doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion Classic & Custom Single Barreled Sporting Rifles @ doublegunshop.com Early M70 Win custom rifles

Asking a favor...Does anyone have pictures of custom rifles made prior to WWII or at least before 1950, based on Winchester M70 actions. Interested in all but especially English made rifles or G&H on this action. Sure wouldn't be disappointed with any help.
I finally came across the right M70 rifle that I can rebuild without feeling like you are depleting the collectors stock. I have a most excellant stock that I bought from a forum member a couple years back that will work for this gun. The pictures are to help develop the design for the gun. The action is a transision model 1947 vintage.
Thanks in advnce for any assistance.

This is my Griffin & Howe sporter, caliber .30-'06, serial number 2182, built on a pre-War Model 70 action. The barrel has been trimmed down and shortened, anticipating the Featherweight model which was introduced after the War. It is fitted with a G&H side mount with windage adjustment in deference to the Unertl Hawk scope and its non-centered reticle. It also has a Tilden safety, which moves the safety lever from the port to the starboard side of the bolt shroud.

Here is another pre-War G&H, No. 1696, which started life as a .220 Swift, and was still in that caliber when I found it in the G&H showroom several years ago.

Having a varmint rifle caliber combined with a 2 1/2X Lyman Alaskan scope and a sporting stock made no sense to me, so I had G&H rebarrel it in 7X57, using a replacement barrel with the original Model 70 profile.

It is a beauty of a rifle and accurate as well. The slide for the Lyman 48 receiver sight is contained in a butt well accessed by a trap buttplate.

Very nice thanks it will be used in the plans

Bill,
These rifles are superb. They make me want to rework my M70s along these lines. And the photography is superb as well. I always add your photos to my collection for future reference, in case I want to steal ideas!

While not a fan of that style cheek piece, the rest of that rifle, to me, is about as sweet a M70 custom I've ever seen.

Kirk,

Thanks for the compliments. Credit for the photography belongs to Rob Hoffman, a friend from undergraduate days and a professional photographer, who has kindly snapped a selection of my accumulation of firearms. The equipment he uses is pretty elaborate, involving an oblong light box and an overhead light with a clear shower curtain as a diffuser, and a Nikon D700.

I hope to prevail on him to do more in the future.

Bill

Bill,
I am curious about the burnishing on the 7x57 extractor. I assume that is hand burnished and not engine turned. Is the bolt finished the same way?

Kirk,

I can't say how the treatment of the bolt and extractor was done. As you say, it doesn't appear to be engine turning. It is extremely uniform, however.

Bill

WOW:

What beauty!

I have been saving a Prewar Swift and a 1954 30-06 for restocking. These guns give me great impetus to get cracking on the projects!

Stay well,

Franchi

Here's another pre-War Model 70 G&H. When I found it on G&H's web page, it was a .30-'06, but I had G&H rebarrel it in .35 Whelen, using, again, the original Winchester barrel profile. Like the .30-'06 above, it has a Tilden safety, but the action is otherwise original. Unertl 4X Hawk scope in G&H side mount, and Lyman 48 rear sight.
The comb of the stock would seem to indicate that the stock itself is post-War, although the barrelled action was definitely not.

This metal treatment is a mystery to me as well. Sort of a cross hatched X pattern. I've seen it in both British and American rifles. Sometimes it's really neat and uniform, sometimes quite erratic and "doodled in". I have no idea how it's done.

Beautiful rifles - thanks for showing.

I believe they use a burnishing tool and "scrape" the pattern into the metal. Tiny bit of metal is displaced making a good place for oil to hold onto.I have seen it used on machine tool ways also.

The scraper is usually a long flat rod with one end hardened and ground to form a slightly curved surface with perpendicular edges. The butt end of the tool is rested upon the top of the operator's shoulder and the operating end is pressed down onto/into the steel's surface at a long angle while also being drawn toward the operator. The operator's hands provide pressure and guidance for the operating end while the backward movement of the operator's body draws the tool's end toward him, across the steel surface. RDH45 is correct about the treatment of the machine tool ways, AAMOF the process of 'scraping' the ways is SOP when refurbishing worn machine tools. The scraping is VERY functional (actually quite necessary) on the machine tool ways but is largely cosmetic when used on rifle bolts.

Scraping is typical of the better prewar rifles while engine-turning largely displaced it on postwar rifles, at least that's my impression.
Regards, Joe

This was the typical crosshatching pattern on all Griffin and Howe rifles in the early years. The damascening we now know, became popular as far as I have been able to ascertain, around 1930. HTH

Deleted

Joe,
Your description of a scraper is precisely correct,for those used to scrape flat surfaces like machine ways,dovetails,etc.German( and I would guess Austrian,Belgian,etc) gunsmiths use a different type scraper,with which they fit curved surfaces together. They scrape front sights,rear sight bases,clawmount bases,etc.,to achieve a close fit before soldering.They typically make these from 3-corner files,and I suppose if they bought one, it would be like a "bearing scraper".I never saw one used on a rifle bolt,so I have no idea how the pattern was achieved.Scraping is just about my least favorite thing to do.
Mike

Interesting, can you provide some pictures of the scrapers you use? Thanks

LRF
I haven't learned yet how to post pictures(I surprise myself that I can post comments).Just take a 8-10" 3 corner file and very slowly grind the teeth off, being careful to avoid "burning" it.Grind in the middle of the wheel, so you wind up with 3 concave(ie hollow ground)surfaces.This gives you 3 edges to scrape with.I sharpen them with wornout 320 grit abrasive backed up by a file,two edges at once, across the"concave". Other people use a stone,and one of my friends used a buffing wheel,to sharpen them. I resist using a buffing wheel,I've grown to like my hands and fingers,proper scrapers are sharp.
Mike

Mike,
You can email them to me and i will post for you

Scraping - of course. Thanks very much - that makes perfect sense.

