some pre war and WW2 operating rods

Photos show some pre-war and WW2 operating rods with the different revision numbersAttachment 62917Attachment 62918Attachment 62919Attachment 62920Attachment 62921Attachment 62922Attachment 62923

What's the blank one? Tool room?

No, a lot of parts marks were dropped in the low 20,000 range, including the op rod. Some were resumed later. My favorite story on that was Tommy Muligan's original 23000 Gas Trap that he beat me to... we were talking on the phone about it and he said it was all original except the op rod which had no mark when he found it. He replaced it with a numbered one, making it "right." I told him we had just discovered that an unmarked rod was correct in that serial range. He said, "Oh no! I have been taking it to gun shows in my parts boxes trying to sell it! Hold on!" He ran down to his cellar and came back breathless... "Thank God nobody bought it, I still have it!" He put it back on the rifle that night.

Have yet to see an op rod marked on top or unmarked in person. Seems that I've accumulated many of the others. Most purely by happenstance, as it's unlikely I'll find the rest of the gas trap specific parts (stock and front end) the same way.

There is also a model shop and early production weld seam operating rod that is quite rare (and difficult to fake) too. I have seen the unmarked with the post WW2 relief cut - I think the revision 2 is not that common either'
Years ago I had both the revision 10 and revision 13 operating rods

The first op rod was made from one piece of material. The handle was machined and the tube was rolled around a mandrel and welded all along its length. SA contracted the welding to a small shop in West Springfield. When the first lot came back they would not function because the welds had bulged into the tube and restricted the spring. They had to be reamed and polished, holding up the assembly of the first rifle for three days. This was a major bottleneck until somebody came up with the idea of using tubing and welding it to the machined handle. I estimate that the D 28296 rod did not last longer than the first production order for 1500 rifles. It s VERY rare.

Ironically, I had one on my rifle in Basic Training (1960). I remember it because the seam had split and was opening up. It still worked fine, I was able to shoot Expert despite one full clip of bad ammo.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by bob seijas

Ironically, I had one on my rifle in Basic Training

---

Interesting how even then , we noticed some of these things. The rest of the guys were worried about making it through and we were looking at the collectables...

We are so fortunate to have these very knowledgeable fellas on milsurps.com! :bow: