Does anyone know how many M1911's after WWII? Just curious.
Printable View
Does anyone know how many M1911's after WWII? Just curious.
The original post should have read "How many M1911's were purchased by the US after WWII?"
I do not know what happen to the original post.
My error.
From what I can find on coolgunsite, USGI 1911/1911A1 went from 1912 until 1945. 1911/1911A1 Production Numbers
No USGI .45 acp pistols were made after the WW2 contracts expired or were cancelled. There were so many in inventory there was no need to make or buy anymore.
Thanks for the response.
That's pretty amazing to think about because it means that "existing inventory" would have carried the U.S. military from 1945 to ca. 1985. Sounds like a whole lotta guns to me. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by Bruce McAskill
Adding up 1 673 190. That should be sufficient for a long time. Keep in mind the military would have purchased spares such as slide, frames, barrels, and smaller parts for repair and maintenance; keeping them in service much longer than you would expect.
FWIK REMINGTON RAND produced about 875,000 pistols; COLT 629,000; ITHACA 335,000; US&S 55,000; and SINGER only 500.
Of course, many were issued (& lost) during the Korean War, but that hardly made a dent in inventory.
IIRC, pistols were offered for sale to civilian NRA members by the DCM in 1963. When someone realized that we were going to be fighting in Viet Nam for a lot longer, they quickly cut off DCM sales. But, they agreed to honor all applications that had been received. Pistols were shipped directly from US armories for at least 5-6 years after that; I vaguely recall that they were shipped at the rate of 10,000 a month, but that may not be accurate.
Many of the .45ACP M1911A1s were rebuilt a number of times. Before I left the Army National Guard in the late 80's. We had a number of M1911A1s with a post war slide with only the Drawing number. The M1911A1 is a fine pistol. I believe a very small number of M45, a variant of the M1911A1 were purchased for the USMC.