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No More Lee-Enfield: Canada's Rangers To Get a Tech Upgrade
ControlsGeek writes The Lee-Enfield .303 rifle is being phased out for use by the Canadian Rangers, a Northern aboriginal branch of the Armed Forces. The rifle has been in service with the Canadian military for 100 years and is still being used by the Rangers for its unfailing reliability in Arctic conditions. If only the hardware that we use in computers could have such a track record. The wheels turn slowly, though, and it's not clear what kind of gun will replace the Enfields.
How about a modern .308 bolt-action rifle with a synthetic stock? The caliber is more than adequate; the stock won't be affected by the elements; and a bolt-action is very reliable. It's extremely simple and easy to keep clean. Almost any brand will do.
...reveals that Colt Canada will be producing the new ranger rifle, the RFP was put to pasture last month. My thinking is that the stock will be a sealed beech rather than abs plastic (which would become brittle in the cold), keep the ten round box but chamber the rifle for .308 Winchester (7.62 NATO) and keep the turn bolt action.
Political debates have me rolling my eyes so much I think I got optical whiplash. I should sue. - Foamy The Squirrel
To imagine the same weapon used so heavily in the tropics, mud and monsoon being noted for its reliability in Arctic conditions is amazing. But this is a very simple basic weapon. Even India is phasing them out, apparently.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
They finally got a 3D printer up North. They can also 3D print new fighter jets and what not, right? It's the game changing technology right?
I saw a documentary on these poor saps and they were scurrying around in snow tunnels and using rifles against huge manned robots. They managed to get one by tying a cable around its legs using one of the few little airplanes that they had, but in the end it was a rout.
You show your incredible ignorance. The rangers do in fact hunt with those rifles (are required to do so as part of survival training), and of course as armed forces practice and patrol with those arms.
Serviceable rifles at about $200.
If only the hardware that we use in computers could have such a track record.
Nobody wants 100 year old computational hardware. Giving hardware longer longevity at this point would be pointless as it becomes obsolete around the same time it fails. Would you buy a 286 PC today from someone who said it was reliable? No, of course not - and that would only be around 30 years old. Furthermore nothing that is made today will be of any significance in 100 years.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
The Lee-Enfield is probably one of the best rifles to have ever been made.
Again, timothy with his massive trolling efforts. Bringing up the subject of guns on a tech site to promote his own agenda by using a weak almost laughable comparison of guns to the shelf life of computers,.
But luckily, no one cares.
If you have "unfailing reliability" why change it? It's a weapon not a computer.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
If only the hardware that we use in computers could have such a track record.
It can if the use case would remain unchanged for 100 years and that technology improvements would be slow enough. The Voyager probes are around 40 years old and (mostly) still working in very harsh conditions so it clearly can be done. Of course you would be hard pressed to find two products more different than firearms and computers so I'm not sure why this hypothetical comparison was in the summary. The pace of technology improvements in small arms is positively glacial compared with that of computers and the use case is almost completely unchanged. Furthermore firearms are relatively simple devices with precisely one purpose. It's a LOT easier to design a reliable and simple single purpose device than to design a hugely complicated general purpose calculating machine.
But retiring them is a good idea. There are lots of great rifles that could be used to replace them.
Wrong, stock will melt if left under vehicle curved window in summer. I speak from experience.
Then it was an inappropriate choice of material but that is not sufficient evidence to condemn (or recommend) synthetics in general. Most cars are loaded with plastics and they don't melt. If the stock you had melted from the fairly modest heat in a car, then it was a piece of junk to begin with. No plastic on a working tool should melt that easily unless that was the specific intent.
There are plenty of non-exotic plastics with melting points well in excess of 130C (266F), and some considerably higher. Nylon's melting point is 190C for example. I work with many of them routinely. If your car is getting that hot I think some plastic melting will be the least of your concern.
