I just bought a 1903 Springfield. Serial number 6280xx. Barrel is dated 2-42 so I'm sure it has been shot many, many times. Do I hang it on the wall or use it for low pressure cast loads?
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I just bought a 1903 Springfield. Serial number 6280xx. Barrel is dated 2-42 so I'm sure it has been shot many, many times. Do I hang it on the wall or use it for low pressure cast loads?
If your looking for votes you will likely get about an even split. I will start with a Hang vote. I see no good reason to take such a high stakes gamble.
I agree with Bullshop. Just because you can shoot it doesn't mean you should.
i'd hang it, no point in being that 1 in a million blow up!
It's the receiver that is in question, not the barrel. There are still lots of safe shooting 19O3s, why chance it.
What are your eyes and fingers worth ?
Every time you pull the trigger you will have to ask yourself " Am I feeling lucky !!".
Trade it for a Spanish 1916 or a FR-7.....:kidding:
I would shoot it with low pressure cast loads.
One of my friends cousins when I was a teenager was mortally wounded by a low number 03 that let go. It had been sportered and he was using factory soft point ammo. Some things are better left as wall hangers...reheatreated or not !.
My understanding is that these low numbers are supposedly safe with issue ammo but the least little thing that causes overpressure can make them shatter..... but I have understood receivers even cracking and shattering by rough handling due to their brittle nature from bad heat treating .
If 2-42 barrel is good and rest of parts are good. Nice A-3 receivers can be had for a buck and a half and away you go.
Over the years I shot numerous LSN 'o3s, especially with cast bullet loads. I don't own one (my two '03 actions are DHT and the '03A3 is better yet) but if I did and it had a new barrel on it such as the mentioned "2-42" and a LSN'd receiver made in 1916 I would probably shoot "low pressured cast loads" through it. That's my choice. I have read Hatcher's book numerous times. I also read a lot of the recommendations for shooting such he and the NRA made in the American Rifleman when the LSN '03 were used a lot and sold through DCM in the '40s, '50s and '60s.
Larry Gibson
I'd shoot it with cast in a heartbeat. Can't think of a more suitable platform.
The thinking that low pressure loads would be ok can be very dangerous here if that is indeed an early poorly heat treated receiver, the metal is brittle and prone to cracking not just weak tensile strength -big difference there! That thing would not only be brittle but it would be old and brittle and undoubtedly subjected to many pressure cycles in the past from the rounds it has fired, who wants to bet his safety on the next round not being the one that turns out to be one too many? In a poorly heat treated and brittle condition even low pressure loads could be dangerous because it's shock as much or more so than high pressure that can cause brittle micro-cracked metal to fail and without testing (ultrasonic for example) there is just no way of knowing for sure but one thing is for certain, that receiver is too darn close to a person's face to take a chance!
The big question is do you like wall hangers? I don't know if I would shoot yours, but I know I shoot every gun I own at least a little bit. I would find an accurate, mild, slow cast load to take it out occasionally and keep it for the history.
.32 caliber round ball and 2.0g of bullseye. Let the kids have a ball! Cheaper than .22's and I've seen more than one that shoot pretty darn good with that load at 15-25 yards.
I think I'll just sell it and let somebody else make the decision on what to do with it.
I to vote for hang it on the wall and admire it for what it is, what it has done in its long and esteemed life and be satisfied. I would probably look at it and wonder about the young soldier who was first issued that rifle and whatever became of him, but that is just how I think.
Well it is your choice but if it has been shot enough to have a WW II rebarrel the action has been well tested. I'd shoot it with cast loads and never worry.
Jerry Liles
Guy I bought my present house from had an attic stored Rock Island 1903 low number. Covered in rust from being stored in the attic, had some funky welding done on it and generally looked a mess. Checked the serial number and it was around the 200,000 series. pretty sure the good ones were over 250,000. Correct me if I'm wrong. He said I'll give you a good deal only $500. Tried to tell him about low numbered 1903's but was like talking to the wall. When I had my 89.00 A3 rebarreled and sporting sights installed and blued I didn't cut the barrel. Took it out of its fajen stock stuck it in a C stock and shot it for quite awhile. Looking to get a really nice set of origional sights for it and try cast boolits. Funny thing is that I never had it drilled and tapped for scope mounts. I found a partially bent and scalloped bolt for my A3. Gunsmith set the headspace so that either bolt will not take the go guage. Turns out the spare bolt is actually for the A4 sniper rifle and probably worth more than the rifle itself. Go figure. Frank
Hatcher wrote of an accident where two boys fired three rounds of .35 Remington through a 7.7 Jap rifle, the receiver blown to shards on the third shot, so any action may be destroyed if put to enough abuse.
