Remington M1917A4

[Promo]

I hope the title attracted enough interest to read this thread - especially since it basically is, what the title already promises!

Being asked on a M1917 sniper by a friend of mine if I knew anything about a scoped M1917 rifle I told him about various prototypes. However, I've never before heard of the rifle he mentioned and later sent pictures of what he had aquired.

The history was soon cleared as it turned out that for whatever reason the Austrian Army somewhen after 1960 had decided to set up two Remington M1917 rifles with the scope mount and scope of the Remington M1903A4 sniper - a sniper of which the Austrian Army anyway had 460 rifles which they were given by the US as a post WWII aid, and therefore probably some spare mounts and scopes too!

For the rifle to accept the Redfield mount quite some work was required. Even when considering that the rear sight base is milled off, you still have the same problem as with the M1903A4 that the model designation had to be split to not be covered by the sight base. And that was what they professionally reapplied, see the pictures! And of course they removed the front sight too, since it was no longer needed.

With only two rifles ever being built and the purpose of this experiment still so far unknown, I'm glad to be the owner of one of the two, with the other one still being in the possession of the Austrian Army. And I definately plan to bring this rifle to the firing range and see how it performs!