doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion Classic & Custom Single Barreled Sporting Rifles @ doublegunshop.com What's the story on improper heat treating on 1903

I've got money burning a hole in my pocket, but he won't sell/ship to CA. Oh well, the clown just lost a sale.

I just read on another forum where a person was asking if it was safe to fire blanks in a Low-numbered 1903.

This is what it has come down to and looks to stay that way for some time.

Something to think about.

The same workmen using the same equipment, same steel and same heat treating built a half-million Krag rifles yet I have never heard of one with burnt steel. All the warnings about Krags over the years have had to do with the single locking lug.

I have often seen the term "burned" when describing how the early single HT receivers got in to the problem condition.

Question..
What exactly is 'burned steel' as it related to HT/case hardening & the steel used in the '03?


If a piece is case hardened, however deeply,,and you don't want it case hardened anymore,,you anneal it.

Why couldn't the '03 be annealed and rehardened.
Wasn't it just being casehardened?.. or am I wrong right there..

What was the 'burned steel' thing that allowed the action the be case hardened in the first place (too deeply perhaps), but did something to the metal that wouldn't then (or now) allow annealing and re-case hardening.

Didn't the same guys ever 'burn' a Krag.


Confused,,but still shooting my Sedgley Sporter..

That has the same carving pattern as the rifle built for C.E. Sykes.

[/quote] That has the same carving pattern as the rifle built for C.E. Sykes. [/quote]

You have a sharp eye, The one you are referring to is in a collection in Montana. It also has a Hoffman barrel. Sykes was one of the people who bought Hoffman and moved it to OK. There is a possibility that this rifle like the other one was his as well.

This is the Sykes rifle from the ad as it looks today. The owner tells me that it looks like it was near a campfire.

I shoot my Sedgley too.

Steel can be "burned" when it is raised to too high a heat, which will actually burn out some or all of the carbon. The steel looses its integrity, and furthermore no longer has the same carbon content so it becomes a sort of spongey, fragile iron. It's easy to do at the forge, if you're making (say) a knife, and leave it in the fire too long, and it turns white and starts to sparkle, then you've burned that part of the steel which might as well be cut off - it will never be useful as a knife.

I'd like to know how they heated the actions, how they quenched them, tempered them, etc. etc. Is this information in Hatcher's Notebook?

There is a book "United States Rifles and Machine Guns," by Fred Colvin and Ethan Vall, which describes all of the prcedures for making the 1903 . This book was prepared in the anticipation that more factories would bebuilt to make the 1903 rifle at the time of the beginning of our entry into World War I.
I have been told that this entire book is posted on the Internet. Since I have a copy, I haven't need to check. It may have been reprinted.
Any way the description of case-hareningis as follows:

OPERATION 91 CASEHARDENING

Description of Operation--Packed in new,whole bone, heated to 750 deg. c. (1,382 deg. F.) and heated for 2 12 to 3 hr. Apparatus and Equipment: Used--Brown & Sharpe furnaces for crude oil 10 to 14 lb. air pressue: firebox 30 x 45 in.: cast-steel boxes hold 42 receivers: quenched in oil." page 80

I have a copy of TM 9-2210, War Department, July 11 1942 "Instruction guide SMALL ARMS ACCIDENTS,MALFUNCTIONS, AND THEIR CAUSES,

The mmanual shows what can happens in various circumstnces, but it has no mention of low serial numbered Springields

Thanks Ryan,I appreciate the tech info. You obviously have hands on know-how.

With regard to the '03,,if it's low carbon steel to start with,,and they 'burned' it in the process (burned the carbon out of it),,,wouldn't the end result seem to be a soft, non hardened receiver when quenched? Not the brittle over hardened problem pointed to?
Again just trying to understand.

Link to the book Paul referenced.
http://books.google.com/books?id=303zAAA...uns&f=false