Here are some pics of my 1903 we had talked about earlier. I had the barrel erosion checked and it was near zero! Proofing on the muzzle has SA 9-12 which corresponds with the manufacture year. In the pics, it appears it was reworked at the arsenal. The cartouches are DAL and EHB. There is a chip in the stock on the B. The is a corrugated staple as you can see located right below the tang. The question is....Why would a virtually new action need to be reworked? Maybe to test the strength of the action? Can someone identify the proof marks?
Low s/n 1903 Pics
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tahunua001
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a couple ideas come to mind.
1. it was improperly stored.
2. the poor fellow it was issued to beat it to hell and didn't get a lot of shots off before he was terminated.
3. it was used, a lot, reworked, and then someone came down the line and didn't like that it had a later barrel date so he found a good condition barrel from the right period and swapped them.
you don't have the swept bolt which means it's original to the rifle and did not go through post WWII rework at remington. probably sat in storage for most of both wars.
1. it was improperly stored.
2. the poor fellow it was issued to beat it to hell and didn't get a lot of shots off before he was terminated.
3. it was used, a lot, reworked, and then someone came down the line and didn't like that it had a later barrel date so he found a good condition barrel from the right period and swapped them.
you don't have the swept bolt which means it's original to the rifle and did not go through post WWII rework at remington. probably sat in storage for most of both wars.
I don’t know of a non destructive test on these actions. Springfield Armory did not install temperature gages in the forge room (we know this from Hatcher) and probably did not have temperature gages in the case hardening or heat treatment areas, that combined with the forge shop workers being paid piece rate, makes the structural quality of these receivers highly variable. Piece rate would create a perverse incentive for the workers to crank up the heat, make the billet softer, and stamp them out faster. The basic problem to these receivers is something called “de carburization” where the metal is over heated and the carbon leaves the steel. This can happen at any point where heat is applied, such as case hardening or heat treat, and the carbon cannot be restored.
Hatcher noted that in one of the 1927 experiments, 48 low number receivers were carefully re heat treated and one third of them failed a high pressure test.
All original pre WW1 M1903 are highly collectable, even though if they are an unknown quantity about structural integrity. You would need to show more pictures, and I recommend going to jouster.com, and see just how pre WW1 your rifle might be. If all it takes is a few parts to restore to an all original condition, I would do that, and sell it. You could buy a real nice double heat treat or nickel steel with change left over and not have the concerns that your receiver would come apart when firing.
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