Mods and Rockers

some kind of sad nonsense

When you hold your Lee Enfield up admiringly and wonder why the stock rattles about like a mob of ill disciplined youth, you focus sensibly on the King Screw. This is the pivotal point of the stock's bedding, holding the forestock to the action.

thanks, milsurp, for the diagram

But sometimes the Lee's wood shrinks and the King Screw no longer holds the forestock snugly in place. I had this problem. So what do you do to fix it?

You can soak the stock in Raw Linseed Oil and hope it expands.

You can re-bed the rifle.

I chose the latter option and there's several ways to go about it (see the helpful forums at milsurp). As a first step, you can file down the bushing that comes with King Screw. With a bit of luck that should bring the stock tight, but I didn't want to do that because I'll be restocking the rifle and don't want the hassle of ordering/duplicating a bushing to fit an unshrunken stock.

collar shim

So I shimmed the top of the trigger lugs by 1/32", taking the measurement as a touch over one turn of the King Screw, which was the gap between metal and wood. A piece of plastic clerical collar cut to size fit the bill and the stock tightened up to the receiver nicely. The metal now rests on the stock's bearing areas and the dangerous movement is gone.

bed time

A cheap fix, I know, but bear in mind that it's temporary. When the new stock is finished I'll center bed it to the action as per the excellent, clear and useful instructions in Riflechair's Lounge.

In the meanwhile I'll take the beast out for a shoot and see how it performs.

Shoot straight,

LSP