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Johnson Rifle Manual Age?


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I have one. The cover on mine is kraft paper color with semi glossy pages which makes me assume it's original? Mine is also bound with three brass rivets , like I assume the one pictured is based on the indentations. Lots of photos in the back of sporterized guns making me think the manual is post WWII slightly. I don't recall when they offered sporters without looking at Bruce's book, but I though it was just after the war when they were looking for a market for the guns. This manual is pictured in Bruce's book page 98, with limited info on 97. HTH

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Here is what I have. The pic with the descriptions of the sporterized rifles is what led me to think it's late or post war. Don't know though since I've yet to find any relevant dates anywhere in the manual. There are early references to testing etc. done in the late 30's, but that is general Johnson type info in many of the publications. The guy in the photos demoing field stripping is in a dress shirt and tie? Other manuals I have for the rifle and LMG, all the photos show people in some type of uniform/shop attire, not dress clothes.

 

Address in this manual only shows Boston, not the Boston and NY address as shown in the military pocket manuals?

 

All interesting

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Is the manual in question 70 pages long, with 28 photos, and 3 section drawings, or is it a different page count? I found a reference to a mail order instruction manual in a Johnson Automatics pamphlet that I have in my collection. I have had a few of the pocket Johnson Rifle manuals in my inventory in the past, but I sold them. The reference I found could be to one of the pocket manuals...I need to see if I can find my description of any of the manuals that I sold in the past.

 

David Albert

dalbert@sturmgewehr.com

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The manual is 37 pages long, though pages 5-8 are missing. Apparently, pages 5-8 are missing from EVERY handbook of this type. Weird. Johnsonlmg41 can check his to see if he has the "mystery pages", but I'm going to gamble they are absent from his example as well.
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OK, now I'm thinking the manual is early, meaning pre-war, since it's under the name of Johnson Automatics Trust. I'm still a bit confused about sporter guns being in it, but I guess the timeline I had in my mind was incorrect.

 

David Albert

dalbert@sturmgewehr.com

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Indeed 37 pages plus the index page in the front. Yes I have 5-8, which is just a description of the parts of the operating groups. No pictures. Likely whomever reprinted them was missing that segment? It is nearly verbatim from section II in the rifle instruction manual but at the end describes a vertical magazine assembly with a "Note" at the end of that section that says "There are 39 parts in the rotary magazine receiver group, and 30 parts in the vertical magazine receiver group" Perhaps that segment was stripped out when no vertical mag models went into production? In one of the photos on page 36 the vertical mag. model is shown broken down, the type V.

 

As for sporters, I have a sporter with a custom barrel set consisting of 06', .270, .358 win., and 7mm. None of it is vintage however, but it's cool to see how adaptable the gun is just by switching out the barrel only. Not sure it serves any purpose at all, but if practicality was part of the equation I'd have only 3 guns? What fun would that be?

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