Unknown British small arms round.]

[Longshaor]

Hi everyone,

I got this round in a loose lot of .303 Mk VII ammo I picked up at a gun show about 15 years ago. I couldn't get a good picture of the headstamp, but it reads:

R(Broad Arrow)I
18
I

Based on the change in colouration of the base, I suspect it may have been in a canvas belt. Beyond that have no idea what this is. Does anyone here know?

 

[relbut]

Unknown British small arm round

From your photos and hstp this is a.303Inch Rimless from Royal Laboratory 1918

 

[TonyE]

.303 Rimless

By the end of WWI aircraft were getting faster and the RAF wanted a higher velocity round than the normal .303, particularly for observer's guns. The round needed to be of the same overall length as the existing .303 round so that the tens of thousands of existing Lewis guns could be converted to the potential new round. This is why the bullet is set back in the case.

Unsurprisingly, neck separations occurred during trials as it was thought the ball bullet was "setting up" whilst still inside the case and tearing the neck off. Trials with AP bullets which did not set up in the same way were also unsuccessful.

Rounds were loaded with ball, AP, tracer and incendiary, but only the ball round is commonly encountered.

Trials continued into 1919 but by then there was no money or incentive to proceed and so the project lapsed. Also, by then, RAF interest had shifted to a larger calibre round and what little development took place was concentrated on the .600/.500 round.

Regards
TonyE

 

[Longshaor]

Thanks guys!

I had considered .303 rimless however the only rifle I knew of that was chambered for it was the Farquhar Hill, development of which I thought had been abandoned before the Great War began. Thanks for the info!

 

[TonyE]

.303 Rimless

There were at least half a dozen different forms of the .303 rimless over the period from WWI to WW2. The one you have is not connected to rifle development.

The one that was originally used in the Farquhar-Hill was the 7.65 x 54mm Belgian Mauser round necked up to take the standard 174 grn. .303 ball bullet. This was dropped, but development of the Farquhar-Hill rifle continued using the normal .303 inch rimmed cartridge and was by no means abandoned. In 1918 work had already commenced on the manufacture of 100,000 rifles for British service, and it was only the end of hostilities in November 1918 that ended the project. Had the war continued into 1919 as was expected, the rifle would have entered service.

Post war a machine gun based on the Farquhar action (no Hill by now) was tested by the RAF and passed with flying colours. Unfortunately small matters such as finance and the presence of several thousand Lewis guns in their armoury mitigated against adoption.

Regards
TonyE