Your most egregious sporterization

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chestnut ridge

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My qustion- what military firearms have been the worst examples of Bubbaizing. Or- take a nice 1917 Winchester Enfield in 90% condition; and cut the barrel to 18", cut the stock just forward of the finger grooves, grind off
the sight ears, polish the W bolt, drill and tap for a weaver side mount.
Did I mention the butt stock had fiddleback figure; and the bore was like
a mirror? Always best to sporterize the best example possible.
I handed it to a friend; he looked at it and said " I don't know whether
to laugh or cry."
I bought this rifle in this state; it is sort of like stopping to see a bad car wreck. I know it is going to be ugly; but I want to look.
 
My Dad's Westinghouse Mosin Nagant, hex receiver. Garish sporter stock, shortened barrel, no front sight, no rear sight, no scope rail, but a dovetail cut into the bolt (what were they thinking?). I've got no idea where he got it, it's his only centerfire rifle.
 
BUBBA

One of the guys sporterized a rifle into a chop-stock hunter with an 8-Ball Bolt handle as a gag

Yodar
 
I picked up a bubba'd M-27 Finnish Mosin for parts a few months back. Someone had hacked the barrel down to about 18", relocated and bent the bolt, sliced a notch in the receiver bridge to allow for the bolt to fit, and then sliced the safety knob so the new bolt could cycle. THey also removed the rear sight completely and attempted to replace it with a scope mount, but the screw holes for the weaver mount don't line up so the whole thing is useless. They also cut the stock beyond all recognition and covered it in layers of tru-oil. It's pretty nasty. Intact it would have been worth a nice three bills at least.
 
Right now, I'm watching an auction for a Eddystone 1917 Enfield that was sorta sportered but the ears weren't dehorned and the front sight's intact with it's guard. Thing is, it has the stock it was issued with that was cut back with the handguards and forward stock hardware done away with. My intent, if I can snag it for decent money, is to drop it into another USGI stock. So??? So here's my gripe: the cut back stock it's sitting in right now has the stamp "OGEK". With this stock as issued, it would be worth a lot more to a collector, but somebody who didn't think that way devalued a stock with Elmer Keith's stamp.
 
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Skeletonized.

Not mine...
Not sure where these went.

Skeletonized Gov't model of 1911. One that had been cut into. So the old boy welded it back up, and skelentonized it. Teaching, learning tool to see how one works. Not fired of course, just a real good way to see the workings.

Even cut away part of the barrel, to show lands and grooves. Had a "bullet" on a rod you pull thru and see how that all worked.

Same fellow did some kind of small semi auto pistol, been too long to recall.

New shooters, teaching and such, he would produce these.

Kinda like what watchmakers used to do in watchmaking school, cut away not needed to run, to better understand the workings and all.

Regards,
Steve
 
i take exception to this... i have some WORLD CLASS sporterized Mausers, and one Enfield... (an Eddystone) in the works...

that is the ONLY way to get certain calibers in a positive feed and extraction... we are talking 5 hundred dollar fajen stocks, 4 hundred dollar McMillan or McGowan premium barrel blanks... expensive sight systems, bueller safeties, timney triggers... they are world class showpieces, and i am proud to use and own them... (some built by me, some by my father)


NOT ALL non original mausers are hacked up crapola...

see the attached pic... (if it works) you'll see that there is one in there, a 284 Win in a mod. 95 mauser, that has all the metalwork done, but is awaiting a bishop stock, that has a cut-down military "c" stock... the other 2 are world class... the one in the white metal was at that time awaiting final finish in 25-06... the 3rd one is a .243 win...

ain't NOTHING "bubba" about these...
 
The closest I ever came was refinishing metal and stock of a Greener Martini action 12 bore. I had it stripped, and was deciding what to put on it; then after getting sidetracked with other things at the time, and in a momentary lapse of reason - sold it to a friend that wanted it.

Ah, foolish things.
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http://ussliberty.org
http://ssunitedstates.org
 
I've got a bubbaized 1917 but all Bubba did was cut the stock down. I'll run into a USGI stock one day and restore the old girl.

I'll run into one that was screwed up but Bubba left the action alone and have that built into a dangerous game rifle.

I've got three Springfield 1903's, one MkI, another 1903. And then a very well done sporterized 1903.

I've got a sweet Carolina Precision Rifles .35 Whelen built on a 1909 Argentine Mauser action. A fine custom job all the way. Premium barrel, premium trigger, curly maple stock.

I won't modify a milsurp myself but if I see a good one I'll take advantage of it.
 
I don't know if "sporterized" applies, but I saw a nauseatingly "pimp-a-tized" Garand at a gun show. The wood furniture had been redone in a high-gloss finish. Most of the parkerized parts were painted with what looked like a black auto finish with opalescent metal flakes. The top of the bolt had been machined to make those swirly metal patterns.

It was very, very unpleasant to look at.
 
One of the pawn shops on Bragg Boulevard in Fayetteville, NC had- at the same time- a sporterized Garand AND a sporterized Johnson rifle. Looked as if the same guy did 'em both, all the "excess" wood was removed from the stocks so they were 'streamlined' and finished really shiny, all the metal was polished bright and then blued. Without a doubt this was the oddest looking pair of rifles I have ever seen, I could imagine them hanging their heads in shame at being all tarted up like that.

