Skipman Posted 5 August , 2013 Share Posted 5 August , 2013 A useful book The complete Lewis Gunner pdfMikeLet me know if link works ok? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Strawb67 Posted 5 August , 2013 Share Posted 5 August , 2013 Yep! Link is good, interesting reading. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted 5 August , 2013 Share Posted 5 August , 2013 Yep! Link is good, interesting reading. Aye, looks good. Thanks for letting me know. It does say American, so not sure how different this version of LG might be? Mike Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Strawb67 Posted 5 August , 2013 Share Posted 5 August , 2013 Not sure on that Mike, did the Americans rejig the calibre of the Lewis to the same as their small arms to .300 calibre as opposed to .303? The front cover describes it as the .300 Lewis Gun. It Would make sense for troops that were operating within their own nationality but the use of like weapons by various nationalities but in variant models would cause issues in battle. John Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted 5 August , 2013 Share Posted 5 August , 2013 " did the Americans rejig the calibre of the Lewis to the same as their small arms to .300 calibre as opposed to .303? " Quite possibly John? Hopefully some of the resident " arms experts " will tell us soon. Cheers Mike Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TonyE Posted 6 August , 2013 Share Posted 6 August , 2013 The U.S. issue Lewis guns were chambered for the .30 calibre cartridge. They were made by the Savage Arms Corp. (who had made the early Lewis prototypes) and there was no need to "rejig" the calibre, as being American the Lewis was originally designed in this calibre. The "rejigging" had been done by BSA in 1913 when they undertook to manufacture the Lewis for Armes Automatique of Belgium (Col. Lewis's sales/manufacturing company) by modifying it to fire the .303 inch round and seven other European military calibres. Regards TonyE Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Strawb67 Posted 6 August , 2013 Share Posted 6 August , 2013 Thanks Tony! I wasn't sure of which way the alteration of the calibre went. Were they as prone to jamming if the US ammunition was used in the .303 chambered Lewis as the SMLE was when the US Pattern 14 .30 calibre ammunition was mixed up? John Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TonyE Posted 6 August , 2013 Share Posted 6 August , 2013 There is no way that a .303 inch weapon could chamber a .30 calibre round. I have never heard of any problems with anyone trying to feed .30 cal rounds into a SMLE, Are you sure you do not mean the Pattern '14 rifle? The .30 calibre US Model 1917( not Pattern '14) looked identical to the untrained eye. With the Lewis it would not have been possible, as the .30 round would not fit in a .303 inch magazine. Even if a U.S. magazine was put on a .303 gun, the .30 round is too long to go through the .303 inch feed slot. Regards TonyE Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Strawb67 Posted 6 August , 2013 Share Posted 6 August , 2013 Thanks Tony! I live and learn, in all honesty I haven't seen the cartridges next to each other so was probably more thinking aloud with a perceived problem from my end! Cheers John Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TonyE Posted 7 August , 2013 Share Posted 7 August , 2013 Here is a comparative picture showing the .30 cal on the left and the .303 inch on the right. There is about an eight millimetre difference in length. Regards TonyE Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Duiker Posted 7 August , 2013 Share Posted 7 August , 2013 Thanks for sharing Mike. Anton Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted 7 August , 2013 Share Posted 7 August , 2013 Thanks for sharing Mike. Anton Mike Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RupertDubrecht Posted 23 February , 2014 Share Posted 23 February , 2014 Love it.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
centurion Posted 23 February , 2014 Share Posted 23 February , 2014 The "Instructor" is in fact Major C H B Pridham formerly of Hythe. The book(let) is listed in a bibliography of his works and effectively covers the standard Lewis with additional notes for the American version an number of which had arrived in the UK 1940/41 and were I think issued to the Home Guard. Down load worked fine but page 14 appears part blanked. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark Finneran Posted 28 February , 2014 Share Posted 28 February , 2014 Just to add some 'colour'! [/url]">[/url] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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