The rear sight ears on the receiver have been ground off too, so you won’t be able to install an original rear sight.  Scope is probably your best bet, although your choice of mounts will be limited to ones that don’t use the rear sight axis pin lugs.  

The rifle is of course a Savage made No. 4 Mk I*, not a Mk 4, which is an entirely different rifle (.22 conversion of the SMLE Mk III). 

Updated and corrected the post title, thanks for that heads up! 

The barrel is 21.0625" and has a nice rounded crown. I have pretty much settled on the Red Star Mountain mount for the reasons you mention and that, at least in my opinion, the other side mount scope options are an affront unto the Lord.  The stock will allow for a slight adjustment in head position to make a scope usable without a cheek piece if the scope is low enough, which that mount should provide.  My challenge at this point is finding a 'smith that would tackle this without wanting to make a boat payment or spending 20 minutes explaining why I should dump this and get a (insert some other random rifle name here) because those are REAL rifles 

A sweated on ramp/globe/post or something is on the list, but I do have an issue with Mission Creep and spending monnies I don't have  . . . 

Why wouldn't the repro Sniper bracket work?   Looking at this photo from some RMS mounting instructions it looks like it *should* work, but I'm pretty new to this mount.  

For some reason the Parker Hale one didn't come up in my searches, now that I know what to look for it does seem like a good clean option.    The 'affront' reference was to the ones that look closer to the Weaver / (you hope it will) B-Square style mounts

I had a "One piece stock" Enfield once.

Make doubly sure the "main (King) screw" is absolutely perfectly set up.

The entire barreled action & bolt can "come up out of here" at you!

It's a blind mag conversion, so no magazine to show.  It will likely be Tues (or maybe Wed) morning before I can pull the action but I can grab a quick photo of the trigger guard area tomorrow 

I am not trying to dissuade you from purchasing the reproduction sniper scope mount from RMS. What I am relaying to you is there is more to it than just drilling and tapping some holes and then bolting everything together. It is very time consuming and if it not done correctly, you are left with a rifle that will never zero. The other issue is the limited choices of scopes that will work with that scope bracket...

No worries, I appreciate the conversation and information!   

In addtion to the detail work required I'm also running into an issue of finding a good 'smith to do the work. I have been looking at the Parker Hale A29 scope base and it looks like the base is relatively easy to source, bur the correct but the mounting block and rings can be a bit more difficult.   One thought I had was to use an old Leupold Adjusto Mount I have by milling the bottom flat and getting the correct mount hole spacing.  For those not familiar with this mount it was used on scopes with no internal adjustments and the rear ring is adjustable for W&E.  With an older Leupold 3X scope it would (at least at a glance) look period correct, more so than a Weaver rail would

There is an old & seldom mentioned alternative!

google the old "indestructable" mount! (link below)

Its made from 1" angle iron & I think you have enough left of the left receiver wall flat to take advantage of it.

Once made you can bolt any one of a number of rail sections to it (with very careful alignment) & go from there with standard rings & so on!

https://303british.com/the-indestructible-scope-mount-for-lee-enfield-rifles/" rel="nofollow - https://303british.com/the-indestructible-scope-mount-for-lee-enfield-rifles/

Although I admire the ingenuity and resourcefulness of that solution it's pretty much the look I am trying to avoid for this rifle.  

yumastepside wrote: A very nice looking rifle....all scope mounting problems aside, I would like to see the underside of this stock to see how the trigger guard and magazine are attached....any chance of a pic with the action out of the stock?? Roger

Yeah, it was a wildly different world 50 years ago *shrugs* 

There was a fad for it "back in the day"

Mauserizing the Enfield!

I'm not knocking this in any way, just surprised at it all...

I keep thinking about your concerns about scoping the rifle and after looking at all the pictures you have shown us, it is my opinion and mine alone that you should just locate a Parker Hale front ramp sight off of eBay, "there are several" and sweat/solder it to the end of your barrel. It is too nice of a rifle the way it is...

Agreed, my eyes say 'scope' but my heart is saying irons.  My left eye is getting upgraded to a cataract free version in October and I'm curious to see how that effects things.  I'm right handed and that eye isn't quite bad enough yet for insurance to pay for that one but it will be interesting to see the difference  

ive lways steered away from these threads as i like to have good things to say , as i said i admire the workmanship and ingenuity im just unclear what the intent was and why ? the enfield offers so much to those that embrace them , there are others that fit a one piece stock that offer equal opportunity to modify , why the enfield unless it was a challenge one could not get past - then why come to an enfield site to unveil it ? just asking , please explain me . 