Why does any military or police unit have firearms? Primarily to shoot PEOPLE. The arctic meanwhile is becoming increasingly militarily significant as the vast undersea oil fields become accessible and set off a new land-grab among the major powers. I'd be surprised if there aren't a fair number of shots fired over establishing new territorial rights.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
However I would be concerned about the opposite. synthetics don't do well in extreme cold either.
That depends very much on exactly which synthetic material(s) you are talking about. Some have chemistry that works great in cold. Others not so much. There is more than a bit of "you get what you pay for" here.
composite (plastic) stocks do become very brittle in freezing weather (I know having had a Crosman Nightstalker disintegrate in my hands while out ratting just last February) Hardwoods are more stable in pretty much any environment as long as the grain is sealed, than any other material save titanium alloy, but I'm sure you wouldn't want to know what thatd cost.
You're using a very cheap ($100) air rifle as evidence that plastics break in cold weather? Do you seriously think the plastics in that were engineered with any sort of temperature extremes in mind? That thing was produced to be as cheap as possible and you can be sure that they didn't get carried away picking a plastic that can handle temperature extremes. There are plenty of synthetic materials that can handle cold just fine.
Not saying you are necessarily wrong but can you cite any evidence for this statement that is something other than anecdotal?
The first rifle the British Army put in my hands was a Lee Enfield. It was the same as my grandfather would have used in WWII.
It is probably the easiest rifle to use, load and fire. Sadly, it was not as easy to clean as the SLR (7.62 L1A1) that I spent more time with later.
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
If you have "unfailing reliability" why change it? It's a weapon not a computer.
Several possible reasons come to mind. Using more standard ammunition is probably the most likely reason. Same with parts and repairs. Good as the 303 might be, it might be causing some significant logistical heartburn getting specialty ammo out to remote locations. They can be converted to a standard 7.62 NATO round but it's probably not worth the trouble.
The short-magazine Lee-Enfield (SMLE) isn't called the "Smelly" for no reason. It's got an eight-ton trigger pull, stock forearm bands that will drill a hole in your shoulder while you carry it, a steel butt plate that will make an attempt to dislocate your shoulder when fired...
But it is reliable. In fact, think of it as the bolt action flavor of an AK-47.
I hope what they end up with serves as well.
Don't take life too seriously; it isn't permanent.
So asking around for a replacement means the end of using the lee enfield?
What the fuck?
The Lee-Enfield eventually replaced the Canadian-made Ross rifle during WW I for Canadian soldiers. The Ross rifle was incredibly accurate with great range, but needed to be fired in clean conditions with perfect ammunition. Not a weapon for the trenches, but a handful of snipers kept their Ross rifles even as they were phased out for regular infantry. Ross, the manufacturer, blamed a lot of the rifle's problems on bad British ammunition, but the army eventually decided that using a less accurate rifle that actually allowed to a soldier shoot at stuff was more important than having a rifle that required a maintenance crew.
Stop pretending that it won't be some AR variant. It'll be an M4A4 carbine of some sort, almost guaranteed. Why would they pick anything else?
These guns are for defense against big predators and not for small unit tactics. The other issue is that the relatively complex mechanism of an automatic rifle is prone to icing up. Even AKs freeze solid in the north
If you had read the article, you would have noticed that “the supply chain no longer has the parts to sustain this weapon long term.” This is because the weapon is old and - from a military point of view - obsolete, so spare parts are no longer manufactured. It'll probably be quite a bit cheaper to re-equip with a newer rifle than to re-establish a Lee-Enfield production line - especially considering they are likely to pick an off-the-shelf rifle to equip a rather small force.
Everything in the world is controlled by a small, evil group to which, unfortunately, no one you know belongs.
Sounds like they're putting the sled before the dogs if they're phasing out a rifle without a better weapon already tested and found better.
T What might a ranger be shooting at in the Arctic? Certainly not a polar bear. T
Yep, them too, you'd shoot to if the option was kill a polar bear or feed a polar bear.
