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Mountain Model Garand

8K views 19 replies 12 participants last post by  aldenl 
#1 ·
#3 ·
Have I ever mentioned how much I HATE short barreled Tanker style Garands?

OK, so you shorten the barrel to 17 1/2 inches BUT you have to have a long suppressor on it so it is ALMOST as long of a rifle as a standard length Garand. What does that get you? Less sight radius and thus less accuracy plus normally less velocity because the barrel is shorter. OK, so it is about an inch or so shorter than a full length Garand and less accurate. Is that WORTH it? Personally I don't think so.

THEN though that bipod may look "sexy" or interesting, I bet it shoots less accurately with the bipod than without.

It doesn't say in the description whether or not the receiver is re-heat treated or melonite/salt nitride treated AFTER they cut out the clip well for the magazines. If such re heat treatment is not done, NO THANK YOU, because that weakens the receiver too much.

I didn't actually measure them, but the REAL Full Auto capable BM59's I saw in Somalia all seemed to have standard full length Garand Op Rods, but it is possible I'm mistaken because I did not measure them. Of course, on those rifles had receivers that were heat teated AFTER the receivers were milled out for the magazines.

I don't know if I would ever have a magazine fed "BM 59" type rifle, but if I did, it would HAVE to have a receiver that was re-heat treated after the receiver was cut out and I personally would want the rifle full length.
 
#4 ·
velocity loss in short barrels down to 16" whether 30/06, .308 or 35 Whelen is about 192 fps.

Garand Guy has receivers that were heat treated after milling.

I do not heat treat after milling, I go the hard way and use carbide. The receivers outside case is still hard where it matters, the wear areas.

Annealing then milling and re heat treating has its own drawbacks, warping. You have to be very careful when it comes to receiver warping and I I've seen the Garand Guys, I haven't seen the warping in the samples presented to me.

As far as accuracy, at short range, I have anecdotal evidence of the shorter barrels being more accurate, I would imagine it's because of the absence of barrel whip.

It's an interesting discussion to talk about for sure.
 
#6 ·
velocity loss in short barrels down to 16" whether 30/06, .308 or 35 Whelen is about 192 fps.

(1) Garand Guy has receivers that were heat treated after milling.

(2) I do not heat treat after milling, I go the hard way and use carbide. The receivers outside case is still hard where it matters, the wear areas.

Annealing then milling and re heat treating has its own drawbacks, warping. You have to be very careful when it comes to receiver warping and I I've seen the Garand Guys, I haven't seen the warping in the samples presented to me.

As far as accuracy, at short range, I have anecdotal evidence of the shorter barrels being more accurate, I would imagine it's because of the absence of barrel whip.

It's an interesting discussion to talk about for sure.
1. GOOD info to know, thank you.

2. Tim, I agree your method does not alter the saftey features, but that is not what I'm referring to. I also have no intention of casting any sort of aspersion to you because of another's work.

HOWEVER, there was a guy by (I think) the name of Ed Bland who also just milled out the receiver with carbide mill bits from the Richmond, VA area in the 80's. He also advertised in Shotgun News back then. I am not a qualified machinist, but any real machinist would have judged a lot of his work as only fair to poor at best. When he did not warp the receiver during the milling process and the receivers were still straight, they still warped after firing between 3,000 and 5,000 rounds as many of his customers found out later on down the road because the surface hardness was lost from the areas of the receiver that were milled. The rest of the surface hardness just could not keep the receivers from warping. I've seen that happen when other guys have milled out the receievers with carbide bits as well, even when they did not warp the receivers during the milling process.

That's why I am so firm in my belief the receivers should be reheat treated after milling.
 
#7 ·
Mr. Fisher. I cannot speak to the receivers you mention and I don't know if the receivers you speak of warped because of rounds shot or age. The oldest milled receiver I have is only 5 years old so I'd know nothing of that for age related warping. I do have over 5000 rounds through it though and still no warping that I can notice. Is there a particular place I should focus on?

Where are the receivers you looked at warping Mr. Fisher? I'd love to learn anything I can whether based on controlled science or even just anecdotal.
 
#9 ·
No, I said nothing about "Age Related" warping. What I clearly stated in the post above was:

"When he did not warp the receiver during the milling process and the receivers were still straight, they still warped after firing between 3,000 and 5,000 rounds as many of his customers found out later on down the road because the surface hardness was lost from the areas of the receiver that were milled. The rest of the surface hardness just could not keep the receivers from warping."