BTW no real flame nor any other attack intended , mostly curious , ive no real interest beyond that 

Maybe you had to be there?  Not guessing your age or making any assumptions, however often times when I here this argument it's from someone born in the late 60's to early 70's and beyond.  I'm counting down to 60 this year but I can recall the barrels of Swedish Mausers and M1 Carbines that gun stores couldn't sell and they just tossed them in there to make room for new production bolt actions well into the 80's.  It was also occasionally a matter of economics if you had the old war horse stuck in a closet a mail order stock or even a quick trip to the local 'smith could refresh the old gun a bit. And at least antidotally, there may have been some that had lingering trauma from war time service associated with the rifles in stock format but needed a hunting rifle the change was enough for them to get past prior associations.    Some also were cut or had the buttstock removed to slip into a duffle and if the removed section was lost or damaged a sporter replacement may have been easier to come by 

But, what is done is done.  There is no restoring this rifle back to its original configuration. If it were me, I would not do anymore cutting, grinding or drilling.  Fit a front sight (it must have had one) and enjoy it for what it is.  I suspect it will shoot very good if it’s got a decent bore. 

Back in the mid to late 60's Parker Hale Ltd. bought thousands upon thousands of No4Mk1&2 recievers "In The White" and sporterized the bejezzus  out of them. The Golden State Arms Santa Fe Division in California did the exact same thing with modifying the No4 Enfield as well as Gibbs/Navy Arms. 

A decade earlier a company in Canada called E.A.L. purchased several thousand No4 action bodies, barrels and whatnot from the Long Branch facility and created their own "Sporterized" version that the CAF and Canadian Rangers were more than happy to aquire. The case can be made about the Envoy and Enforcer as well with both being a Sporterized version of the L39A1 & L42A1 since those were for Civilian/Police use only with Parker Hale producing many of the Enforcers. Take into consideration the, "Commercial Lee Speed." A military rifle that was Sporterized by the same hands that were creating its military counterparts in the same facility. The act of Sporterizing ANY military firearm is as old as the day is long and will continue to be so. Accept it for what it's worth...

To be fair the "collectable" aspect of MilSurps is a fairly recent thing.

Barrels of "take your pick for $15" was the norm back then.

I still recall being sold my issue (just issued, less than a year before), probably only had 2~300 rounds through it during that year, mummy-wrapped No4 Mk2 for £7.00!

I was on the Wing & County shooting team & we only requested them from Central Stores when I discovered them in the "Book of Armaments" by mistake. We were shooting with gawd knows how old No4 Mk1's

They were being surplussed off like crazy because the L1A1 "Ess Ell Arr" was coming immediately.

I had an FAC (licence) but if you didn't they'd hold it for you till yours arrived & even provide assistance in the form of references, training records & do on.

I don't think I didn't know of a sported one in the more rural areas.

In the UK, many No4 T rifles were converted to similar spec for target competition's. The "Whitaker Enfield's).

Apparently they were accurate!

The same thing pops up on other forums as well, a great example would be vintage car forums that bemoan the scarcity of unmolested Model T's while at the same time there are other forums or sub forums that can't get enough of the 1950's Model T based Hot Rods 

Chacun à son goût 

Yes, a friend of mine had one.

Not as severely modded as this IIRC though.

Six à un une demi-douzaine à l'autre...

I grew up with several walls in our house full of various Service Rifles, mostly of British origin, plus numerous versions of the Ross rifles.  None were sporterized.  That collection would be quite valuable today.  The Ross Match rifle in particular would be worth a lot, even more that the No. 4 (T) rifles Dad had.  

Place the blame on directly on manufacturers such as Parker Hale,  Golden State Arms,  Gibbs Rifles, BSA, Charnwood Ordnance, etc that, after there was no practical use for a fully dressed military rifle those people sought to profit by converting whatever military firearm they had into a "Sporting Rifle". Particularly anything with a Mauser action. Fortunately for the Lee-Enfield, it only sees a very small niche in the Sporting Rifle Industries due largely in part to its two piece stock and rear locking lug design. A perfect example of a firearm designed solely for military use but has since been Sporterized beyond belief in its civilian dress is the product of one Eugene Stoner...

And let's not forget without that trend we would not have anything with the name Weatherby on it 

I'm not sure, times change, things that weren't "collectable" become so. They were never made as "collectables", like many things but they became so.

I've never sporterised anything that wasn't "Pre Buggered, by Bubba".

Even the No4 Mk2 mummy is "de-convertable" in about 10 minutes as I have every orignal part all kept together.

I wanted one "sporter", so I bought the bubba'd No5, for the right price, knowing where it was going.

i do also remember the new hunting rifles were high priced in comparison , i recall all the deer hunting rifles made from milsurps , but seldom did anyone go to anything like this amount of work to do it , i hope it shoots well for you , enjoy it , 

for the record im in my early 70s 

Military rifle collecting is not a new thing though.  My Dad was a collector, he belonged to an association of Canadian Arms Collectors in the 1960’s.   I wouldn’t call myself a “collector”, a real collector is someone like Terrylee.  And yes, it seems to have gotten a bit more popular with the interest in reassembling rifles to be “correct” in terms of the configuration of the various parts to match the receiver date.  

