TheU.S.Rifle,Caliber.30,M1917.pdfVIP

The U.S. Rifle, caliber .30, M1917 ?2003 By Dick Culver The U.S. Rifle, caliber .30 M1917 (often called the Enfield or P-17) is one of the most misunderstood and neglected of United States Service Rifles. For many years the M1917 has been basically ignored by collectors and shooters in favor of its more popular cousin, the M1903, usually called the “Ought Three” or Springfield (even though produced by both Springfield Armory and Rock Island Arsenal). Here I will attempt to give you some insight into the thinking and usage of one our most prolific and combat used battle rifles of WWI. First, we should know the intricacies and the growing pains of our main (or at least most used) service rifle of The Great War, and why in the final analysis it was not adopted as our principle service arm. Let’s start with the rifle itself and its attributes. Nomenclature of The M1917 Rifle: The U.S. Rifle has been often called the Enfield, or the P-17. While both of these conjure up a vision of the same rifle, technically neither is correct in military terms. Officially, the .30-’06 version of the British design is known as: The United States Rifle, caliber .30, M1917 and is described as a breech loading rifle of the bolt type. It is sometimes called the Enfield rifle (extracted from the War Department Basic Field Manual 23-6), since it was developed at the Royal Small Arms Factory located at Enfield Lock, in Middlesex and located approximately 11 miles north of London Bridge on the outskirts of London. M1917 Principal Dimensions, Weights and Miscellaneous Data are: Weight, without bayonet Weight with bayonet Length without bayonet Length with bayonet Diameter of bore Trigger Pull, minimum Rifling: Number of grooves Twist (uniform) Sight Radius battle sight) Battle Sight Magazine Capacity round) 9.187 lbs. 10.312 lbs. 46.3 inches 62.3 inches .30 inches 3.0 pounds 5 1 turn in 10 inches (left hand twist) 31.76 inches (31.69 inches using Set at 400 yards 6 rounds (compliments of using a