Winchester P 14 follows me home.

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  • Last Post 30 January 2017
tturner53 posted this 28 January 2017

That's about it. I found a Winchester P 14 .303 Br. in the bargain rack at a LGS. All the metal is a-ok but somebody bubba'd the wood. Cut off the front end as usual. All matching with some interesting proof marks and such. I'm flush on .303s but couldn't resist this deal. Bore was nasty but I knew it'd clean up good enough. The rifling looks good and sharp edged like it was not shot much at all. I'll play with it and then stuff it in the box. Anybody out there messed with the P 14?

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JeffinNZ posted this 28 January 2017

I was given a Bubba'd P14. The barrel is dark and like Dry river bed. The action has been drilled for every add on you can think of. New barrels are avavilable now however so that's a good option. They shoot well and have been used for years as a foundation for many custom builds.

Cheers from New Zealand

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Ed Harris posted this 28 January 2017

I had a Remington P.14 years ago.  Was accurate enough, but never a 100% reliable feeder.  I only bought the rifle  to get the Parker-Hale sight that was on it.  

I later found a Winchester M1917, an Ogden Arsenal WW2 rework with EK inspector mark on it and bought that, put the Parker-Hale sight on it and swapped the issue rear sight onto the Remington P.14, which I then sold.  Fired lots of matches with the M1917.  Because barrel was a non-matching 2-groove WW2 rebarrel, drill and tapped it for Unertl blocks under the rear handguard and fitted it up with a 6X Unertl Vulture scope for load testing. With scope blocks and Unertl removed and rear handguard put back in place nobody was the wiser.  

Most accurate load was #314299 cast 1:5 linotype/wheel weights, sized .313” with 1:5 ATF/Beeswax lube and 30 grs. of RL7.

Also had very good results with 40 grains of either 4064, RL15 or Varget, depending on what was handy at the time.

Rifle was swapped to Maj. James Freeman, Military Police Corps, US Army, retired, who now lives in San Antonio, TX.  

Understand the rifle still does duty at his deer lease.

 

73 de KE4SKY In Home Mix We Trust From the Home of Ed's Red in "Almost Heaven" West Virginia

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papertrl posted this 29 January 2017

I have one. Also with the front wood bubba'd and an unsightly hacksaw knick in the barrel where they cut the wood. For a fun load I shoot a Lee TL314-90-SWC with 3.5 gr 700X. Still on paper at 100 yds if you elevate the rear sight ladder to 600 yards or better. I don't have anything but paper plate data for 100 yds, but at 25 yds it shot a 5-round group just under an inch. Velocity was 1040 fps. I guess that makes it about a 4 moa combination. Fun load, though. Sounds about like a .22. In fact the guy next to me at the range asked what kind of big old .22 rifle I was shooting.

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frnkeore posted this 29 January 2017

I have a ERA (Remington) P14. The forend was also shortened and the rear sigth remove and ears ground off but, I bought it because other than that, the metal was perfect, including the barrel.

I mounted a scope on it (14X) and had the drill the receiver ring, to do that. It was hard as a rock and I had to normilize the area for the two holes.

I've only shot it once since I bought it, 4 years ago. In that outing, I got a 2", ten shot group at 100. The load was a 311413 with 18.5 gr 4759 and the bullet into the rifling. 

I'm not much of a bolt action guy so, I haven't got back to it but, I'm sure it will do better than that, specially if I used a 311299.

Frank

 

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tturner53 posted this 30 January 2017

Thanks for the replies and info. I always thought these P14/17s were ugly but somehow this one caught my eye. I'll see if I can get a picture up. Could be a challenge for a caveman. With a lot of milsurps in my box I've wondered at times how much you could tell from looking at the bolt face, if original.  The ones that are more shot out (like an old Turk 98) show a ring around the firing pin hole in the bolt face that correlates to the primer pocket edge of a round of old corrosive ammo. I notice this on many guns, not just old milsurp rifles.   PP-   Ed, was the P14 feeding issue with cast bullets or just in general?

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Ed Harris posted this 30 January 2017

P14 feeding issue was in general.  

At the time I was testing hand loaded APM2 bullets and SLAP penetrator in .303 rounds against belly armor of an Mi24 and we wanted a “stronger action than a SMLE."

None of the MkVII or MkVIIIz ammo we tried initially fed reliably and the rifle was essentially a single-shot.  I finally broke down and had a Ruger No. 1 rebarrelled in .303 to use as the ammo test platform.  We got 4200 fps with 42 grs. of WC680 powder firing 7.62mm SLAP saboted penetrators in the .303 case, and sucked up all the WW2 and Korean era leftover primed .303 empties the Canadians had left.  We also got the SLAP rounds to feed and function a BREN, but then-President Carter cut off the R&D money because our policy was one of non-involvement.  Later the client had Rep. Charles Wilson of Texas wheel and deal to buy captured Soviet ZPUs etc. from Egypt using Israel and Pakistan as cutouts, and since then they made the movie Charlie Wilson's War out of it...

73 de KE4SKY In Home Mix We Trust From the Home of Ed's Red in "Almost Heaven" West Virginia

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