Charlton Automatic Rifle

The Charlton Automatic Rifle was a fully automatic conversion of the Lee-Enfield rifle, designed by New Zealander Philip Charlton in 1941 to act as a substitute for the Bren and Lewis gun light machine guns which were in chronically short supply at the time.

The original Charlton Automatic Rifles were converted from obsolete Lee-Metford and Magazine Lee-Enfield rifles dating from as early as the Boer War,[1] and were intended for use as a semi-automatic rifle with the full-automatic capability retained for emergency use.[2] It used the 10-round Lee-Enfield magazines and 30-round Bren magazines.

There were two versions of the Charlton: the New Zealand version, as designed and manufactured by Charlton Motor Workshops in Hastings, and a version produced in Australia by Electrolux, using the SMLE Mk III* for conversion.[3] The two designs differed markedly in external appearance (amongst other things, the New Zealand Charlton had a forward pistol grip and bipod[4], whilst the Australian lacked this making it lighter and cleaner in appearance[5] , but shared the same operating mechanism.

Approximately 1,500 Charlton Automatic Rifles were manufactured in New Zealand,[6] and nearly all of them were destroyed in an accidental fire at the Palmerston North service storage facility shortly after World War II.[7]

An example of the New Zealand-manufactured Charlton Automatic Rifle is known to survive in the Imperial War Museum in London, along with a handful elsewhere– one is on display in the Waiouru Army Museum in New Zealand, and another at the Army Museum (Bandiana) in Australia. {| class="toc" id="toc"

Contents
[hide] *1 See also
 * 2 Footnotes
 * 3 References
 * 4 External Image
 * }

Footnotes
 * 1) ^ Skennerton, Ian: The Lee-Enfield Story, page 183. Arms & Militaria Press, Australia, 1993
 * 2) ^ Skennerton, Ian: The Lee-Enfield Story, page 184. Arms & Militaria Press, Australia, 1993
 * 3) ^ Skennerton, Ian: The Lee-Enfield Story, page 185. Arms & Militaria Press, Australia, 1993,
 * 4) ^ http://img299.imageshack.us/img299/6537/smallarmsw44.jpg
 * 5) ^ http://img299.imageshack.us/img299/7979/smallarmsw42.jpg
 * 6) ^ Skennerton, Ian Small Arms Identification Seriess No. 13: Special Service Lee-Enfields; Commando & Auto Models, page 33. Arms & Militaria Press, Australia, 2001
 * 7) ^ Skennerton, Ian: The Lee-Enfield Story, page 185. Arms & Militaria Press, Australia, 1993