Also, why are humans allowed into the Arctic to ruin it? Shouldn't the Arctic be devoid of humans and their damage?
Why are humans allowed in the everglades?, why are humans allowed in the nevada desert? Oh yeah american's only expect conservation to occur in lands they wouldn't WANT to vacation in.
A land-grab in the ocean? The Battle of Ellesmere Island?
I think there's about as much chance of having a small arms conflict in the Arctic as there is of Putin invading Greenland riding a polar bear. What exactly do you envision? Canadian troops invading Novaya Zemlya? The Arctic is unpopulated in a way that is difficult to describe. There is no one to shoot, and even getting there is a huge logistical problem. I'm pretty sure you've never been to the Arctic, but for the sake of argument, is there any basis to these ideas of yours?
Those who advocate genocide deserve every protection afforded by law, and none afforded by common human decency.
...from the numerous Stargate SG-1 episodes I've seen, the Zat'nik'tel seems to work effectively in the Canadian forests.
The arctic lands are already grabbed by the relevant nations. There is mot suddenly some new land, just because the ice is melting.
For the rangers the main concern are wild animals and not people.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
One of the concerns for the arctic is an action that will function in the extreme temperatures and snow wet etc. Indeed the Lee-Enfield is the best candidate for a bolt rifle. It is simple. It functions when other bolt actions get very tight from contraction due to cold. The only other rifle that has these qualifications is the Kalashnikov. Which is an automatic Russian gun. It would be an acceptable replacement.
It's also bullshit. For a weapon this age, there are no patents, and parts can and are supplied by a multitude of vendors. The number of vendors that specialize on supplying parts for firearms that are no longer produced is quite high.
What I see is an unfounded belief that buying long-term non-OEM support will be more expensive than buying support for a new weapon. In the real world, it's the other way around - new weapons are far more expensive to support. Never mind all the other costs of switching.
Mark my words: Five years from now, there are going to be Canadian news articles about how the original budget was blown several times over.
My guess: Someone has been promised kickbacks and incentives, and the choice of a replacement has already been made. It will now be followed by a circus to "determine" that it's the best choice. And it will end up costing the tax payers a fortune. I.e. a smaller version of the F-35 scam. Follow the money trail.
There's an old joke about a tourist asking an eskimo why he still uses a dog sled instead of a snowmobile. He says "If you get stranded you can't eat a skidoo." I bet a wooden rifle stock would burn for hours to keep you warm in an emergency.
Fiberglass is nice where its warm. At low temperatures a sharp blow to these stocks will have them shatter like a dinner plate. Think Titanic hull plates slamming into hard thick ice. The metallurgy tests (1990's) showed that an iron ball hitting one of the plates at the temperature of the icy water and at the speed the ship was travelling through the water smashed through the hull plates like smashing a dinner plate. So we stay with wood. Frost, ice and thermal shock (high temperature/pressure of the round within the chamber and the low temperatures of the ambient air) are considerations too. Likewise a trigger guard that can accommodate a glove, accuracy, durability, etc.
My first deer rifle was a .303 Enfield with a sport stock. As close to a zero maintenance weapon as you will ever find. It could be replaced with a rifle similar to a 700 Remington in 30-06. It is also a very reliable gun and .06 will do the job. Still a heavy gun though.
it's all bullshit, an Enfield will take any .303 Winchester barrel. If you need to replace the breech, you're replacing the rifle anyway. It takes about twenty minutes to handcut a beech stock for the Enfield. Springs? I'm pretty sure CZ Brno or Crosman can sort that out, even Umarex. Yes, they do make firearms most would consider toys but a spring is a spring. Hell, one of my first rifles was a Frankengun, built from parts of at least four weapons from three different manufacturers.
Political debates have me rolling my eyes so much I think I got optical whiplash. I should sue. - Foamy The Squirrel
Didn't the Afghan tribesmen manufacture and use these for many years after fighting the British, until it was replace by the AK47?.
I think the problem is the Canadian government does not want to cobble together multiple suppliers for one weapon like this. If they can go with Mosin-Nagants, they have a durable weapon that's an even older design than the Enfield, and probably still has a bunch of suppliers. Just make sure to get a model with some decent sights.
They could also go with an M98 system, like a K98k.
That or you can pick a weapon that was designed sometime in the 20th Century, as opposed to the 19th. There's a lot of bolt action goodness out there.
I do agree that if they go with a composite, and not wood, they would benefit from the weight savings, but they will need to be very careful about the characteristics of the material they use, and all that technology is going to cost $$$. The big benefit of those old bolt-action rifles is that they were designed and built in the days of the conscript armies before WWI. Other than something like an AK-47, you don't find weapons as numerous, durable, and well tested these days without some R&D money that needs to be paid off.
My guess: Someone has been promised kickbacks and incentives, and the choice of a replacement has already been made. It will now be followed by a circus to "determine" that it's the best choice. And it will end up costing the tax payers a fortune. I.e. a smaller version of the F-35 scam. Follow the money trail.
DING, DING, DING! And we have our winner! Money and votes are the only motivations here. Nothing else makes sense. Money, some manufacturer is going to get a juicy multi-year exclusive contract. Votes, some MP is going to be able to say, "look how many jobs I brought into our district!"
Put my fist through my alarm clock with its ding-dong death inside my ear. - The Blackjacks.
I remember deciding whether to buy the army-surplus .303 with the wood-covered barrel ($12.95) or the sportster edition ($17.95) from the catalogue back in the 50's. I settled on a pellet gun ($6.95).
You're an idiot. WWII-vintage firearms eventually wear out, and the SMLE is no exception. Even if you could source replacement springs and firing pins, there's no replacement barrels easily available - and once the rifling is finally shot out of them, their accuracy goes right to hell.
The civilian market is flooded with powerful, reliable, accurate bolt-action rifles every bit as good, if not better, than the SMLE/Enfield. The Remington 700, which served as the basis for two different US Army sniper rifles, was originally purchased off the shelf for use by snipers in Vietnam. If someone was looking to make money via a rigged competition, they picked a spectacularly poor target for replacement: something with a vast number of cheap, cost-effective and already extant competitors, to re-equip a very small rural force who will probably keep using the same rifles for fifty or sixty years until they shoot THOSE barrels out, too.
Disclaimer: I have no Enfield experience.
It turns out that patent encumberance isn't the only thing that makes something difficult to make.
Many older weapon designs were optimized for low volume manufacturing by skilled machinists, and required hand fitting by gunsmiths and armorers. That made sense when human labor was cheap and skilled.
The Garand and M14 receivers, for instance, are very complicated to build. The 1911 is also a much loved design, but most 1911s are either built to loose tolerances or require custom, per-example fitting.
Comparatively, the AKM receiver is bent sheet metal. Any workshop that can do basic metal work can build an AKM; the barrel is the only specialized part.
The M4/AR15/M16/AR10 family of receivers were designed post-aerospace industry, and are made to be mass produced by machining down aluminum forgings. I know multiple people who have completed their own AR15 receivers on CNC equipment.
The SIG handguns manufactured in the USA are taken from billet to serial number in a single machining center; no operator intervention required.
It turns out that it can be very difficult to re-create old things. Often, the original tooling is missing. The techniques used may no longer be taught nor widely practiced.
Comparatively, building a modern mass produced firearm is a matter of having the right CAD files.
My opinions are my own, and do not necessarily represent those of my employer.
I own an early 1940s-vintage version of this rifle, and it's a solid piece of gear.
Thank you for that very clear and succinct assessment of my intellectual capacity after reading a full paragraph of my writing. Touche. You perfectly hit the nail on the head. I am totally and utterly lacking in intellectual capacity, despite any evidence to the contrary.
Now, if you'd care to engage in a rational debate without ad hominem attacks, I'd be happy to respond. If not, please go away.
