1903 shooting problems.....help

[Twinson]

I have a 1903 rifle (USGI) with a SA barrel that is shooting 17" left at 200 yards with the rear sight set to zero windage. The barrel passes a 6" bore straightness gauge thru with no problems. This does not seem right to me??? Thoughts???

PS: I was using the bottom peep hole on the sight...

[Dave in NGA]

Hard to diagnose without being able to inspect it. Could be any number of things; pressure on the barrel from a warped stock, bent front sight blade, bad muzzle crown, slightly bent barrel, damaged rear sight. Just too hard to say without seeing first hand.

[JohnMOhio]

Just a thought, is the rear sight loose or not on correctly.

[Cosine26]

Check your barrel indexing. If barrel is not screwed in to draw mark, rifle will shoot to the left.

[Parashooter]

17" at 200 yards amounts to just two "points" on the windage scale. Crank it over and fire for effect.

[Jeff L]

How does the crown look?

[Cosine26]

There may be another reason for your rifle shooting off to the left. During final assembly of the M1903. the rifle was bore sighted and the front sight (properly know as the stud, movable M1903/M1903A1) without a hole was mounted and aligned either by firing or bore sighting. When in correct alignment a witness mark was struck that was aligned on the movable stud and the fixed stud. The fixed stud is mounted on the barrel and is the fixed part of the front sight. With the movable stud in place with the witness marks aligned, a hole was then drilled into the movable stud using the hole in the front fixed stud as a guide so that the front sight screw, could be screwed into the fixed stud securing the front sight assembly. If your rifle has had a new barrel installed perhaps the movable stud assembly did not bore sight correctly. Examine the front sight from the front and see if the two witness marks line up. The armory found that mounting a rifle in a different stock could adversely affect the bore sighting.
At one time, I believe that the armory manufactured rear sight slides with offset holes to allow the movable assembly to be lined up if it hung too far to right or left. The slides had off set holes of about one point on each side of center. I do no remember where I read this so cannot cite the reference.
FWIW

[Col. Colt]

The M1903 rear sight slides with the peep holes offset are mentioned in Col. Brophy's "The Springfield '03 Rifles", on pages 453 and shown in a picture on the top of page 456. Col. Brophy states that the offset slides were "available only at the National Matches". It might be worthwhile to advertise for one, or check with your Springfield parts supplier and have him look through what he has. CC

PS - Another thought - if the rifle was rebarreled, did the alignment pin (the horizontal one that lays in a groove in the barrel and engages the groove in the fixed rear sight base) get installed? If the rear fixed base is not indexed by this pin, it could be rotated slightly off. CC

[Sunray]

Have a look at the front sight. Assuming it shoots way left at 100 too. Front sights get moved in the opposite direction you want the group to go.

[Cosine26]

I remember where I read of the offset drift slide. Capt. E.C. Crossman in his book The Book of the Springfield (1931) indicated that one could order the drift slide from Springfield Armory with ether 1/4 "point" (one MOA) or 1/2 "Point" (two MOA) right or left offset.