Eddystone 1917 Sporter

Browsing the local gun rack and noticed a Eddystone 1917 sporter. For it's age it looks pretty good and the asking price is around $400; no scope. The rifling looks good and the bore appears to be good from what I could tell.
Anybody know about these rifles? Here are a few pics I took of the receiver.

The 1917 Enfield is considered a strong design; many were used for magnum caliber conversions. It looks like they did a good job of knocking off the rear sight ears and recontouring the rear receiver ring. Eddystones are the least desirable of the 3 contractors and have a reputation of being brittle which led to cracked receiver rings usually associated with changing barrels. The "cock on closing" firing pin design is generally not considered a desirable feature. The asking price seems high unless it has a nice stock and the workmanship is really good.

There's nothing wrong with cock on closing, let's get that out of the way.

IMHO it is at least $200 too much given its condition. Whether the Eddystones cracking was due to brittle receivers or the original barrels were put on too tight with some kind of machine is still debated in many circles. Either way, you don't see the issue with Winchesters and Remingtons.

The Eddystone, IMHO, is one of the finest bolt action '06s around, only to be outdone by an 03-A3. They are going for about $600 in my area, and most that I've seen have good bores. Mine is extremely accuate.

It's a shame the PO "Sporterized" the one in the pics above. The factory peep sites are good enough that a scope isn't really needed.

In that butchered condition it isn't worth more than $200.

The 1917 Eddystone is my all time favorite American military bolt action rifle,
Its longer sight radius, better sights and extra heft enable me to shoot it more accurately than my old 1903 Springfield.



As an added bonus is it shares the WWI Winchester Trench Broom bayonet .

Don't generally go for sporterized military rifles, but a nice one came along. Was done by a master metal smith, (knives and guns) for his future son-in-law, that didn't work out. I put an Ashley ghost ring on the back and a Williams brass bead on front. The metal work on the bolt handle is many hours of work, as well as the stock work. Barrel cut to 21 inches and ST-2 coated. Shoots great, handy all around rifle for most anything with four legs.

The EDDYSTONE is considered one of the strongest, if not the strongest of all actions. Holds six rounds in magazine. Nothing wrong with cock on closing, just get used to it, no problem if you have Enfields.

I have my fathers Eddystone he bought in the 60's for about 17.00$ came packed in cosmoline, with a tag in the barrel that said, "test fired 6 times". He had it sporterized, mounted a Weaver scope, and he had a deer rifle. It has taken many deer, and a fair number of ground hogs with a 110 grain hand load at 300 to 400 yards. Strong as a bank vault, never had an issue with it, one of those "not for sale at any price" guns, it was Dads....

It looks like a fairly crude job of sporterization. I agree with the $200
figure. The 1917 is often thought to be a super strong action because
of it's bulk but in reality it's no stronger than a 98 Mauser.

Concerning cracked receivers: I doubt that Eddystones have a greater percentage of cracked receivers than Winchester or Remington. Eddystone made a lot more rifles than eiher Winchester or Remington, so more crack have appeared on them than Winchesters or Remingtons. The problem occurs when the original 5 groove, left hand twist barrel is removed; as they were put in very tightly. When sporterizing military firearms was common, many gunsmihs cut a relief cut into the barrel just ahead of the receiver, which prevented cracking. Incidently, my experience with the original barrels is that they don't shoot boattailed bullets very accurately.

If the origional barrel is toast and you wish to remove the barrel,then stick it in a lathe and cut about 1/8" slot all the way around the barrel right where it screws into the receiver. The slot or cut will release the metal compression and make barrel removal much easier. this trick when used on old mausers who's barrels are toast also helps make removal of the old barrel easy Frank

1917s are my favorite military rifles.

There are two classy ways to grind the receiver bridge for scope mounts, either match the receiver ring radius or grind it lower to duplicate a Winchester Model 70's radius. Both remove the step seen in mrrick's close up side view. Redfield made one piece Junior bases to fit both styles. Since opaul's 1917 has only one rear scope mounting hole it was probably fitted with one of the Junior mounts.