The low number receiver failures with known causes would have likely destroyed any action but in less spectacular manner.
Some were due to a very bad lot of WW1 manufacture ammo with soft caseheads the case head splitting and venting more gas than the tiny vents could handle, probably why the USMC bored "Hatcher Holes" in their low number receivers.
Others were due to a very bad lot of barrels provided by a subcontractor. The breech had been over heated in the bumping up process, something that was discovered in some early P-14 and M1917 barrels as well. When barrels crack at the breech they can split any receiver.
I think the defective barrels were replaced, but a few might still be out there.
The receiver failure that disturbed me was the shattering of a LN when a low pressure Guard cartridge was fired. Hatcher seemed to believe that in this case it was a mechanical blow to the bolt because the case did not expand enough to grasp the chamber walls. That resulted in a sharp blow as from a hammer. All the pieces remained in place with nothing blown out by gas escape.
If someone was killed by a blown up LN 1903 its never made it into print that I know of, but that does not mean it didn't happen.
Some will still claim that no Lee Enfield action ever failed except when using handloads but I was able to find dozens of failures documented by the Canadian House of Commons. I found one fatality in Canada and another in the U S. Published accounts of all those incidents were sketchy. People don't like having a dead relatives name tossed around, and if theres a lawsuit records are often sealed by the court.
Around here no matter what the cause of a firearms accident the only thing the public is likely to find out is the alcohol content of the victim's blood.
Even if I were willing to fire a LN 03 , with Hatcher Hole of course, I would not want one left in my estate for my heirs to possibly end up being hurt by.
The LN rifles should probably be converted to Drill rifles as so many were, or deactivated and used as museum displays.
"Well tested" is a good way to get oneself dead with that potentially suicidal rifle. The steel of low number "lethal threes" is about par with that of the 30 40 krags. And using a milspec 30-06 loading in a krag would not be healthy or warranted. So imagine that same steel and being poorly heat treated with such a load...playing with fire.
You're exactly right and "well tested" stated another way would be "well fatigued"! Just because it has fired a few thousand rounds is no proof what-so-ever that the next one would not be the one to ring the bell! Post no.21 above yours gives an example of what I said earlier about how even a low pressure load could cause a brittle receiver to come apart, it's an error to assume that a lower pressure round is going to make one of these things safe to shoot because a brittle micro-cracked receiver could easily fail with a reduced pressure load depending on the circumstances at the time.
I stand by my statement. With cast bullet loads the rifle will be safe. Since this rifle was rebarreled in '42 I suspect it was used by the Marines (see if it has a Hatcher hole in the right side of the receiver ring) and it likely has been fired a lot with full pressure military ball, possibly even saw combat and it is still intact. As for metal fatigue its wear to the moving parts not metal fatigue that puts a rifle out of commission. Steel stressed below a certain level has an unlimited fatigue life. You don't get this kind of controversy about using cast in a Krag, a much weaker action also often with over heat treated steel or any one of a number of other rifles including early Model 70 Winchesters (overheat treated and brittle with coned breech and poor gas handling). If you are that concerned about it sell it to me. I'd love to have one for cast shooting. Still I can understand and respect a decision not to shoot such a rifle.
Jerry Liles
Very true BUT metal fatigue does not usually become apparent until the rifle "lets go". The fact is these rifles have a long history of failures and while I agree too that the likelihood of such a catastrophic failure is slim one must ask "is it worth the risk just to shoot that particular rifle"? While I understand that yes it just might be worth it to some folks and they are willing to take a chance is it really a good idea to downplay the risks and encourage someone else to do it?
Of course really low pressure plinking loads in all probability would not hurt a thing as long as they were indeed very low pressure rounds, I guess it would depend a lot on a person's definition of low pressure for that particular rifle, considering the consequences of erring on the wrong side of this debate I have to ask again "is it really worth the risk"? .
Yes, the sky is falling and we must tell the king......and now I am really confused............
How many years old does a rifle or handgun have to be before "metal fatigue" sets in? Is it based on round count, number of barrels, how many times the bolt was cycled or years old? If I buy a used M98 Mauser how do I know if it "fatigued"? If 10,000 rounds are shot in a rifle/handgun over 10 years is that rifle/handgun then "safer" than if those 10,000 rounds were fired in a year? Should I hang up my M884 TD and not shoot service level BP loads any more in it because it is old and "fatigued" because I've no idea how many rounds were shot out of it before I got it? Is my M1A match rifle "fatigued" because it is on it's 3rd barrel?
