Bulldog tidbits

The Ishapore Enfield Bulldog is being finicky, which is to be expected, but part that's part of the fun of these old rifles. I floated the barrel on my 91/59 to increase accuracy, and used some plastic straws to make the trigger pull a little better. I love machines, and I love figuring out creative ways to fix or tweak them.

I spent a few hours trying to figure out what the problem with the extraction was, but only managed to determine what it was not. I checked the adjustment of the rear left mag lip, which was not functioning as the ejector, nor (interestingly enough) was the ejector screw. There is an edge cut into the left side of the receiver that was ejecting. The screw only seemed to make ejection a sixteenth of an inch earlier. Contrary to most guns, working the bolt quickly caused problems, while working it slowly caused no issues. The extractor claw seems to just let go half way through the draw back, and leave the shell loose above the mag, but only when worked quickly.

This is extra strange because the extractor claw is damn strong. I almost feel like it's pushing so hard it's shooting the case off the bolt face once it's out of the chamber. I brought the extractor claw position closer to the center of the bolt face by raising the opposite side of the extractor arm by the tiny amount I could while keeping the opening in line with the screw (which was broken, but somewhat functional).

I got it feeding more reliably from both sides after I was done, but couldn't eliminate the shell dropping problem. I'm going to order a new extractor, spring, and screw just so I can replace them or have spares while troubleshooting. Of course it could just be a problem extracting an unfired round (which I believe I read somewhere), so I'll probably shoot it before I make any changes (other than repairing that extractor screw).

The sear meet up is short, but extremely positive, making for a short heavy pull with lots of overtravel. I'll refrain from tweaking it until I shoot it, because the Enfield No.4's trigger is technically bad, but I shoot it just fine. (though that trigger is much lighter...)

Can't wait to shoot it, and play around with it.


I just stare at it.