Put my fist through my alarm clock with its ding-dong death inside my ear. - The Blackjacks.
They are not replicating rounds like 303 in a new weapon because they are "medium" pressure longarms circa 1930. Modern metalurgy allows for a lot more power in the same package. 308Win (7.62NATO) is cheaper and better. I would imagine that all of the MMGs and sniper rifles that India has pointed at Pakistan are 7.62 NATO or something China has produced with similar balastics and energy.
"The Adobe Updater must update itself before it can check for updates. Would you like to update the Adobe Updater now?"
Well the real issue would be how powerful a handgun would be if it had scaled from about the turn of the 20th century. The c96 Mauser fired a 86grain bullet at +1400FPS. If that had scaled like silicon, we'd have bullet powered interplanetary travel. As for current significance, that 118 year old c96 handgun still does it's job. 100 years from now it would still be just as effective. Just keep it oiled.
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Why would it be an AR? It's Canada, not the US Army. Canada used to use the FAL until switching to an AR, so some FN rifle could also be in the cards
It was a military surplus rifle that had been "sporterized" (mainly by cutting the stock down to a more civilian profile).
The Enfield has an interesting history: Back in the period leading up to WWII the British mmilitary had a good idea the war was coming. The army was armed mainly wiith the Lee-Enfield bolt action rifles and they knew they needed a good slect fire automatic/semiautomatic rifle to replace them, least they be outgunned. But they debated over WHICH design to pick for so long that, when the Blitzkreig brought the Germans into a faceoff with the British, the autos weren't yet deployed.
It turns out that the Lee-Enfield action has a number of features that make it VERY much faster to operate than other bolt-action military weapons of the time. The bolt has a very small throw angle. It has rear, not front, locking lugs (out where there's lots of clearance and little stress and opportunity for dirt to gum them up). The action is almost glassy-smooth. The bolt ball is located where it can be opened by the thumb, while slapping it closed with the palm, doesn't require accurate positioning of the hand, and guides the hand back to the correct position to fire, letting the user's attention remain on the target scene and sight picture. It cocks on closing (rather than on opening as Mausers do), dedicating essentially all the energy on opening to case extraction, rather than splitting it with spring-cocking and keeping the opening and closing work closer to equal.
The result is that, with a modicum of practice, a rifleman with a Lee-Enfield can achieve higher firing rates than the operator of a machine gun. (Machine gun rates are deliberately limited to make them easier to control and aim, avoid wasting ammunition, and reduce overheating, burnout, and jamming.) It can't keep it up as LONG, because the Lee Enfield has a small, fixed, magazine. But it can fire a couple fast, controlled, bursts - just what is needed in many situations - using a powerful rifle cartridge.
By comparison the Germans were armed with things like the recently developed "assault rifle" - a short-barreled select-fire rifle (for easy handling in cramped hallways or popping up out of a tank hatch), firing a low-powered cartridge. (Militaries had figured out that a gun should be designed to WOUND, not kill: Kill a soldier and you take one out of action - wound him and you use up him, his buddy, a medic, and a lot of infrastructure and supplies taking care of him and shipping him back home.)
The Blitzkreig stormed across much of Europe and encountered only limited resistance, typically armed with the likes of the slower bolt-action Mausers. Then they came up against the British. They knew the Brits were armed with bolt-actions and believed their own propaganda about their lack of resolve. So they expected to sweep them up as they had their previous encounters. They came charging out, and were blasted back, repeatedly, by withering fire. There are records of communications from the front where the officers were claiming all the Brits were armed with machine guns. (I hear one of these records is a recording - with the officer in question being killed in mid-message by a round from one of those Lee-Enfields.)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Having an ample sample size to work with vis a vis idiotic comments, (viz. slashdot) I have been able to apply basic pattern recogniton to your prior comment in order to swiftly categorize it. Based on this most recent reply, which characterizes my prior assesment (which was supported by argument) as an "ad hominem" statement, I submit that my analysis withstands scrutiny.