If the service technicians at Ruger, Winchester, Colt, S&W, Remington and Savage would only write books about how many of their rifles/handguns they've gotten back blown up I'd bet several models would be much more documented than LSN'd '03s. As I recall in the last 15 - 20 years I've been on gun forums on the internet I've seen all sorts of actions of every make destroyed by SEE, overloads but mostly bore obstructions. All the pictures of those destroyed actions were as bad or worse than anything pictured in Hatchers Notebook. Come to think of it I've not seen a "long history of failures" of LSN'd '03s in the same last 15 or so years.......
I'm not advocating anything but this sure has scared the c**p out of me......think I'll give up this "risky" shooting business and take up golf......no wait. I've read about more golfers killed wrecking those golf carts than I've read about blown up LSN'd '03s in the last 15 years. Oh what to do........
Larry Gibson
I was going to make a crack about having a round-counting chip installed, but some nutty Dem might see it and run with it ...
After seeing how easily some receivers were shattered into several pieces by rapping the rails with a mallet in tests done by Parker Ackley I just would never be able to shoot one. I mean I would never be able to hit anything because my mind would be on those pictures of shattered receivers and not on aiming and squeezing.
I have always tried to recognize potential danger and remove myself from it. When I walk under a big tree I look up it for hidden danger. When I walk into a large building I look up to see what is over my head so I know what to do if things start falling. I am a cautious person by nature. To me the reward in using such a rifle is not worth the risk no matter how slight.
Perhaps if it were the only rifle I had or could get I might use it with greatly reduced loads but that is far from the case for me and I will guess for most members here.
The issue is about fatigue in a rifle of already questionable integrity due to improper heat treating not a normal rifle that that has no known issues. In this case if the rifle is indeed one of the many produced with improper heat treating then it has been fortunate enough to survive despite it's known weakness, as most (but not all!) have, but to continue firing this rifle is tempting fate IF it is indeed one of the poorly built examples. Fatigue, while not a concern normally, in this case could be a real concern but that does not have anything to do with a properly built rifle that does not suffer from the known deficiencies that exist with these firearms due to the improper heat treating. Weak and brittle receivers on these rifles is a well known fact and documented accidents have happened in the past, considering the past record I would hardly say that a warning about the shortcomings of these rifles (NOT all rifles) is a case of crying the sky is falling.
So, I'm still confused; Is it "fatigue" or is it "questionable integrity due to improper heat treating not a normal rifle that that has no known issues" or is it "tempting fate"?
The one thing I learned from the mallet test was "don't smack the receiver with a mallet."
Again, don't get me wrong. I am not advocating anything. I would just like something more concrete than the above. I know of many LSN '03s that are still in use. I know of no deaths or serious injuries from a LSN '03 action for no reason other than letting go just because of the "fatigue, heat treatment or fate" in the last 25+ years. If you have an SEE, an over load or a bore obstruction the damage will be catastrophic regardless of the action used. We have seen too many other actions catastrophically destroyed posted on forums in the last 20 years to believe other wise.
Well maybe I am advocating something; how's about you all sending me all your LSN'd '03s so you won't tempt fate.....I'll pay the shipping.........then I'd have one!
Larry Gibson
I believe the mallet test broke the receiver rails, not the receiver rings. Most of the rings that let go that I'm aware of were due to defective cartridges, blockages, or suspect practices such as greasing bullets that increased chamber pressure. The real problem with the '03 is how much cartridge head hangs unsupported outside the chamber. When that lets go it can be a mess. But that's also how the highly regarded Mod 70 is breeched as is the M17 Enfield. Incidentally early Mod 70s are also brittle and can fail the mallet test. Still the low numbers are suspect and I can't fault someone for being cautious. I still believe they are perfectly safe for cast bullet loads.
Jerry Liles
The LSN action failures are not myth, they have happened in sufficient numbers to cause major concerns even "back in the day" so there's no doubt about the potential for failure. As far as "fatigue" or "questionable integrity due to improper heat treating" it's not a question of one or the other, in this case it's both. The potential for failure in these LSN receivers is well known and the fact one may have been fired several thousand times without incident is not necessarily proof that it's safe, rather the fatigue from that wear could easily be a contributing factor to failure of an otherwise already compromised receiver. Maybe you think these old LSN receivers are safe but documented failures along with the known facts surrounding the improper heat treating makes a LOT of others think otherwise.
The warnings about these poorly treated receivers have come from many sources for a long time it's pretty well documented and not just "an old wives tale"!
From the Civilian Marksmanship Program,
*WARNING ON “LOW-NUMBER” SPRINGFIELDS
M1903 rifles made before February 1918 utilized receivers and bolts which were single heat-treated by a method that rendered some of them brittle and liable to fracture when fired, exposing the shooter to a risk of serious injury. It proved impossible to determine, without destructive testing, which receivers and bolts were so affected and therefore potentially dangerous.
