doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion Classic & Custom Single Barreled Sporting Rifles @ doublegunshop.com Springfield M1922 Magazine Treatment

I've never worked on an M-22 or a M-52, but I have closely examined just a few sopisticated custom jobs. the most recent was an M-22 by Stephen Heilmann, I detailed in an Accurate Rifle story (with cover photo below in November 2001. It has custom bottom metal milled from bar stock, but altered original magazines are inserted through the faux floorplate. (The action was shortened and other extensive alterations accomplished. An extraordinary rifle all around!)


All the hinged floorplate, .22 magazine conversions I've seen, did not have the magazine attached to the floorplate. Unless, I am not correctly understanding, I don't know why one would want to attach the magazine to the floorplate?


BTW, Joe, you'd have to be a great friend to have a good enough friend to give that rifle to, I applaud you!

Best,
Steve

Joe is a friend as i am,and hard to get rid of.ben



Steve it is nice to hear from a person that can do the work on a rifle then talks about it. i look forward to your next post.ben

Steve, this has long been just a hobby with me; admittedly it's sometimes more of a vocation in the spiritual sense, but I try to keep the pressure down by only working what & when I want. It takes me such a long time to finish a project that doing it commercially is out of the question, so I frequently give away the product to a nephew or friend or friend's son. This custom isn't new with me, when I was just a chap I watched two well-regarded local craftsmen give away their work; AAMOF a gift was the ONLY way a person could get either a walking cane from the one or a Kentucky/Pennsylvania long rifle from the other, and each product was recognizable & widely coveted in the area. The 1903 I'm building now will be my gift to a friend's son in 2-3 more years, depending upon his graduation date.

The friend who received my 1922 also has a fine little Mauser sporter repeater 22LR with mannlicher-style stock by Ed Shulin. Remember that name? Ed's first year as an instructor at Trinidad was also my freshman year as a student, and we had many a 'discussion'. The poor guy still won't believe that Joe Namath didn't really learn to play serious football until he left NY to attend college in the SEC!(G)

The same friend also has a bench-converted 700/40X 22LR repeater that's worthy of mention here. I had a RF 40X complete bolt and we both knew where there was an orphan 700SA receiver and my friend wanted a super-accurate 22 WMR, so we built a single shot magnum with Shilen CF barrel. Short version, it didn't shoot to suit so he converted it to use a 10/22 magazine and set the barrel back using my 22LR match reamer. Short version again, it shot like a house afire and will still shoot into 1/2 MOA on a good day. The part that's worthy of mention is that all this took place about 4 years before the 77/22 was released, due entirely to my friend's imagination and workmanship. I figured that my 1922 would be in good company and the gift was especially gratifying to me since my friend's father was one of my early gunsmithing and flying mentors.

As I mentioned on another forum recently and as my friend Ben Shelor The Infamous Engraver already knows, it's very satisfying to pay forward rather than pay back. Both my smithing mentors have died so I pay forward where I can.
Regards, Joe

Steve, I forgot to add that my last hidden mag conversion was adapting a 1909 Mauser hinged floorplate (floorplate only) fitted to the TG of an 1891 Mauser converted to 223. I used a Rem 788 223 magazine, shortened and silver-soldered to the inside of the floorplate. It worked OK and is one of my varminters but the next one will be detachable as you said. It's somewhat difficult to add the very last cartridge to the now-integral mag since it's hinged and not completely removable. A removable floorplate as in most 1903/1922s would simplify loading but I agree that a separate magazine is preferable.
Regards, Joe

Ben & Joe,
Sorry I haven't gotten back to you. I greatly enjoy and appreciate your personal comments about the thoughts and feeling that go along with all of this technical shop talk.
Sometimes I post long and lots, and sometimes I don't because I'm either over-the-top busy with what is making a living rather than a hobby or past-time, or I'm just written out which happens when one produces some 30-50 thousand words per year for hire. (Both at the moment!)

Ed Shulin taught me how to make stocks and I will forever remember the wonderful times I had in his shop, and in and around Trinidad with Ed and Lee(Mrs. Shulin) with my ex-wife.

(I clearly remember the discovery that someone could, in fact, Make a Custom Rifle!!! And then found myself DOING IT!!

In 1998 I had the pleasure of teaching Stockmaking for Single Shots in Ed's old shop at TSJC during an NRA summer session (20 years after graduating). I invited Ed in one day (saw quite a bit of he and Lee while there) and got him talking and drawing on the chalk-board, just like he did when I was the student! (Giggle!)

Photos circa 1977
Two pics of Ed Shulin (blue jumpsuit) in his TSJC shop teaching my class stockmaking.
And two photos of my first Mauser, metalwork next to Am. walnut blank and highest priced French blank (Tessier) at the bookstore ($85 a birthday gift from my wife!) Other photo of that metal in that Am. walnut blank, my first stock, in Shulin's classroom.
That rifle was my .270 O'Connor dream and I sold it in about 1984(?) for $400 to buy a plane ticket to Vegas to join the Guild and show my muzzleloaders. Wasn't I surprised when I got there and everyone had bolt rifles and no m/l guns but mine!
Sorry for hijack! (BTW, Heard Bill Prator, TSJC GS Dept. head, died recently.) Wouldn't it be great to tell stories!

Also, I endlessly edit this stuff just like I do with manuscripts which adds lots of time!

Steve, I was vacationing in Trinidad ~ 1999 & 2000, saw Ed & Lee then and even bought 2 profiled blanks from him. He told me then that Bill Prator was in really bad shape and wouldn't remember me, so I didn't call on him. Boots Obermeyer told me that Prator's old P&W barrel-making machines had been sold, finally, and I gathered that the reason was lack of interest by the students. Too bad.

Ed told me that before his retirement from TSJC he went through a bad period with his students when all they wanted to build was something made of painted synthetics. I've heard through the grapevine that he, Ed, is finally thinking of selling his stock profiling business and I'm encouraging one of Ed's nearby (nearby to me, grin) customers to buy it. The older I get, the more I appreciate good wood & good workmanship. Ed tried his best to teach us about both!

At least with you he succeeded.....
Best, Joe

I didn't look up Bill Prator on the same advice.
Here are a couple of pics of him (also circa 1977) at his lathe and teaching spring tempering and a shot of those rifling machines. I had no interest in rifling, but remember watched Dennis Detloff (an instructor) re-cut a .32 Ballard to .44 S&W Special.
For all we learned at TSJC (at least those of us who took it seriously) the school always seemed about one tooth out of sync, eh?
I spent a bunch of time with Prator running his trap line up near Tercio during holidays.

I have a framed print of Lee's, Fisher's Peak, and a couple of her small original oils of Fisher's from that time period. Bet you were shooting iron over the hill?
Did/do you know Dave Sullivan (Westwind Rifle, CO), a classmate of mine and Racine,WI, Obermeyer friend?
Ed taught me well and I think of him often when working walnut.
Lots of memories.

BTW-- This is were I most recently saw the Blackburn M-52 bottom metal! (and a lot of other great work)
http://www.martiniandhagngunmakers.com/custombarrels.htm

Numrich Arms in West Hurley, NY (now Gun Parts Corporation) used to sell a one piece Springfield firing pin made up using parts from a 1922. They may still have some. Also, there was a Garand speed action made for the 1903 International Match rifles, it used a square cross section striker spring and a skeletonized one piece striker to keep the weight down. I had one and put it into a sporter, the bolt lift was very hard because of the powerful spring and I removed it. Today a Garand speed action is a prime collector piece and would go for big bucks.

I should add that the Garand speed actions were classical examples of Springfield Arsenal toolroom virtuosity, supreme metalsmithing.