Parker & Hale .22 Conversion - Never seen one before now!!!

[Jim Watson]

Never heard of the like, please show pictures.

Early times after the war, England had ferocious import duties, they were saving their foreign exchange for food.

See '84 Charing Cross Road' by Helene Hanff for an account of a correspondence between a New Yorker and an English bookseller from 1949. She was sending them food packages after she got acquainted.

 

[handejector]

Another for you guys.
NO marks on the barrel but the proofs, and no liner seam is evident, so I think they made a new barrel.

 

[handejector]

Barrel pics. No markings but the proofs.

 

[handejector]

more pics.....

 

[handejector]

more pics.....

 

[2152hq]

You should NOT dry fire a rimfire gun!

Peter

I agree and go even further. I don't recommend dry firing ANY firearm,,
but people do and it's their gun to do what they want with it..
Simple as that.

Even if one chooses to do so, in a properly adjusted RF firearm, there would be no damage as shown here to the chamber face.

The damage shown on the OP revolver is from the firing pin being too long AND the gun being dry fired.

The RF firing pin should be shortened to the correct length so it never contacts the chamber face. It's too long and is a simple fix.

 

[deadin]

I seem to remember that my first .22 S&W was one of these.
Pretty common in the 1950's. (And not expensive....)

 

[handejector]

BTW-
The company is Parker-Hale, Not Parker & Hale.

 

[153]

I have read that post war Britain established "currency restrictions" that made the purchase of firearms from the U.S.A. very difficult. These conversions allowed Brits access to models that were otherwise unavailable to them.

Of course today they are virtually restricted to deactivated pistols.

 

[vinn]

I had one. they were quite common after ww 11. I have an old webley .45 with one that has a special Parker cylendar. I should post it.

 

[steelslaver]

I find these very interesting and a testament to some excellent gun smiths abilities.

 

[dingomann]

Oh, the work that went into those conversions! Can you imagine what similar-quality work would cost today? Just splendid work.
As far as dry-firing a handgun, it does no harm to the cylinder if the firing pin does not contact metal. It does wear the action a minuscule amount which could wear the mechanism out quicker, but it is a non-issue. I read where S&W built a machine which would dry-fire a gun endlessly and the number of pulls it took to wear out a gun was astronomical.

 

[6string]

After the war labor was cheap, the Victory Models were cheap. I bought a Victory that had been converted to 38 special by a sleeved cylinder, I paid $15.00 for it, I was making Less than $100 a month after taxes as an E-3. I was stationed in Lybia at the time ('62-64). It was my first S&W. In 1948 my Dad decided to build a house because his rent had gone up to $26.00 a month. It cost him $5000 to buy a lot and build a house. I don't know what the labor rate was in '46-'64 but after I got out in late '64 I got a job with Fisher Electronics building stereo equipment for all of $1.27 an hour.
SWCA 892

Great stuff!
I like your "fiscal sense"!
Fisher made great stereo components, too. Very competitive with Marantz, and they were doing it well before the Japanese (who made nice audio electronics, for sure) really moved in.
But, yeah, these revolver conversions, when done right, can be excellent guns!

 

[Green Frog]

Lee,

Is the adjustable sight on the one you showed missing one or more screws? I'm also wondering whether any or all of these adjustable sight units are "micrometer adjustable" like those on the Masterpiece Series made by S&W at that time, or were they more like the pre-War style with opposing screws?
Thanks to you (or whoever can answer) as I'm not able to get out and examine these esoteric topics in person like I once could.

Froggie

 

[Green Frog]

PS to last: Does anyone know of any book(s) that cover this era in British Gunmaking? There was a lot of both innovation and repurposing that went on during this time and it would be fascinating to learn more about it.

Froggie

 

[Mk VII]

Foreign Exchange controls in the Bretton Woods era, and the 'dollar gap', meant that even if you wanted a K-22, the Treasury wouldn't let you send the funds out of the country.
Converting these (and other) revolvers generated some useful dollar income.

 

[Dave_n]

Currency controls were still around in the middle 1960s. I ended up using almost the complete allowance of $300 that the ARC's Unit of Nitrogen Fixation (where I was a "lowly experimental officer!" en route to my doctorate), buying a 50 US gallon drum of lactic acid for use in growing some unusual microbes, as the UK equivalent lacked some "magical component that the bugs loved!!" Dave_n

 

[hardknocks]

Value

Found a 22 conversion locally, anyone give a ballpark price for a 90% gun?
Im interested.
Thank you

 

[handejector]

Lee,

Is the adjustable sight on the one you showed missing one or more screws? I'm also wondering whether any or all of these adjustable sight units are "micrometer adjustable" like those on the Masterpiece Series made by S&W at that time, or were they more like the pre-War style with opposing screws?

It is not missing a screw. The elevation screw is screwed into the frame. Turning it left jacks up the sight leaf. The first S&W sights on HEs worked the same way.
Windage is opposing screws.

 

[MajorD]

Back in the 50's and earlier, possibly into the 60's, remember that workmanship was often cheaper than parts/ machining. There were guns ( war souvenir rifles come to mind) that had very high quality and tastefully done sporterizing that cost a good bit less than buying a new model 70 for example.
I once owned a very nicely done 98 Mauser in 22-250 with unertl scope. Probably sporterized in the 60's, when it was still cheaper to gunsmith and rebarrel an old action, with a bunch of additional work, than to buy even a new Remington 700 in the caliber.

Sadly the days of affordable quality gunsmithing is gone.
Sadly my experience is no one wants to take minor repair jobs anymore, and if they do, want to charge you $65 / hour for shop labor. Today all they want is full custom 1911 builds at 4+ thousand bucks. And many of today's so called gunsmith's couldn't do the work the old masters did- welding up and re- profiling parts, building absent or hard to get parts from scratch