1931 M1922 M1 M1941 Clone

[Cecil]

I picked up a M1922 M1 with a 10-31 dated barrel. It's built as a M1941 Sniper with Unertl blocks. I have a look-a-like 30-06 with a 22 conversion kit but this one is way better. Anyone seen one like it before? Any idea who made them/it? I'm using my phone and will get pictures when I get home.

[JBinIll]

I think MJ1 posted a picture of an M1922 in an 03 stock awhile back.I don't know if it was ever determined what the origin on these was.It looked like a professional job not a bubba and a few others I believe had seen a few done that way but as regular 03s not the sniper model.

[Cecil]

Here are some pictures.... I added the scope.

IMAG0141_edit0..jpgIMAG0145..jpgIMAG0144_edit0..jpg

[JimF]

I believe a fairly reliable method to ascertain if the "conversion" of the 1922 series into a '03 stock, is to remove the barrelled action, peer down into the magazine well, and observe the "slanting cut" in the forward wall of the magazine mortise. (As i'm sure you know, it needs this cut to provide clearance for the 1922 series of magazines.)

Does it look to be done by machine . . . .or "bubba" with a wood rasp and sandpaper? --Jim

[Cecil]

I compared it to my M2 stock and the cut is not as clean.

[1903shooter]

Cecil, I have made several of them. I don't think that yours is one of mine. I have made several using shotout 30-06 barrels and drill rifle receivers. I machine a chamber extension, bore out the chamber, attach the extension with solder or epoxy, bore out the barrel, reline it with a .22 liner, turn the extension forcorrect lenght, mill the ejector and extractor cut, chamber with a match chamber reamer. They usually will shoot some amazing 50 yard groups using match ammo, every bit as good as the original M2 barrels and a lot cheaper. I am going to make some in .45 ACP that will use the standard 1911 magazines. I think that it would be a real gas to have a '1903 plinker cabine' in 45acp. That should really toss those soda cans around and a great way to use shot out barrels and drill rifle welded up receivers.

[Herschel]

Cecil,

I am providing the following information that may help you figure out the possible history of you 1922M1 #2031(red dot).

The following are on the SRS list as Sales 1922M1 or 1922MII rifles and are show to have been in the NRA stock.
20311
20313
20314
20316
20317
20319

If yours is one of these then it would have been sold directly to a civilian and the modification to 1941 Sniper look alike would not have have been done by a military facility.

I have owned at least two 1922 series rifles that were in 1903 or 1903A3 stocks and have personally examined 5 or 6 more. They are not that unusual. I have heard rumors but have never been able to find any documentation that the USMC did some of these conversions. I would suspect that the holes for mounting the target scope blocks were done by SA as all 1922M1 and M2 sales rifles as well as the DCM Club Issue rifles came drilled and tapped from SA. FWIW

Additional:
I just found this info in an article by the late W. P. Eyberg in the January/February 1985 issue of Man AT Arms magazine.

"Occasionally, a full military configuration of a 1922 series rifle is seen. As far as is known, and excepting the very first experimental rifles built at the Armory in 1919 and beyond, such weapons are private assemblies which vary from poor to excellent in their workmanship. A "how-to-do-it" article by Charles O. Bower, writing in The American Rifleman for August, 1932, page 5, entitled "My National Match .22," may be the source of these interesting, but unofficial, rifles." end of quote