.46535/
Quoted:
"They are of no consequence whatsoever. They were only put there because it was initially thought that components that required a certain amount of hand fitting might go missing when an armourer had a bench full of rifles to service.

When components were being cannabalised to repair rifles, so long as the bolts were lapped in and produced witness marks when blued, they were fit for service. I don't suppose for a minute that re-numbering was considered necessary at the time, although many SMLE backsights have as five different numbers on them as they were chopped and changed beteween rifles.

I think people are living in a fools paradise if they accept that a common numbered bolt is the one the rifle was originally built with.

We have several rare Enfields with non-matching bolt numbers. I get an little cross when people become rude about the fact. I do point out that the bolt fits, it is safe and the rifle passes headspace and probably the bolt was the one fitted by an armourer many years ago, so for all purposes, the bolt is the correct one."

In truth that's what we class as 'operationally correct' but in true military fashion that's not what was done. It's looked at from a civilian viewpoint rather than a military operational viewpoint, and for the squaddie on the dirt if he was discovered to be carting a rifle with a mismatched bolt he knew he was for it not mucking about. At section cleaning time when the bolts all needed to be pulled to clean their rifles, the only way to ensure the correct bits ended up in the correct place was via the numbers whacked into them. This was a safety requirement, and it still is unless you have certain types of firearm which each part is tolerance measured to the micron level and each part is literally interchangeable. If bolts weren't matching, the rifle was tagged possibly unsafe, set aside for amourer service inspection and the situation with the bolt numbers rectified ASAP (after the identified miscreant had his parentage, genetic flaws, poor life choices, freedom and future leave entitlement all 'sorted out'). In general use, bolts were not to be pulled from the firearm unless authorised by a senior to prevent this clusterfluck from happening - and at regiment level the rifles ran off 'Rack #' rather than serial - the serial was purely to keep the bits together.

It's only after military service that we confused this with the 'oh it's still all matching even though the numbers arent' BS.