I own a .303 No.1 Mk.III Enfield. Fabulous weapon. I collect and shoot classic infantry rifles, incl. '06 Springfield, G98 Mauser, Mosin-Nagant, etc.
I agree with a comment regarding WW1-era weapons: The Germans brought a target rifle (the G98), the Americans brought a sporting rifle (the '06 Springfield) but the British brought a battle rifle (the .303 Enfield). In the hands of a skilled shooter, the fastest-action bolt gun. Ever.
And no, your crappy little plastic .22 AR is not a battle rifle. Unreliable, under-powered lead hoses. They suck. The Marines say they suck. The 11 Bravos say they suck. The SEALs say they suck. No amount of wishful thinking can change the physics of a glorified .22 versus a 7.62, 7.92, .30-06, or .303 round. AR's just suck. They were foisted on us by a rigged Army ordnance competition, and the rest is sad AR-15/M-16 history. They had to pry the M-14 away from the Marines.
Scruting the inscrutable for over 50 years.
Epoxy is a thermosetting plastic so is very unlike nylon. It's already as brittle as it is going to get at room temperature - it keeps the same toughness at lower temperatures because it doesn't have a glass transition temperature like nylon does. It's due to the two materials having very different structures. Epoxy has a lot of crosslinking, like a mesh, while nylon doesn't, like spaghetti. Cool the spaghetti down and there's a lot more resistance to it moving about on the plate until suddenly it's all stuck frozen together - glass transition temperature.
Look up "thermosetting vs thermoplastic" for some ideas. What the holders of the nylon patent know is not relevant for something made of glass reinforced epoxy resin.
It's bolt action. It's fairly accurate. It's available in .308 Winchester which means it should fire 7.62 NATO fine. IT's also available in .338 Lapua if that's preferred. It's under $1600 at single unit prices. The .338 has a box magazine.
The Ruger 700 is under $900 in .308 and it can take a suppressor, muzzle brake, or flash hider on its threaded muzzle.
The Tikka T3 CTR cost about $1000. It has a glass fiber-reinforced copolymer stock, a 10-round box magazine, an integrated picatinny rail, and a threaded muzzle.
My choice would probably be the Tikka CTR which in volume pricing should be more than affordable.
You're an idiot. WWII-vintage firearms eventually wear out, and the SMLE is no exception. Even if you could source replacement springs and firing pins, there's no replacement barrels easily available - and once the rifling is finally shot out of them, their accuracy goes right to hell.
I call BS. I can buy a brand-spanking-new replacement for literally any part of my Garand except the receiver. In fact, when I bought it, the receiver was probably the only part that was still original. I know for sure that the spiffy walnut stock and Criterion barrel were new off-the-shelf. I can also buy clips, bayonets, ammo pouches, and other accessories on the cheap. I don't personally own a Lee-Enfield, but it's a fairly popular hunting rifle. You can get parts for it. This reeks of a contract for the contract's sake.
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Whatever they choose it needs to be field serviceable, rugged and reliable. I saw a profile of a Rangers trip recently and one of their skidoos broke down. They had to disassemble part of the engine and repair it on the spot, miles from any support or assistance.
This is a key part of the attributes of a Ranger. They are used to being independent and doing what it takes to survive and achieve their mission.
Therefore they want weapons that don't break easily, parts are widely available, and field stripping is possible when needed. This happens to the the forte of the AK-47 too, but the AK is hard-core military. The Rangers want a hunting rifle that has secondary ability as a military weapon. The AK's automatic fire mode, for instance, is nearly useless in the Arctic.
Given the sheer amount of Lee-Enfields in circulation, it would probably be cheapest for them to just buy new rifles.
Just to give an example, here is what is available on a typical day on GunBroker. How many Canadian rangers are there, again?
If they want cheap, they should just buy Mosins by the crate. They can likely stock up on a dozen rifles for every ranger they have, and use them for spare parts as needed for several more decades to come.