[Kaylee]

Well.. if you know which rifle I'm talking about, you prolly know which book I've been reading lately. :)

Anyone have one of these? What do you think? How does it work? Did McBride's work push their prices way up, or are they still pretty affordable?


-K

[Mike Irwin]

Haven't seen one in some years.

Very very accurate, but had a number of serious and pervasive flaws, not the least of which was the tendency of the bolt to exit the gun into the firer's face if it was incorrectly assembled (older models).

Another serious problem that showed up in the trenches during WW I was the serious lack of primary extraction power (funny, second time I've brought that up this week) with a stuck case.

Third was, with the early guns, a faulty bolt catch. Apparently Canadian troops and RCMP would get some place and discover that the bolt had fallen out of their rifle.

As a sporting arm the Ross was a good gun.

As s combat weapon it left quite a few things to be desired.

[4v50 Gary]

Very accurate arm but very unreliable in muddy conditions. I think McBride may have written about them in his classic book, A Rifleman Went to War. The Ross Rifle Factory was on the Plains of Abraham in Quebec. It's since been flattened out to make a city park. The Quebec Museum may stand where the factory was. It's pretty close to the monument marking where "the Immortal Wolfe" died.

It was featured in an episode of The Prisoner with Patrick McGoohan. No. 6 intentionally reassembled them incorrectly so as to cause injury to his pursuers.

[Jim K]

They are pretty strong rifles. I used an old Model 1910 to shoot up some Italian 7.7 MG ammo (dimensionally the same as .303 British) that did an SMLE Mk III no good whatsoever. (Sprung action, blew out extractor, mashed magazine.)

Didn't bother the old Ross a bit.

Jim

[Gordon]

I have a Canadian Ross in .303. Don't ask for pictures, I can'tgetaroundtoit The straight pull is nowhere near as smooth as the K-31 . The interrupted thread breaching may be strong but I get case head expansion like an old SMLE! The initial extraction is nothing to write home about . Hard then baaaaack she comes then push the contraption shut. My mannlicher M-95 is much faster! The gun is fairly accurrate , about like a smelly(SMLE) , not near as good as a similarly sized 1917 . The workmanship and fitting is of a very high order rivaling the K-31 in all but machining and metalurgy. Trigger pull is REAL GOOD! I have the rifle as the flag ship of my straight pull collection for its uniqueness and collector value!:D

[tex_n_cal]

Mike called it....well thought of for their time, but what I remember about them is the fact that assembled improperly, they will fire with the bolt out of battery:what: This condition of course causes the bolt to exit the rear of the gun nearly as fast as the bullet goes out the front.

I haven't seen one in years, either. If I found one I would use EXTREME care to understand exactly how to put it together.

[Mike Irwin]

It's usually pretty easy to tell if you've assembled it incorrectly.

The bolt will be harder than normal to close, and if you watch the locking collar, it doesn't rotate the whole way.

[tex_n_cal]

I have many, many odd and unusual facts filed away in my brain, but after reading about the Ross once, I decided I would only remember the firing out of battery part, and go look for the references if I ever got one.:D

I can't imagine why I'd ever acquire a Ross, but then again one never knows...there's a sporterized Arisaka I know with a maple Mannlicher stock, that's been sitting in the same gunshop in CA for the nine years I have been here. I just might buy the stupid thing someday.:evil: