Questions About Restoring a Lee Enfield

[PPCLI Guy]

My father in law left my wife a rifle when he passed away, and I am now in the process of restoring it - and have no experience with this whatsoever, so I have a few questions. 

The markings on the rifle say that it is a No4 MK1 ROF (F)F T A 1943 AK 2580.

My father in law appears to have stripped the finish off of parts of the stock etc, and then painted the whole thing with a high gloss lead based brown paint.  I have stripped all of that off of the wood "furniture".  What do I finish the wood with?  The paint is all over the rifle, and it is clear that removing it will remove some of the original blueing.  How do I re-blue, and with what product?

Thanks in advance,

Dave

 

[Farmboy]

  Dave

You will find quite a few more knowledgable people about this sort of thing on CanadianGunNutz.com that can help you out with this.  ;D

There is a military surplus and a gumsmithing forum that would both be good.

Darren

 

[Jay4th]

Dave, alot of double boiled linseed oil and very fine sandpaper in your future.  See you on www.canadiangunnutz.com.  I have restored a few No 4's you will enjoy it labour and all.

It sounds strange but start off cleaning the wood with oven cleaner to remove 60 years of grease....

 

[PPCLI Guy]

Dave, alot of double boiled linseed oil and very fine sandpaper in your future.  See you on www.canadiangunnutz.com.  I have restored a few No 4's you will enjoy it labour and all.

It sounds strange but start off cleaning the wood with oven cleaner to remove 60 years of grease....

Hmm - so the 80 grit I used was a bad start?  I think this will be a long term project.  We work in the same neighbourhood  so perhaps I will lean on you for some advice along the way.

 

[TCBF]

Royal Ordnance Factory Fazakerly

FTR is "Factory Through Repair", I don't know about FTA. I can't find it in Skennerton.

Starting in Feb 44, ROF (F)  also made the .303 jungle carbines.

http://www.9mmlargo.com/enfaq.pdf#search=%22rof%20fazakerly%22

The above link is one of many good ones.

http://www.telusplanet.net/public/philqgbr/enfields.html

http://www.geocities.com/smlemk3/mkI.html

http://www.jouster.com/cgi-bin/lee-enfield/lee-enfield.pl?noframes;#16970

http://www.tommyatkinsonbooks.com/Porter's%20Book/pb1.htm

And this, from a retired "Wpns Tech Air":
http://www3.sympatico.ca/shooters/303Page.htm

Enjoy!

 

[KevinB]

I was going to suggest asking Jay since he is down the hall...