If that was not clear, then allow me to state it this way. The receivers that had been cut with carbide cutters and Mr. Bland did not warp during cutting, warped after firing 3,000 to 5,000 rounds after the cutting was done. IOW, it was the effect of those rounds fired that warped the receivers after hardened surfaces had been cut away and the thinner metal left wound up warping because the remaining hardened surface and less metal could not stand up to the stress of that many rounds fired. These were the estimates given of the number of rounds the owners told me when the brought the rifles to me to see what was wrong. The throat erosion on the barrels indicated the estimated round counts they gave were accurate.

Where are these receivers now? One I pulled off was given back to the owner and I replaced it with a standard receiver and built the gun back as a standard rifle. On three others I personally inspected that had been modified by Mr. Bland, I don't know what the owners did with the rifles they were on as they did not have me work on them. Another four or so receivers I saw so modified by other people were also kept by the owners or sold or whatever they did with them and those I saw while stationed in California and inspected the rifles there. Bottom line is that none of the rifles were mine, so I have no idea what happened to them.

These receivers had all been machined in the 80's or very early 90's before you began doing it. If I did not make myself clear, and I thought I had, NONE of them were receivers or rifles you machined or built.
 
#16 ·
The area of the front receiver legs was the most notable warping point. The owners of the rifles said they could not get the actions out of GI stocks without undue force and in one case it actually cracked the stock. On one or two of the rifles, even a well worn GI stocks would no longer fit down over the warped receiver legs without having to do some serious filing inside the stocks.

Now, of course I have no idea whether the receivers were stress relieved before or after the machining was done. I don't think they were stress relieved after the machining was done, but I don't know for sure. I also don't know if stess relieving the areas after machining would have kept the receiver legs from warping.

What I did notice on the approximate 1/2 dozen or more REAL BM59's/64's I examined in Somalia was that the receiver legs were not warped and those rifles had at least 3,000 rounds fired, if not more and in a couple of cases a LOT more rounds fired, judging by the Throat Erosion Readings in them. Those receivers were hardened after they were originally machined to those specs when the receivers were first manufactured.
 
#13 ·
I dont know anything about them really besides the winter trigger guard. One of my best friends grandfathers was a 10th Mountain soldier in WWII. I have heard some of his stories second hand of 10th Mountains exploits during and after WWII apparently he was still fighting SS Gorilla units in the Alps 6 months after VE day.
(Not trying to snipe on your thread buddie)
 
#14 ·
I post this with the best of intentions.

We all know what the road to hades is paved with.
Metal warps from its at rest position due to internal stress, machine the metal, remove some, if the metal has internal stresses than it moves, the machining is a form of stress relief. If the metal doesn't have internal stress and the machine operation does not impart any stresses than it does not move. I think a relative solution would be cryo stress relief of the Garand receiver prior to machining, that is if the receiver has internal stresses.
Oh yea for those who stipulate cast is equal to forged, cast receivers have internal stresses because the different parts of the receiver based on mass cool at different rates, hammer forging reduces internal stresses and orients grain structure. Cast receivers can contain alot of stress due to the casting process, if someone wanted to do a bang up job, cast the receiver, stress relief the receiver, machine the receiver, heat treat the receiver, and stress relief the receiver again. Now back to that road.
Just my 2 pennies.

Jim
 
#17 ·
Like I said Mr. Fisher, I wanted to hear what you had seen, anecdotal or not. I have seen what you describe but I've seen it on standard Garands as well. On the 59, which requires pretty thin legs, you can literally bend the legs by hand. If I had it my way, I'd just cut them off as you don't need them but in an effort to make things look real, they are profiled and left on.

On my M14 magazine mod, I started out leaving 1/3 of the front leg on but have now gone to no front legs at all.

Always good hearing what you've seen Sir.
 
#19 · (Edited)
Looks like a Frankengun, IMHO.
I'd feel better if the rifle used the later BM-59 type gas cylinder and op-rod. Again, IMHO, too many of the short barreled garand type rifles with the original gas cylinder/ op-rod configuration tend towards unreliable operation for me.
That bi-pod doesn't look anything like an Italian BM-59 rifle for mountain troops.
Makes me wonder about the magazines he's using too.

To be clear, the above is about the gun in the OP. Not anything to do with Shufflin's work.
 
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