I get along very well with the original dog leg bolt handle and cock on closing but both were usually altered in expensive sporterizations. (I hope that's a word on gun forums) I see opaul's bolt was straightened but not swept backwards.

In nearly all bolt actions the first portion of rotating the bolt closed cams the bolt forward then the final turn down does not move it any further forward. The exceptions are the U.S. 1917 and the British 1914 that it was based on. Their final bolt rotation advances the bolt slightly at about 100 to 1 leverage. That makes it possible to press in very tight fitting cartridges at the risk of getting one stuck.

Remington owned the factory located in Eddystone Pennsylvania so opaul's rifle is a Remington marked to identify it as having been built in Eddystone. Uncle Sam wanted them stamped that way.

While in normal use receiver strength is not an issue it gets talked about a lot. P. O. Ackley demonstrated that the strongest WW II military bolt actions were the Japanese Arisakas. He progressively increased the pressure in all the different actions until they were destroyed.

People thought the Japanese Arisakas were junk because of their
rough appearance but the blow up tests proved that they were the
strongest. They are an unloved milspeck but they are very well
designed. I have a few and the action is amazingly simple. A sound
7.7 mm would make a good cheap sporter for anyone who could look
beyond the external appearance.

I am not informed enough to tell you what is a good price for that rifle. I do have an Eddystone that was made in August 1918. I took it to a gun smith to make sure it was safe to fire modern ammo in. I was told quote " that thing is built like a tank and you won't kill it." I have put a lot of ammo through it that I got from an Uncle. That ammo was made in 1950's (military ammo) and it shoots fine. My Eddystone was also "sportized" it isn't pretty to look at but, it shoots just fine out to around 300 yards. That is as far as our gun range allows. I have heard that such a gun is accurate enough to hit a 5 gal bucket at 600 yards, don't know haven't tried that yet.

I'd guess price is a bit high for what is offered, but the customer has to decide wether they want the rifle or not.

Just a couple observations,,
The scope mount holes on the front rcv'r ring. The rear hole is far back on the ring and probably goes thru the area of the locking lug in the roof of the ring.
If the mount had been located forward more to place the rear mount hole into the lug raceway (the forward hole ends up in the bbl thread area either way generally), it's usually considered a better set-up from a safety stand point.
I'll add though that I've seen 100's that were done just like this and have stood up just fine on all sorts of milsurp sporters.
So perhaps it's just a good tire kicking point for the buyer.
If a slightly longer mount base was used the hole spacing could have been pushed forward on the front ring and back on the rear ring.

Check the ejector on the rifle. It and it's small leaf spring are mfg'd as a one piece part orig. The spring portion breaks very often. The ejector remains in the rifle but no spring tension behind it=no ejection.
The ejector pivots on the same screw as the bolt release. You can see and feel it in the bolt raceway with the bolt removed.
Check ejection with a fired case. Even a 45acp snapped onto the face of the bolt opened far enough to get at it. Then pull the bolt open the rest of the way as if at the range. The case should fly accross the room.

If the rifle can be taken out of the stock,,do so and check the rcv'r ring especially on the bottom (thinnest part of the recv'r ring) for any cracks. This usually occurs during re-bbling to sporter status, but has shown up on re-arsenaled/rebuilt rifles too I'm told.
H/S and JA (Johnson Automatics) were 2 bbl mfg types used on rebuilds & they are marked at the muzzle just like the orig mfg E, W & R

I've only ever seen 2 1917's with a cracked receiver ring. That's in over 40yrs of this stuff. Both were Eddystones and both were rebbld with aftermarket sporter bbls by unkn persons.

Cock on closing,,never a problem as far as I was concerned. I never complained about pre-98 Mausers or Lee Enfields either.

The 1917 & the P14 are large actions. Heavy for their caliber(s). Some very large bore sporting rifles have been and still are made on them. The .505 Gibbs is a favorite for the P14 action.

