Barrel installation on Remington M1903

[Jon Field]

I have a 1942 Remington 03, which some banana, baboon or bozo drilled and tapped the receiver and then even bent the bolt handle so much they had to notch the stock and the receiver. So, now that the painful part has been said, I was given a beautiful Remington receiver of 1942 manufacture, only 51,000 numbers older than the original one. So in taking off the old receiver I notice the alignment mark in the barrel, but was surprised that there is no mark on the face of either receiver. Not having a fixture or marks, is there a trick other than trial and error to getting it correctly reassembled?

Thanks for any advise!

[purple]

Take a look at the left side of the receiver where it butts against the fixed rear sight base and you will see the index line/witness mark. I've never seen an 03 or 03-A3 receiver that didn't have this mark.