Tag: Instructional Cutaway

Rifle No.4 Cutaway

We’ve looked at a few cutaways in the past, today we’re going to take a look at a Lee-Enfield Rifle No.4 cutaway.

One of the main drawbacks of the venerable SMLE was that it was expensive and time consuming to manufacture. The No.4 was an attempt to address this. It evolved from the experimental No.1 MkV and MkVI which were trialled in the early 1920s. The key mechanical change was that the barrel was free-floated and had a heavier profile to deal with expansion of the stock. The No.4 also had a new rear aperture sight mounted further back on the receiver giving a better sight picture and a longer sight radius.

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Close up of the Rifle No.4 Instructional Cutaway’s receiver (Matthew Moss)(Matthew Moss)

With this cutaway we get a look inside the butt trap, which has a pull-through and oil bottle inside, then as we move to the action we get a look at the rifle’s trigger, sear, sear spring and magazine catch.  If we look closely we can see the bolt head catch. The magazine has also been cutaway, with the magazine follower spring just visible.

This cutaway rifle has had all of the wood around its receiver removed, so we can see the magazine housing floor plate and the point where the retaining screw attaches to the trunnion. As we move along we get a look inside the chamber where the outline of the cartridge neck is easy to see and we can also see the barrel’s rifling too.

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Rifle No.4 Instructional Cutaway (Matthew Moss)

Down near the muzzle the rifle’s upper retaining band and the hand guard have been cutaway to show the barrel inside. The No.4 was adopted for service officially in November 1939 and just over 4 million were made during WW2. We’ll have a full, more in-depth video on the No.4 in the future.

Check out our earlier videos featuring cutaways including the Pattern 14 and the CETME AMELI.

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TAB Short: Pattern 14 Cutaway

During my recent research trip to the US I was lucky enough to handle and examine a lot of very interesting firearms. This short video is a bonus, while we were opening one of the cases at the Cody Firearms Museum to examine another firearm (that video is coming soon) I noticed a sectioned British Pattern 14 rifle, made by Winchester for the British government during the First World War. It was too good an opportunity to pass up so I filmed this quick video taking a look at the P14’s internals.

The P14 would go on to be the basis of the US M1917 rifle built by Winchester, Remington and Eddystone.

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Cutaway of a Winchester-made Pattern 14, note the rear volley sight and sectioned magazine and chamber (Matthew Moss)

The cutaway shows the internals of the rifle’s actions as well as the barrel, chamber and magazine. It was cool to see a cutaway of the P14 up close and I couldn’t resist grabbing some footage.

My thanks to the Cody Firearms Museum, at the Buffalo Bill Center of the West, for allowing me access to their collection. You can find out more about the CFM here.