For Ford:



Somewhat "underwhelming"

Kind Regards,

Raimey
rse

The photo of the scrapers is because LRF asked for them.I knew Raimey's email address.
Mike

I would kill to see a video of someone scraping a bolt or Springfield safety with a good photo of the finished product. I have some examples of the finished product, but could never figure out how it was done. About 98% of engine turning is best left undone, unfortunately. Most scraping I have seen is wonderful. I guess it's a sign of the times.

Hi All:

As a younger man, I watched a millwright scrape the ways of a large lathe that was being installed in a steel mill in Cleveland. He had wooden nail keg that had a thick padded top on which he sat. It was a real treat to see him scrape very small amounts of metal off of the ways to get a near perfect fit by hand. I think that this was the new J$L mill.

This guy was a real artist! I was always impressed by the skill the the older tradesmen possessed! This included a back hoe, glazier or a window painter! These men were very good at what they did!

In those days, all tradesmen took immense pride in their work! I think that pride in one's work is a think of the past. It is sad to see this pride disappear in today's work force!

Stay well my friends,

Franchi

Franchi, I never thought I'd be saying this, but I've seen this same sort of pride of workmanship in some union workers. Believe it or not, it's true. I know it's hard to believe, I wouldn't have believed it myself if I hadn't seen it and worked next to it.

I hasten to add that these fellows were working as subcontractors in a commercial nuclear plant and so were fairly well paid by local standards. However their work was so good that we called them craftsmen rather than workers or tradesmen. I DO know that much of their pride in workmanship was due to peer pressure but the result was still most impressive to me.

I also hasten to add that my state is a Right-To-Work state and most of the residents are adamantly opposed to any sort of union. I was raised in an environment where most of the goodoleboys fairly screamed "I don't need no stinkin' UNION to get me a job OR keep me a job!" and "Unions are a tool of lazy weak-kneed no-work socialists!"

So you can see that my change of opinion was significant. I found that some of these guys were every bit as proud of their work as any artist in any other genre, and the quality of their work reflected it.

Not saying that all or even most union workers are superior craftsmen, no not AT ALL 'cause I know better. Just saying that pride in superior craftsmanship isn't completely dead quite yet, and (lucky for us) can still be found in some surprising places (grin).
Regards, Joe

Joe,
I suspect the craftsmen you spoke of got that way by serving an apprenticeship,moreso than being a union member.Some unions require(or run the program)an apprenticeship for membership.Some don't require, but encourage it and offer a program.I also am from a right to work state and not a union supporter,but was really impressed by ASME welders on a fuel storage job and structual welders putting together a gantry crane.There was a union "quality control" chief that inspected the work before we did.At the final inspection(2 days worth),not a single deficiency was found.Really impressive.
Mike

Mike, you're absolutely correct that most if not all of the Pipefitters served their apprenticeships. These subcontractors were all union men and this was considered a premium job so the locals sent their best men. Ditto most of the other locals too, but I'm most familiar with the Pipe-Fighters and Electricians.

I got into a 'discussion' on another forum about full-penetration welds, and it appears to me that very few gun folks have ever seen a truly GOOD welder's work. Some of these guys are EXTREMELY artistic and creative as well as quite demanding of their own personal skills; witness some of their truly spectacular handmade and bespoke belt buckles! 'Government work' of course, but IMO their expertise more than made up for any personal projects done on company time. When these guys finished a job, you KNEW that it was done by a professional taking pride in his work.

IMO the ACGG is kinda like a union hall in the sense that whoever belongs is almost always at least competent. Maybe not the best but supposedly not the worst either. Of course we've all seen even some Guild members' work that smacked of what Ackley called 'fearful turkeys', but then others' work is IMO the epitome of elegance and grace as well as flawless performance.

IMO internet forums like this one have done MUCH to weed out the crooks and charlatans but also IMO the rest of us are too quick to give a pass to substandard work. We don't want to hurt anyone's feelings so we don't tell folks that the smith they're planning to use is a doofus with all the refined taste of a space alien and the mechanical ability of a gorilla.

True craftsmanship isn't dead yet but it's become all too rare and now we hafta HUNT for it!
Regards, Joe

Okay, now that has been said, maybe we can get back to the subject of fine work done by the good craftsman on M70 Winchesters.

I "scraped" the bolt body of a Springfield once to see how it would come out after seeing a G&H at a show.It's hard work for someone with compromised hand strength(carpal tunnel syndrome)and the results weren't the best but it was interesting to try your hand at something when you can't ruin the workpiece.