Campbell wrote about what he called "grab-bag" assembly, where an assembler took parts from a parts bin. Maybe they used old parts before new parts or maybe vice versa. How many single shot high wall actions would Winchester have had on hand? The rifle was at or near the end of its run, perhaps was being phased out. They had an initial order (12/1917) for 2000 3rd Models, but the staff instructions said to grind down 1,500 high wall actions. What about the other 500? Campbell apparently could not answer that. Then along came orders for at least 13,000 more actions.
If you were the works manager, would you have had 10,000 actions for an obsolete rifle on hand? Those orders for 13,000 more would require additional production somewhere along the line. It would have been close to 10 % of the total # of both high wall & low wall actions made.
And where would heat treating come into the manufacturing process? Or modification of some actions for rimless cartridges? If a high wall action had been heat treated & otherwise modified for use with rimless cartridges, would or could it be ground down?
Winchester kept other obsolete or out of production models in the catalog as long as they had some on hand. The Model 1907 was last assembled in 1942, but was in the catalog until 1957. But the Single Shot was gone, not listed, after 1920, and then only the Winder musket. The regular hunting rifle was last listed in 1919, the Schuetzen and the 20 gauge shotgun last listed in 1916.
Harold Williamson wrote an economic history of Winchester back in the late 1950s. He wrote 2 chapters on Winchester & WW1 production. Half a page on primers, but not a single mention of any training rifles, even in his list of items produced. Winder muskets did not even rate a footnote.
Last edited by waterman; 10/16/10 01:03 AM.