To solve this problem, the Ordnance Department commenced double heat treatment of receivers and bolts. This was commenced at Springfield Armory at approximately serial number 800,000, and at Rock Island Arsenal at exactly serial number 285,507. All Springfields made after this change are commonly called “high number” rifles. Those Springfields made before this change are commonly called “low-number” rifles.
In view of the safety risk the Ordnance Department withdrew from active service all “low-number” Springfields. During WWII, however, the urgent need for rifles resulted in the rebuilding and reissuing of many “low-number” as well as “high-number” Springfields. The bolts from such rifles were often mixed during rebuilding, and did not necessarily remain with the original receiver.
Generally speaking, “low number” bolts can be distinguished from “high-number” bolts by the angle at which the bolt handle is bent down. All “low number” bolts have the bolt handle bent straight down, perpendicular to the axis of the bolt body. High number bolts have “swept-back” (or slightly rearward curved) bolt handles.
A few straight-bent bolts are of the double heat-treat type, but these are not easily identified, and until positively proved otherwise ANY straight-bent bolt should be assumed to be “low number”. All original swept-back bolts are definitely “high number”. In addition, any bolt marked “N.S.” (for nickel steel) can be safely regarded as “high number” if obtained directly from CMP (beware of re-marked fakes).
CMP DOES NOT RECOMMEND FIRING ANY SPRINGFIELD RIFLE WITH A ”LOW NUMBER” RECEIVER. Such rifles should be regarded as collector’s items, not “shooters”.
CMP ALSO DOES NOT RECOMMEND FIRING ANY SPRINGFIELD RIFLE, REGARDLESS OF SERIAL NUMBER, WITH A SINGLE HEAT-TREATed “LOW NUMBER” BOLT. SUCH BOLTS, WHILE HISTORICALLY CORRECT FOR DISPLAY WITH A RIFLE OF WWI OR EARLIER VINTAGE, MAY BE DANGEROUS TO USE FOR SHOOTING.
THE UNITED STATES ARMY GENERALLY DID NOT SERIALIZE BOLTS. DO NOT RELY ON ANY SERIAL NUMBER APPEARING ON A BOLT TO DETERMINE WHETHER SUCH BOLT IS “HIGH NUMBER” OR “LOW NUMBER”.
Some interesting info on the bolts there but that line,
"CMP DOES NOT RECOMMEND FIRING ANY SPRINGFIELD RIFLE WITH A ”LOW NUMBER” RECEIVER. Such rifles should be regarded as collector’s items, not “shooters”.
makes it plain what their stand on the issue is! Like I said earlier this is a real safety concern and NOT just an "old wives tale"! Considering the consequences of what could happen if a person chooses to ignore these warnings is it really worth the risk just to shoot a rifle?
Well From what Hatcher and others wrote not all the Low Number receivers were bad, but there was no "non destructive" method of weeding out the bad ones, all those that failed so spectacularly had been proofed at 70,000 CUP so pressure alone was unlikely to be the culprit in the failures.
I'm not a machinist but I've drilled enough holes that I can judge by the feel, and the sound, whether core steel is brittle. I'm fairly sure any USMC armorer boring the hatcher hole would have been able to judge whether the core metal of the receiver ring was brittle.
As for the Krag, while made with old school methods these had no record of blowing up, but some suffered fractures or setback when they tried to up the FPS of the service Ball cartridge increasing the chamber pressure. The bolt was more likely to be damaged rather than the receiver.
Some European Krags also suffered fractures, though this was mostly put down to a sharply machined corner without the proper radius, some FN Mauser bolts fractured one leg of the split left hand lug for the same reason.
Some Lee Metford and LE rifles suffered broken bolts due to defective ammunnition, and some action bodies cracked as well. As metalurgy improved incidents became uncommon.
Till someone puts the effort into devising a reliable non destructive method of determining if an LN 1903 receiver is brittle the question will never go away.
I'm pretty sure that such a method already exists , its just never been applied to antique fire arms as of yet.
I shoot mine. There are only 11,231 springfields with lower serial numbers. I neither advise nor encourage anyone to do the same. I feel "if you need to ask then don't."
Tie it to a tire pointing downrange and fire a magazine full thru it'
It its still ok, then shoot cast loads thru it and enjoy shooting it.
That's my story.
what numbers are considered low? i know some of the eary receivers fail with higher pressures, just not sure where the safe serials start?
oops, i see it in the great link posted by MTech. thanks!
Thanks for the information guys! I learned a thing or two today!
Better not shoot Krags either, same steel and HT process. By the way does anyone know how many failures there were?