Place got broken into a few weeks after I saw 'em, and they actually got stolen. Now THAT was strange...

lpl/nc
 
I have a confession to make, I did this to a Russian-capture K98 with a great bore.

file



But in my defense, I bought it like this:

K-SPORTER-RGB.jpg
 
Picked up a 1903A3...

at a flea market a few years back. The absolutely perfect A4 stock had been cut off and rounded at the lower band and the guy chiseled out his initials in the butt and filled it in with solder. The sights had been removed but none of the metal had been touched. I easily replaced the missing parts and stock. The parkerizing and bore are perfect.......Ended up with a nice A3 for about 225 bucks.........chris3
 
Hmm…

I've had quite a few in my life. Some were even my fault when I was young and stupid…

I bubbaed a .308 NATO No. 1 Mk III Ishapore Enfield. Put it into an ATI plastic stock, and a "no smith" reciever bridge scope mount. Topped it with a inexpensive 30mm Simmons. In my defense, it's only dating back to the 1960's when R.F.I. made it, and I had purchased two, and it was the rougher of the two rifles, the better specimin I left stock.

In the homely thing's defense, it has done 1 MOA for me at 100 yds with Hirtenberger 7.62. Probably some freak outcome because I probably over-torqued everything in my early twentysomething zeal.

I also bubbaed a milled Tula Russian SKS. Dremeled off the bayonet lugs, and put it into a Choate "Dragunov" stock, and added a Chi-com 20 round fixed magazine. Another youthful indescretion. Russian SKS's were being sold for $80, while MAK-90's were running over $300 because of Bush Sr's little EO banning import. I was trying to make a poor man's AK.

Oh, did I mention I tossed the laminated stock and the bayonet?

I sold all the aftermarket junk, and have since put my poor abused Russian into a fiberglass "jungle stock". I hope to restore the bayonet and find another laminated stock someday to undo my younger self's stupidity.

From my Grandfather's estate, among several other firearms, I inherited a Eddystone P17 Enfield in in quite good condition. It looks to have been sporterized in the late 50's or 60's by being placed into a nice Fajen stock. I intend to sell the stock to raise funds to buy some P17 furniture and hardware. Luckily, other than what went with the stock, no metalwork was done, and the ears are intact.

If anyone knows a source for P17 wood and hardware, please PM me.
 
A 1903A3 in a Bishop stock w/ the rear sight replaced with a Williams 5D receiver sight. Front sight has been modded somehow, with a gold dot. Not too bad, and it shoots very well for me. I found it this way, of course, and had to provide the poor, misunderstood thing with a home.
 
I went to Cabelas in Buda yesterday. Browsing through the "Gun Library", I came across a bubbatized 03A3. Except whoever did this one was no bubba, but a master. Probably done in the '50s or '60s. Beautufiful checkered stock in some highly figured wood, glossy blue finish, 30-06 caliber. I had to look at it twice to realize that it was a sporterized 03a3. I think they only wanted $3,500 or so for it. :eek:
It was seriously a beautiful gun, but in my mind only worth $500 at most.
 
Well, a couple...

This first one my dad bought in 1946. Rock Island 1903, he used it as is for a few years and then sporterized it in the 1950's. I rebarreled it in .270 AI recently.
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This one I built in the 1980's using a new,never barreled nickle steel 1903 reciever I bought from Sarco. Its a 25-06, with Douglas Air Guaged barrel and French walnut stock.
attachment.php


And I ain't no bubba. ;) :cool:
 
The only thing I've done so far is to put a clamp on mount on a K-31.

I do have a turk 38 with a severly worn barrel where their are actual chunks of rifling missing in the bore and a new spare swede 96 barrel lying around. Things that make you go hmmmm.;)
 
cracked butt said:
I do have a turk 38 with a severly worn barrel where their are actual chunks of rifling missing in the bore and a new spare swede 96 barrel lying around. Things that make you go hmmmm.;)
Click to expand...

Well, I was saying "hmmmm" a few days ago thinking of building a sporter on a Swede M38 Husquvarna action dated 1942. Thing is, I was thinking of .308 and I found out the '96 type action won't take the pressure, but I'm not seeing commercial barrels to fit that action anyway. The biggest problem I saw though with the '98 barrels is their threads are bigger diameter than the '96 action's threads. To rebarrel a Turkish M38 with a Swede 96 barrel will present the opposite problem... it won't screw in tight like it's suppose to.
 
A turk 38 is a large ring mauser threaded for a small ring barrel. A swede barrel has the correct threads and diameter for a turk 38. My main concern is having a smith true up the action and fit the barrel properly.
 
That combination sounds like it oughta work pretty well then, theoretically. Sounds like it'd be an interesting combination. Show up with what everybody thinks is a Turkish Mauser and start loading up Swede ammo... make 'em all scatter.:D
 
Very nice pair of '03's, Larry.

The closest I have to a Bubba is a KBI Swede '96 that has the plastic stock they put on them and the funky sight bases, no sights. Pretty much as it came from them. Picked it up for next to nothing from a friend who runs a pawn shop who knows I look for 'Swedes'. It sort of qualifies, as I consider the KBI stuff 'factory Bubbaized'. It's my beater/loaner but I've yet to stick a scope on it. Maybe one of these days...

My '94 Swede sort of qualifies, too. When I got it, it was wearing the original stock, but someone had trimmed the forearm down almost to the stock bolt and stuck some semi-buckhorn sights on it with a Williams ramped brass bead front sight. The stock was 'in the raw', devoid of any finish whatsoever and looked like a pallet skid. I spent a lot of hours working with it and got it looking pretty decent, but then I ran across a nice Kevlar stock so it sits in my closet, waiting for another day. I did put a Timney trigger on it and converted it to cock-on opening, which made it more functional to me, at least. I have another bolt, which I used for the conversion. The original bolt is intact; both are original bent bolts. I'm still considering putting XO's Scout mount on it. Haven't brought myself to do that yet, though- it's just so lean and handy as it is.


Regards,
Rabbit.
 
I put a tapco stock on an AK before coming to my senses and getting an ACE stock. In my defense it was only the collapsable stock, not the atrocious plastic folder.
 
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