Need help identifying a rifle.

[Wayne Smith]

SIL has a original bring back in good shape, it shoots great. You do have to find out what chamber it has, many were modded. Official modded have the ground off chys. but who knows. IIRC some will take 303 ammo which is more available than 7.7 jap stuff. Don't know what wood they used but much lighter than a garand.

Ground off chry. is no indication of anything but a rifle picked up/turned in after the surrender. All such rifles had the mum ground off. As issued and captured during the war and brought back can have the mum intact.

[Multigunner]

Some last ditch 7.7 rifles used a older type 38 6.5 receiver with a 99 type bolt. Don't know if there's anything special done to make the bolts fit.

I'd just clean it up, make sure its safe and leave it as is as a family heirloom. It could also be a good game getter within its limitations and perhaps a loaner for a hunting party.

[abunaitoo]

Arisaka that someone has sporterized.
To bad.
It is a last ditch.
Flat bolt safety, soup can bolt knob, fixed rear sight.
Looks like someone tried to bend the handle down.
Stock cut.
Looks like it has a wood butt plate.
If so, very late war last ditch.
Probably didn't have the Mum on the reciver.
If it were still original, would have made a desirable collectable.

[3006guns]

Some of the type 99's were built by using type38 parts

No, they weren't. The type 99 is a completely different rifle, although the design is quite similar. It was designed as a replacement for the type 38, using a larger bullet (7.7mm) as a result of the Japanese experiences in their China campaign (invasion). The 99 is designed for more rapid production, just like our 1903A3. The OP's rifle is a very late war example, with the wooden buttplate, oversize recoil bolt and simplified parts. The type 99 is a good, strong rifle.........even the last ones, despite their appearance.

The Jap rifles are unusual in that metallurgical examinations revealed that each part has a SEPARATE heat treatment, in order to do its job. This was discovered by the H.P. White Laboratories at the request of Parker Ackley after he found it almost impossible to blow one up with his hot wildcat loads back in the fifties. White Labs commented that the heat treatment was advanced, almost elaborate, and was consistent from gun to gun. In other words, the Japanese designed an improved, simplified Mauser using the best materials and production techniques. The unfair reputation of these guns came from the strong anti Japanese sentiments following Pearl Harbor, when the whole race was condemned as "weak eyed, buck toothed toy makers...unable to create anything original. They can only copy other things.....and poorly." I'm paraphrasing a bit, but that was the description I read in an article written by a gun "expert" at the beginning of WWII. He was wrong. Flat out wrong.

Note: The bolts of the type 38 and 99 are NOT interchangeable. The bolt lugs on the type 38 are slightly deeper, so it's possible to install a type 99 bolt in a type 38 rifle, but the result is dangerous as it leaves the bolt head unsupported...excessive headspace.

[Multigunner]

"Note: The bolts of the type 38 and 99 are NOT interchangeable. The bolt lugs on the type 38 are slightly deeper, so it's possible to install a type 99 bolt in a type 38 rifle, but the result is dangerous as it leaves the bolt head unsupported...excessive headspace. "

All I remember reguarding this was photos in a reference book showing a 7.7 last ditch rifle described as being made using a salvaged earlier type Calvary carbine receiver with new rifle length barrel in 7.7 mm and bolt more like that of the type 99.
Probably a purpose made bolt.
It could have been a one off tool room prototype I suppose.
I've found that the 6.5 type 44 calvary carbine which used a Type 38 action was subject of attempts to rebarrel it to 7.7 late in the war but the project was dropped because the very short and light carbines kicked too much.
A few worn Type 44 Carbines may have been converted to last ditch rifles using bolts with Type 38 lugs but with the roughly made skinny bolt handles with small cylindrical knob found on some last ditch rifles.

PS
I suspect a few of the smooth bore training rifles intended for use with blanks may have blown out their two piece pipe stock barrels if fired with live ammo.
The blank firing trainer I had years ago was given to me by a relative who said he had fired it using live ammo but couldn't hit any thing. He had not known it was a training rifle at the time.

The Japanese did copy weapons designed in Europe and in the USA. Their main flex mounted aerial guns were copies of the US designed Lewis gun. They chose the beefed up .30-06 version to copy but chambered it for a 7.7mm cartridge interchangeable with the .303 British.
Most if not all their aircraft MGs were copies of western designs.
They also built some pretty weird machineguns that were hopper fed or used stacks of rifle clips in a complicated feed mechanism.
For the most part their domestic firearms designs were overly complicated and not well thought out.

[Earlwb]

Well, the Arisaka rifles are great donor rifles where you can use the action to make some other caliber rifle out of them. I did get several of the rifles, in fair condition to convert myself. I converted one to 22-250 Ackley Improved and it has turned out to be a tack driver. On a good day I can put ten rounds into one small hole at 100 yards. So if you have a rifle that isn't much for collector value then by all means customize it, or sporterize it. Anyway, way back after WWII the Arisakas did not have any value to them, so the guns were sporterized and used for hunting. After the war there wasn't much in the way to buy as to hunting rifles. So people used what they had.

[Stephen Cohen]

I haven't seen one since I was a kid, but it sure reminds me of a WWII Japanese Ariska.

If it has a small chrysanthemum flower stamped on it, that would about confirm it.

If it is, don't expect to win very many benchrest competitions with it.
They cost about $2. to produce.

My grandad had one his brother captured on the Kakoda trail, it was used by a Jap sniper that took a heavy tool of our boys, I remember it had a couple dozen notches on it and the shark skin bag of cartridges that the Jap hung over his shoulder while sitting in a tree hide. It was many years after the war before my Grandad could bring himself to shoot it along side his 303 Lee Enfield Range rifle and found it to be extremely accurate. I inherited it on Gran dads death and some slime bag stole it before I could fire it, perhaps the Japs like the Brits hand picked their sniper rifles. They are an ugly rifle no doubt. Regards Stephen

[Arisaka99]

Ground off chry. is no indication of anything but a rifle picked up/turned in after the surrender. All such rifles had the mum ground off. As issued and captured during the war and brought back can have the mum intact.

To expound on Wayne's comment,

My Type 99 still has the mum, but was sporterized and reamed for 30-06. I'll see if I can rustle up a picture of it.

Like your friend's, mine was a family heirloom and Wayne had it fitted for a Lyman receiver sight and helped me refinish the stock and learn to load for it.