It looks like the bolt handle on the rifle has been straightened from the military dog-leg style.
Check carefully and see if it's a welded on new handle. If it is, see if you can see the weld and if it has any porosity/pin holes in the weld indicating a poor weld. It's not unknown for the bolt handle on some of these to come right off due to a poor weld.
If it's a forge job of the original (and this also applies to the welded handle above),,check the bolt cam surface on the bolt body to make sure it hasn't been over heated and annealed (softened). Galling of the metal surfaces can result and aside from that it just shows sloppy workmanship involved in the sporterizing work.

Make sure the safety engages properly with the bolt handle considering the work that has been done altering the bolt handle.

One other observation. Though I can't see hardly anything of the stock, the grip area right behind the action in the pic seems to taper quickly to a very narrow width for the grip itself. Seems awful thin to me.

I'd prefer a heavier profile for the stock in that area for the weight of the rifle, the cartridge and recoil. But maybe it's just the pic.

About the only thing I can add is that the original leaf-spring style ejectors had a habit of breaking. You can get an ejector with a coil spring from Numrich, and probably other sources as well. I think $250 is about as high as I would go on that particular specimen...

The CMP had a few 1917s for a while but I think they sold out pretty
quickly. The day that I went up to the North store they had some and
I looked at them but most were in only fair condition. Nice clean
original examples are getting pretty pricey on GB. Way back in the
early 60s before the infamous GCA of 1968 there were lots of milsurps
available by mail order. I was still a teenager in the early 60s living
at home when I ordered a 1917 Eddystone from Klein's Sporting Goods
in Chicago. It was in very good shape and was around $18 if I recall
correctly. I ordered some ammo with it and both came right to my
parents' house just like anything else would have. I kept it for awhile
but back then I couldn't afford multiple guns so I traded it for
something more practical, a shotgun I think. Of course I wish now that
I still had it. Great piece of history.

$400 will almost get you an unaltered 1917 around here if you look long enough. They are steadily going up in price but I am still seeing sporterized examples routinely sell for between two to three hundred dollars, usually with scope mounted.


Have a Winchester 1917 that has been in the family for over 60 years now. My grandfather acquired it shortly after WW II and the story about how he got it is interesting. I know I've posted about it before but here goes again.
My fathers dad, Bertil Larson, was the chief clerk for the north central Pennsylvania division of the New York Central rail road. As such he frequently traveled by rail throughout the area. Sometime in the late forties or early fifties he was approached by the local American Legion post to see if he could fetch them some military surplus rifles from an amory in Harrisburg, Pa. They were intended for use with the Post's color guard. Bertil made some calls and found that the rifles, all 30-06 bolt action guns, were available to all comers for around 10 or 11 dollars. He "took some orders" from friends and coworkers and ended up bringing back an entire case of rifles, which turned out to be all 1917 Enfield actions. Bertil kept one for himself and trimmed it down for hunting.
It's had a long and success career. This is him with a nice 12 point taken circa 1952. Stock was cut down, but the sights were original.



Bertil died the next year and dad took ownership. He had additional modifications made to the barrel and receiver, an installed an inexpensive 4x Dickenson scope in the late fifties. It continued to drop deer like clockwork over the next fifty years with no additional modifications. When dad passed on my brother used it to take this nice 10 point:



Since then the old Dickenson scope fogged up and died and I ended up with the old gun. I've put a Lyman 57 receiver sight on it and plan to put a Boyds replacement stock on it. The original is developing a few cracks.
Yes... its a bubba'd military long arm that they quit making long ago. But they did make hundreds of thousands of them and besides, 60 years ago the average worker didn't have a lot to spend on sporting goods. I'd say the old old boy is still earning a return on Bertil's original investment.

John

My father in law brought his Eddystone back in his duffel bag we he got out of the Army after WWII. I show up on the scene in 1976 and he told me to get the rifle out of the closet to examine. I hand him the rifle and he did the whole manual of arms with it and rattled off it's serial number!! Years later he traded it for a Charter Arms .38 snubbie.
Before he passed away, he became more talkative about his wartime service and I asked if he ever fired his rifle at the bad guys. His eyes became really focused, I could tell he was thinking hard.
He finally said "Son, I served on a ship and everyone on it was shooting at the Jap Airplanes that were trying to kill us" It turned out this was in the battle of Okinawa and he was talking about the kamikazis attacks.