Parker Hale Question

[OleReb]

I have acquired a Parker Hale Enfield repro. artillery carbine/musketoon serial number 36395. What have I got? Is it one of the "good" ones or not?
Thanks for any info

[R. McAuley 3014V]

Hmmmm... SN 36395? Is the trigger-plate marked “Made in Italy”? If so, it’s one of the Italian-made Parker Hales. The barrel is also marked with a BM in rectangle, which means it was made in 1999, some nine years after Val Forgett at Navy Arms bought out Parker-Hale Ltd. So what do you define as “one of the ‘good’ ones?”

Below is a photo of your carbine (note same serial number and date code), as well as a 50-yard target from my first outing with the carbine in May 2002 (shortly after I purchased the carbine from Navy Arms at the 105th National), using 45 grs FFg with a Rapine 575460 minie. If you are not getting comparable results, you have had the carbine for what, five years now? 1) Where has it been stored? And 2) what modifications have you done to it? When it was sold, it wasn’t sold on account of there being anything wrong with it or because it wasn’t wanted. It was sold as a sacrifice, in order to buy something else. I had just had to replace the central air system in my house at a cost of $4K, and my fiancée was in chemo battling stomach cancer. Money was wee bit tight.

Now, if you think there’s is something not right about the carbine, I’ll be happy to give you your money back, if that’s what you want? I don’t necessarily need two Parker Hale artillery carbines but it is a good shooter, or was five years ago. I can always re-barrel it as a 20-gauge smoothbore. If it’s because you aren’t getting the same results as I did, then I suggest you let Joe Howard Sr shoot it. Some years back, I had bought a new musket and thought there was something wrong with it, Joe picks it up and proceeded to shoot it, and couldn’t miss with it. That’s when I learned, it wasn’t the musket’s fault—

http://i267.photobucket.com/albums/ii305/rmac1023/PH36xxx3.jpg
http://i267.photobucket.com/albums/ii305/rmac1023/PH36xxx2.jpg
http://i267.photobucket.com/albums/ii305/rmac1023/ItalianBM.jpg
http://i267.photobucket.com/albums/ii305/rmac1023/PH5052702.jpg

Twenty years ago, the Parker-Hale 1861 Artillery Carbine retailed for $465, and today, five years after you bought the above carbine for $500, retail is now $900— and you want to know whether you got “one of the ‘good’ ones?”
http://www.dixiegunworks.com/product_in ... cts_id=953 (http://www.dixiegunworks.com/product_info.php?products_id=953)

[toad]

There seems to be a lot of snobbery with skirmishers with regards to all english made Parker Hales. I tried to sell my two bander at the nationals and several people turned their nose up at it because the serial number was in the 9000 range. It was always my understanding that anything below 14,000 was all english made but have never been made privy to any information supporting this claim. If anyone can shed some light on this subject, please weigh in. Nonetheless I have dozens of italian guns that are damn fine shooters so I don't understand this brand snobbery anyhow.

[John Holland]

I believe you will find your answers at http://britishmilitariaforums.yuku.com/. I don't have first hand knowledge of it, as I don't care enough to go look. It's just what I've been told.

As far as "snobbery" goes, talk to the Sharps shooters and discuss Shiloh vs Pedersoli....or if you want a real experience go to a hi-power long range match and ask one of the competitors you are competing against what load they are shooting. The best treatment you will get is as if you have leprosy. At least in the N-SSA someone is always willing to help you with whatever type of shooting problem you are experiencing. I've participated in many, many, shooting disciplines over the years, from archery to hi-power, and the N-SSA membership is unique in their unselfish willingness to help. The rest of them will tell you to "pound salt" at best.

JDH
44th NY

[John Gross]

There seems to be a lot of snobbery with skirmishers with regards to all english made Parker Hales....Nonetheless I have dozens of italian guns that are damn fine shooters so I don't understand this brand snobbery anyhow.

Snobbery might not be the best word to use, especially on your first post at the N-SSA Board :)

Some things just carry a certain aura or mystique about them. Harley Davidson, Pre-64 Winchester, a genuine Colt Single Action, or a newly made original Hawken Rifle from The Hawken Shop.

None of the above may be better than their competition, but there is....something....about them.

John Gross

[R. McAuley 3014V]

Whether a Parker-Hale Enfield is English-made or Italian-made, it is nothing more than a replica Enfield. Despite the hype about how it was recreated using a set of original Enfield pattern gauges loaned to the makers by Herbert J. Woodend, MBE (1943-2003), Custodian of the British Pattern Room at Enfield Lock (not the Tower of London as some have surmised), Parker-Hale replicas were not manufactured using the original RSAF machinery, so are not fully-interchangeable with original arms. Yet, that seems to be the public’s perception.

