1869 3 band Snider mark 3 rifle

[Huttles94]

does the latch work ? as they tend to stick and can be a pain to free up.
i have 3 x snider mk 3 and they are easy to work on.
when you get the breech off stick your finger in the chamber and check for rust as you tend to find it at the 12 oclock position......hard to remove lol...but possible.
it needs doing as you might not be able to chamber the brass.....and if you dont fully remove rust the first time you fire a strong load to fireform the brass it will stick in the chamber and you have to whack the breech to open...dont ask how i know.

I have got it all in pieces. The latch on the breech does work, though the extractor is stuck.

As for rust.....well there is no way around it. The entire bore is covered in rust I cant get a photo but in the ones I do have you can see the breech has a lot of rust in it. I tried a snap cap and yes, it will not go in all the way. I have some cleaning equipment coming.

I have no idea how the bore will be once cleaned. Though, the breech trench which was equally rusty has cleaned up good so fingers crossed. Though I suspect the rifling will not have survived.

[loiner1965]

bung the muzzle up with a tight fitting bung ....stand upright in a bucket and fill from chamber with caustic soda mixed with warm water.....white vinegar is good but will take bluing off.....after a few days empty barrel and use a loose fitting brass cleaning bore brush with some strands off those pound shop stainless steel pan scubbers wrapped around and give it a good brushing.....then repeat with caustic soda etc.....

[Huttles94]

bung the muzzle up with a tight fitting bung ....stand upright in a bucket and fill from chamber with caustic soda mixed with warm water.....white vinegar is good but will take bluing off.....after a few days empty barrel and use a loose fitting brass cleaning bore brush with some strands off those pound shop stainless steel pan scubbers wrapped around and give it a good brushing.....then repeat with caustic soda etc.....

Aye thats sounds like a good idea. Ill do that then. I have the breech block and other bits soaking to help free them up.

Now I just have to look at getting the stock repaired. The break is rather simple and I might have a go myself.

Cheers

[Huttles94]

Someone has been asking about their snider on imgur. Here are the pictures: https://imgur.com/gallery/1jn3N

He says that it was brought back from Afghanistan. Looks real to me (or a very well made fake, I am no expert) but has been heavily polished and engraved which I think is typical of afgan guns. Was probably a captured British rifle.



Oh also, anyone know what the crown over x inspection marking is? I understand that a crown over E is the inspection marking at the Enfield factory but what does X mean?

[Huttles94]

I have just been looking at the photos of the butt plate. I can make out the number 70 (just), cant make out the number underneath it, looks like its starts with 8. And after a little digging, could the 70 mean the 70th (Surrey) Regiment of Foot? Or is the top number the rack number ect? Would be nice to know where it was issued.

[enfield2band]

Condition wise I think it looks good.
I got an Albini Brandaelin that looked like a piece of rusty tubing stuck to a lump of wood! It cleaned up enough to make it good enough to be a wallhanger, but it had had a hard life. The forend was split and the front barrel band is missing and the backsight sight has been ripped off.

If you want to clean the bore get a length of aluminium tubing and cut a slot in the end, about 1/4" in, so you can put a strip of emery cloth in and wrap it around so it fits the bore. At the other end rivet a piece of aluminium or brass bar in so it will fit in a drill chuck.
All you have to do is keep going up and down with the drill running and change the emery cloth as it wears. The barrel will come up looking reasonable eventually.

If you cannot fix the crack in the stock with epoxy resin and the piece can be detached from the wood, knock a couple of panel pins in part way and snip the heads off. Then press to two halves together. This will mark where the pins are and then you pull out the panel pins and drill holes where the marks are and you can epoxy a piece of dowel in. If you do that put a slot in the side of the dowel so it wont air-lock.

[Huttles94]

Condition wise I think it looks good.
I got an Albini Brandaelin that looked like a piece of rusty tubing stuck to a lump of wood! It cleaned up enough to make it good enough to be a wallhanger, but it had had a hard life. The forend was split and the front barrel band is missing and the backsight sight has been ripped off.

If you want to clean the bore get a length of aluminium tubing and cut a slot in the end, about 1/4" in, so you can put a strip of emery cloth in and wrap it around so it fits the bore. At the other end rivet a piece of aluminium or brass bar in so it will fit in a drill chuck.
All you have to do is keep going up and down with the drill running and change the emery cloth as it wears. The barrel will come up looking reasonable eventually.

If you cannot fix the crack in the stock with epoxy resin and the piece can be detached from the wood, knock a couple of panel pins in part way and snip the heads off. Then press to two halves together. This will mark where the pins are and then you pull out the panel pins and drill holes where the marks are and you can epoxy a piece of dowel in. If you do that put a slot in the side of the dowel so it wont air-lock.

I have managed to glue the stock together. It is pretty solid right now. All i have to do to the crack now is smarten it up. I was originally thinking about sending it off for a repair but its a pretty clean break. Someone in the past has hammered some nails into the break to "fix" it. Nails look to be over 50 years old so not a recent repair. Still, gotta get them out or at least cut the heads off the nails to make it look a bit neat.

I also found that the screw that holds the breech pin in on mine has been replaced with a nail that has had its pin bent over! Probably the same bloke who worked on the stock.

I have a cleaning rod and screw coming, thank god parts are somewhat easy to get.