secondofangle
Well-known member
- Joined
- Dec 25, 2015
- Messages
- 296
I just learned this from a tip on another thread yesterday and confirmed it by inspecting my own guns.
Sometime after 1986, the forging changed and ever so slightly altered the area under the front push pin.
The guns that are blacker than 1986 even though not as black as A4s, and with SN 8170xxx - some of them have 2 manufacture dates at colt, one pre-86 and a second sometime in the 1990s.
See pics for how pre-86 grey forgings were radiused, and 1990s black guns (though will all other pre-86 correct markings), have a more angled forging. Both have standard A2 LRE reinforcements.
It's a subtle distinction, but if you see it, you can definitely recognized it.
Another tell-tale sign is that they boogered up the anodizing with the insertion of the roll pin for the mag catch at the rear, and the night-time remakes didn't have a dab of paint applied.
Sometime after 1986, the forging changed and ever so slightly altered the area under the front push pin.
The guns that are blacker than 1986 even though not as black as A4s, and with SN 8170xxx - some of them have 2 manufacture dates at colt, one pre-86 and a second sometime in the 1990s.
See pics for how pre-86 grey forgings were radiused, and 1990s black guns (though will all other pre-86 correct markings), have a more angled forging. Both have standard A2 LRE reinforcements.
It's a subtle distinction, but if you see it, you can definitely recognized it.
Another tell-tale sign is that they boogered up the anodizing with the insertion of the roll pin for the mag catch at the rear, and the night-time remakes didn't have a dab of paint applied.