For example, if you try to install an English-made P-H barrel in an original RSAF Enfield, not only does the replica barrel not fit the stock channel at the snail, the hole for the tang screw does not align because the length of the replica’s tang is a quarter-inch too short. Trying to re-fit original Enfield lock-plate or whole lock doesn’t fit any better than an original Tower lock-plate. Even replacing the Baddeley-pattern barrel bands with the earlier Palmer-style barrel bands is no guarantee they will fit. Rather, while the Parker-Hale barrel bands often require you to “spread” the bands with a screwdriver to remove them from the stock because they are so tight, original bands are so loose they practically fall off because the replica stock is too small for the original bands, while the other portions of the stock is larger than an original.

So while the mystique surrounding the Parker-Hale is not vanished by such shortcomings, I recall that when the Euroarms P53 first came out, Euroarms made much the same claim about its product being more authentic than the Parker-Hale because the Euroarms product was made with a one-piece walnut stock, while the English-made Parker-Hale P53 had a two-piece stock, finger-jointed beneath the lower barrel band. Yet, the latter never really affected sales to my knowledge. It never deterred me from buying one, and I have owned several Parker-Hales and EOA Enfields as well. All I was ever concerned with was how tight they grouped, and how fast I could reload! Perhaps that may explain why for nearly 18 years, I shot an original 1860 Enfield short rifle.

[Southron Sr.]

Back in the 1970's the Parker-Hale company constructed a barrel making machine at their factory in Birmingham, England that made the P-H barrels by "Hammer Forging" which (as I undersand it) is to mechanically "hammer," and pound a piece of steel around a mandrel that will produce a finished barrel.

Even though the P-H company has been sold, that machine is still in the factory at Birmingham, pounding out barrels that then are shipped down to Italy to be installed in the "Italian made" P-H Enfields!

One of the BEST SHOOOTING rifles available today (and since it was introduced in the 1970's) is the repro P-H Naval Rifle with the five groove, 1 in 48" twist barrels. The original Naval Rifles with the 1 in 48" twist were legendary for their accuracy. Unfortunately, the "other" two band Enfield repros as made by Euroarms, Armisport, etc, DON'T have 1 in 48" twist barrels, but usually barrels with slower twists.

Another advantage of the hammer forging process of making barrels is that due to the pounding the barrel receives when it is being made, the steel is HARD-which produces a barrel that is superior to the barrels made out of soft, easy to machine, steel that other Italian makers often use.

UNFORTUNATELY, Navy Arms (that owns the P-H company now) DOSEN'T SELL replacement, hammer forged Naval Rifle barrels-although there are a lot of old P-H Naval rifles out there that now need new barrels!

[R. McAuley 3014V]

UNFORTUNATELY, Navy Arms (that owns the P-H company now) DOSEN'T SELL replacement, hammer forged Naval Rifle barrels-although there are a lot of old P-H Naval rifles out there that now need new barrels!

Sorry Brannen, but that's not entirely true. There are a few, maybe a couple hundred or so, unused pre-1990 inventory Parker-Hale barrels available on the market that were purchased from the auction of Parker-Hale Ltd (separate from Val's acquisition of the Parker-Hale name), and these barrels have been advertised on-line periodically. A couple of years ago, I bought one of the P53 barrels (minus sights) from a Canadian exporter who had purchased the barrels from the auction. The barrel was in the 65xx serial number range and had never been stocked but very nicely blued with mint bore, for about $350 CAN. I also bought one of the 20 gauge smoothbore barrels (also mint bore) for the P61 carbine minus the breech for like $15. So contrary to the myth that any certain serial number range denotes the quantity of the 1st generation P-H rifles, rifle muskets, and carbines made, the serial numbers only denotes the quantity of patent breech-pieces that were serialized not the quantity of completed barrels, or rifles, rifle muskets, and carbines.

[liontame5]

Hey friends..

This may be of help--at least it came from an appropriate site..Muzzle Loader's Assn of Great Britain..28 Jan, 2010
RE: PH serial numbers...here are sets of manufacturing 'runs'
0000 to ~9000 made in Birmingham
~9000 to 14000 Birmingham barrels, rest made in Italy
>14000 Italian made.

Best!

liontame5
Central Texas