SMLE

[Khaki]

The British as far as I can see, were the only ones to use sight protectors, front and rear, as they survived the various 'star' alterations I presume they thought them important, but were they?

khaki

[Lancashire Fusilier]

khaki,

As far as I can see, front and rear sight protectors ' ears ' were still being fitted to the Short, Magazine Lee-Enfield Rifle Mk.III* whose production life spanned 1915/16 through WW2, with BSA manufacturing this rifle during most of WW2.

Either due to the manufacturing process, or because it was still considered necessary ( which is most likely ), the fitting of front and rear sight protectors on Lee-Enfield rifles spanned WW1 and WW2. Assuming the rifle designers could have removed the sight protectors at any time, if they elected not to do so, it must have been that they considered them operationally necessary.

Interestingly, when the Short, Magazine Lee-Enfield Mk.V was manufactured between 1922-24 ( only 20,000 produced ), due to changes in the configuration of the rear sight, there were no rear sight protector ' ears ' on this particular Lee-Enfield rifle, as there were on the Mk.III*.

Front sight protectors remained in use on both the No.4 and No.5 Rifles.

Skennerton's ' The Enfield ' page 471, states that although the Australians and the Indians continued production of the Mk.III* into the 1950s, they made changes to the rifle including removing the rear sight protector, due to " general production economies ".

Regards,

LF

[4thGordons]

The SMLE and No4 rifles both have adjustable foresights which I think is the primary reason that the protecting ears are there - they are set in the factory or by an armourer but a bang or knock on the sight blade could move it and ruin the zero. This is why they remained throughout the service life of the rifle types. The Australians and Indians modified the design of the foreight protectors (the Australians milling holes in the foresight protectors to allow more light to fall on the sight blade (a la No 4 rifle) and the Indians simplified the design by making the ears square and removing the piling swivel boss but the protectors remained. The same logic can be seen on the change from MLE to CLLE. an adjustable foresight was fitted on most CLLE conversions (except some IP ones) and this necessitated fitting a sight protector around the foresight on the CLLE. Most other WWI service rifles did not have an adjustable foresight it was a solid block and therefore this was not such an issue.

(as a matter of interest you will notice that the foresight blades on many SMLEs are visibly off center at correct zero)

I am not aware of any production variants of the the SMLE which did not have rear-sight protectors but I have seen quite a lot in Indian service (esp .410 conversions) which have had them removed.

Originally the rear sight on the SMLE was also windage adjustable and I suspect the rear sight protectors were originally intended to protect this. Later versions were pinned and still later versions were simplified and not windage adjustable but the rear sight protectors remained (although again the offset - to allow access to the adjustment was not included in the later versions which were symmetrical)

The No4 rifle and the SMLE MkIV (like the P14/M1917 and the No5) had aperture sights mounted on the rear of the receiver and thus had no need of rear sight protectors in the same way -- although the MkIV had them after a fashion built in to the sight slider and the P14 and No4/5 receiver serves to protect the sight from damage when folded flat.

Chris

[Thunderbox]

Seeing the number of No4s around with bent foresight protectors, it seems clear that they were an important design feature!