Barrel Errosion

[Alasdair MacDonald 0]

I attended the big Reno Gun Show over the weekend and found three Johnsons. One was complete with bayonette and scabbard and was in very good condition. Asking price was $7500.00. It did not sell. The second was a sporter with wood plugged stock and blued with new front sight. Asking price $6500.00. It also did not sell to my knowledge. The third was another military with bayonette and scabbard listing price as $6500.00 to 7500.00. Attention Ed Johnson and Joeseph Scott:The thing that interested me is one of the vendors told me that Johnsons normally have their barrels removed for inspection and are inspected from the chamber end thus not disclosing barrel errosion for the approxamately ten inches of errosion from the muzzle. He said that the Dutch used tracer ammo that had lead plugged ports on the side of the bullets that when fired the lead melted and washed the last ten inches of the bore with corrosssive material that caused errossion. I have never seen or heard of this. Anyone else heard this or experienced this before? Cordially, Alasdair

[webmaster 0]

Let me peruse my copy of "Nederlanse Vuurwaapens of the KNIL" (Sorry for misspellings!). This is the bible of KNIL issue weapons and has a whole section on ammunition. I believe though that the .30-06 was supplied as ball for these rifles. I will check my KNIL/ NPC records on that too.

[metrotps 0]

I would think that type of erosion would be evident at or near the muzzle along with some possible traces of gas cutting at the crown. I always check both the forcing cone area of the barrel and the muzzle when buying a surplus rifle. I often find muzzle wear due to cleaning rods being used from the muzzle end. I have shot a fair amount of tracer ammo over the years from various rifles and have not seen erosion caused by it in any of them.

[Bob Lamoreaux 0]

In the AAC (American Armament Corp.) material that I've accumulated, there is no mention of cal. .30 tracer ammo being supplied to the Dutch. . .at least in the Netherlands East Indies. It IS possible, of course, as I believe the NPC was attempting to purchase M1919 Brownings (I believe for the tanks -- Marmon-Herringtons and possibly a few M-3 Stuarts) which would suggest one-in-five tracer loads (I think that is the correct ratio, even back then). Unfortunately, ammo was pretty scarce then, hence AAC contracting with Fabrique (?) Mexico -- the Mexican National Armory in or near Mexico City -- for both cal. .30 ammo and for barrels for the 7-mm Chilean contract for Johnson rifles.

I never came across the barrel erosion story and tend to discount it if for no other reason that so few JSARs reached the NEI. Those "mint" JSARs that Interarms (then Interarmco) was selling in the late '50s/early '60s were probably from the Netherlands West Indies or the Dutch Navy. My guess is that they came from the NWI (Aruba, Curacao, etc) where they were probably used only for drill and training exercises.

One other thought! I'm not sure ANY forces issued tracer ammo as a regular combat load for use in rifles during WWII. Belt-fed machine guns -- yes! Not sure about Automatic Rifles such as the BAR.