There also was never a lot of interest in the LE’s in the US, a “not invented here” mentality, so it can’t be a good rifle, right?  This is where a lot of these notions originated, a “weak springy action”, two piece stock, rear locking lugs, and other criticisms.  I won a annual match last year with my No. 4 against shooters with many different vintage military Service Rifles, including the M1, 1903 Springfield, M1917, Mausers, K-31 Swiss, and others.  The Match Director was rather surprised someone “with a Lee Enfield” won, which he thought was one of the ugliest rifles made and never shot well.  

The LE was obviously a very effective service rifle, and I suspect it made a very good hunting rifle in its original and sporterized form. 

I recently chatted with an individual over his 1943 U.S. PROPERTY No4Mk1* in that he was adamant about having everything fitted with all the metal bits stamped with a square S and that,"his words now," this sh*tty stock with the yellow specks in the wood HAS to be replaced with that dark wood and the piece with the slits cut in it so it can be collectable once more and worth more than what I paid for it. I took the time to examine his rifle and found that it had been FTR'd some time in 1947 and that the barrel had been changed to a M47C stamped 5 groove but it appeared that the  Beechwood stock set was original to the rifle. After explaining how the FTR worked and that what had been done at the factory level and that he should leave well enough alone. He thought about that for a moment and then went out and bought every metal part with a Savage stamp on it, found a walnut stockset with the slits in the upper hand guard and as final touch, found a wore out 2 groove barrel to replace that, "his words again" that hideous and not correct to MY rifle junk barrel. The gunsmith hired to do the work charged this individual over $700.00 in just the labor but, this individual now has a Period Correct 1943 No4Mk1* that he currently has on consignment at a Collectors Warehouse of antique firearms with a Buy It Now price of $2000.00. I asked if I could have that hideous 5 groove barrel and he simply handed it to me and said do whatever you want with it. That barrel is on my Faux Parker Hale currently. This is the issue with collecting the Lee-Enfield rifles in that people today are overlooking What it Was and hyper focusing on What It Needs To Be, for it to be collectable by adding Period Correct pieces, forgetting or not even realizing that those rifles were assembled with whatever pieces were directly in front of the person assembling that part of the rifle at the time it rolled down the assembly line. Especially if it was sent to Fazackerly for Refurbishment. The Sportification of a military rifle, IMHO was derived by the actual producers of those firearms so that those who were once charged with operating them in their respective military configuration could now operate and handle them in their new civilian applications. We have places to properly view original and unmolested military firearms and we also have had firearm manufacturers that took alot of military firearms and Sporterized them. We also have the Backyard Gun Smith that went one step further to produce what the OP to this thread has shared with us. Do not criticize the individual or their firearm of choice be it, Collectable, Original Military application, or Sporterized.  Accept it as it is...

When I had examined it, it had been FTR'd by Fazackerly in 1947 and had a barrel replacement done and in the process had various metal bits replaced with non Savage stamped items.

This, "individual" and I use that word loosely,  went and bought every part he could locate with a square S stamped on it, including a very worn 2 groove Savage barrel and then paid over 700 dollars in labor to have a gunsmith disassemble a perfectly good rifle and reassemble it with a worn out barrel and metal bits that are just short of rusting apart just so he could own a Period Correct No4Mk1* with all matching pieces when he would have been better off leaving the rifle alone in its FTR'd condition. That also included removing the Beechwood stockset that WAS original to the rifle and replacing it with a walnut stockset because,(His Words), "Every S stamped Brit gun I saw had slits on that top wood thing!" He has it for sale right now for 2000.00 and it matters nothing to him that that it probably will not shoot accurately any longer. The FTR'd rear sight WAS a MkI Poole made example but was replaced with a S stamped L flip type. Technically yes, it was a "mixmaster" of parts but done at the Fazackerly factory and was updated with a 5 groove barrel and a MkI micrometer sight so it was still considered "Original" and WAS very much collectable. Now its Period Correct...

I have a spare Addley Precision NoTap scope mount that I decided to cutdown and shorten to see if it would be feasible to mount to a receiver that has been cutdown like yours or mine without having to find a piece of angle iron and then an actual scope mount. Initial mockup  looks promising...

I don't have another receiver on hand to compare mine to, but from what I can tell the left receiver wall has not been modified in any way, so any mount that only mounts on the left side of the receiver should work OK.   If anyone missed it in my first post, here is the catalogue from Robert's Wood Products that has the instructions this modification on page 20 - 22

https://archive.org/details/roberts-wood-products-gunstocks/page/20/mode/2up" rel="nofollow - https://archive.org/details/roberts-wood-products-gunstocks/page/20/mode/2up

From the pictures the left side receiver wall has been modified in 2 places:

The "square bit, sticking up" for the charger bridge has been removed down to level with the rest of the side wall.

The pivot block for the rear sight pivot has also been lowered to the same alignment.

Neither will be a problem as long as whatever sight mount you use isn't using those place for anything.

Many ND/NT use the rear sight pivot hole though.

I drilled the holes and cut the notch out for the ejector screw HT.

I cut the mount down to match my PH A29 scope base. I only did this because there are alot of "Sporterized/Customized" Enfields out there like mine and the OP's that could benefit from a mount like this. It's already centered over the rifles boreline...