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Maineboy
05-06-2005, 07:57 PM
I have two CMP purchases, a Springfield 1903 and a Remington 03A3. I believe just about all of the '03s they have for sale are WWII rebuilds. My question is; how many companies supplied barrels to the government for these rebuilds? My 03 is marked HS and I assume that's High Standard. My 03A3 barrel is marked SC which I take to be Smith Corona. Both are 4 grooved. Did anyone besides Remington make 2 groove barrels?

Char-Gar
05-06-2005, 09:28 PM
High Standard was making replacement 03 barrels for the goverment and received the contract to make 03A3s. Lacking everything it needed to do the job, High Standard brought SMith Corona into the picture. High Standard continued to make the barrels even though they were marked SC. All things being equal ,these are the highest quality barrels. I have not checked the sources, but I am unaware of any 2 groove barrels made by anybody but Remington.

Bob S
05-07-2005, 12:05 AM
A very few two-groove barrels marked SC have surfaced in the past several years. Since it is known that High Standard was rifling with the broach method (vs "cut" rifling), they continued making 4-groove barrels, both for SC assembly and as spare barrels, for both the 03 and 03A3. It is theorized that Smith-Corona had a small number of barrels made by Savage, who was already making two-groove barrels for the Savage/Enfield No. 4 rifle. All of this is conjecture ....

High Standard, Johnson Automatics, and Springfield Armory made large numbers of "spare" M1903 barrels under Army contract through late 1944. Sedgely made spare barrels for both the Army and Marine Corps.

The lion's share of spare 03A3 barrels were made by Remington, who had a "spares" contract long after production and assembly of rifles was terminated in February, 1944.

Resp'y,
Bob S.

swheeler
05-13-2005, 06:02 PM
Bob S: that is interesting, I was under the impression that they were all broach cut rifled as opposed to single point cut.
Scooter

fourarmed
05-13-2005, 08:46 PM
I have a Remington 1917 with a Johnson Automatics 2-groove on it. It was rebuilt at San Antonio Arsenal.