The John Inglis manufacturing year?

Can any-one please confirm if the John Inglis manufacturing year started in January and ran until December or, as I suspect, started at some point in the previous year but ended before the end of the year in question, please? For example did the 1944 manufacturing year, marked under the John Inglis on the Bren body, start at some point in 1943 and end before December 1944?

The reason that I ask this is because following a close inspection recently of a 1944 dated J.I. Bren I also noted a 43 stamp on the other side of the receiver which looked like an abbreviated 1943 date. I realise that this could also possibly be an inspectors stamp although there were no other letter/number/digit stamps near it.

I know that during the 19th century Enfield had a system of starting it's manufacturing year part way through the previous year and a rifle may have been made the year before what is marked on the receiver. On Enfield made Martini Henry rifles the true manufacturing date was often marked on the forward underside of the receiver but could only be viewed after the removal of the fore-end woodworked. This true manufacture date is marked in the style, for example: 5/86 implying a manufacture date of May 1886. I do not know if Enfield continued with this policy of starting it's manufacturing year part way through the previous year into the 20th Century and until the factory closed but I have not heard that they did not.

I would be very grateful for any information on this matter, thanks.

You'll have to give us a serial number because the proof date and date on the side of the gun body do differ at certain change-over points. You can have a 1943 dated body with a 1944 proof date.

With the case of JI Brens, we know from the consecutive serial numbers that when the right bodyside date is, say, 1942, then it was actually engraved somewhere between Jan 1st and Dec 31st 1942. What we need is your serial number to identify fairly accurately when!

Incidentally, the word BREN, place of manufacture or 'means by which the manufacturer can be readily identified' (can't find the exact wording now but something like that) and the date were part of the licensing agreement. As was the strict consecutive serial numbering upon which which royalties were due

....You probably have less of a mystery than you think there.

There are always two ways, AT LEAST, to look at "year of manufacture" that may appear on a weapon. First, the most common and perhaps most common-sense approach is to stamp the weapon with the actual year that the complete weapon was either completed (notice I didn't say "manufactured" at first here), -OR- actually physically manufactured, and thus released on the contractual demand. Either would thus agree with a date perceived to be the "date of manufacture", depending upon the overriding definition in use at the time and place.

Second, the weapon may bear multiple date stampings or engravings, etc., which may be different by a wide margin. This is common when certain components are manufactured in once date sequence (year), and only LATER either consumed in production or final assembly to produce a finished completed weapon. Not all parts are actually manufactured in any given calendar year, identically. Production, or economic, demands may result in a factory or arsenal concentrating upon, say, receivers that are then stocked in supply, while making no other component parts in that calendar year. Or even more simply, a receiver made at the end of one calendar year may lay waiting for final assembly dating in the early part of the next year as other needed component parts trickle in in sufficient supply to merit assembly into complete weapons.

Lastly, it is often a function or either national culture, or specific contract outline, to date certain components, while not demanding dates of all component parts of a complete weapon. Thus, a receiver that requires a date stamp being made in November, may also require another date stamp when it is assembled into a complete gun the following January, etc.
-TomH

Well, come on then Flying 10, what's the number so we can answer the Q fully and sate our curiosity..........?

Sorry Peter, here it is 12T5081 and, as already stated above, the date below the Inglis is 1944 but there is also a 43 mark on the other side of the body. I also notice that this number is marked longitudinal to the sides on the top, rear body as apposed to being at tangents to the sides of the body. Is this unusual or did J.I. normally mark the serial in this way, please?

Also while I think of it, would a MK1 Bren magazine be marked as such like Mk2s + 3s are or is there normally no MK designation marked on a MK1 Bren mag casing, please?

The year change 1943 to 1944 took place between guns 11T 88XX and 11T 97XX. Your gun is certainly an early 1944 with that close 12T 50XX number. Usually during a change over period the date under the INGLIS mark is earlier than the proof date on the left side barrel nut reinforce area. Indicating to all that the gun was manufactured in late '43 and proof fired and stamped early the NEXT year, 1944 and so on - on the basis that the gun couldn't be proofed before it was manufactured and marked!!!!!

But if yours is marked as manufactured in 1944 and proof dated 1943 then who knows. It is certainly the odd man out in the rather large list of such info I have.

The serial numbers were changed to length-wise later but maybe BritPlumber can say exactly when. It was notified in an instruction for Quartermasters as a feature to aid 'ease of manufacture'

Bren mags are usually marked at the bottom. Notice I say 'usually' and not always. The Mk1 magazines weren't generally marked though for a long winded reason that I won't go into

Thanks for that interesting information, Peter. I will take another look at it to see if there are any other markings that I may have missed. For an Inglis Bren, would it be expected to observe any different acceptance markings for a gun first issued (1940s) to the British army as opposed the Canadian army? Would British issued Inglis Brens just have the broad arrow mark but Canadian issued Brens have the arrow within a "C", please? It's a good point that Tom makes about the component parts being made before the weapon manufacture date. I have seen this kind of thing on 1930s British made motor cars where some manufacturers include the date on which the engine block was cast on the side of the engine. I have seen this take the form as part of the casting rather than being stamped on post casting. Obviously this date was some months before the vehicle was first registered unless, of course, it is a replacement engine.

It is interesting . My JI 1945 is 15T3393 and '45 proofed.

Yes, that's because your 15T 3393 was made in June/July 1945 and was made and proofed in the same year Brian. And the serial number will be lengthwise as opposed to widthways across the body. You'll occasionally find UK service gins with the number lengthwise but this is only because they have been re-numbered to DP or SKN or had a 'lost' number added

I've had a second look at the left side of the body near the barrel nut where Peter indicated the proof mark would be and I would confirm that it is marked thus '43 with an apostrophe just before the "4". There are a few other faint markings in the area which I can't fully make out. I take it that the '43 is the proof mark and it's not one of these other marks? Is the proof mark of this style, an abbreviated date? I did wonder if an explanation could be that the body of this gun was a new spare part held at a base workshop and the serial number and 1944 date was added to match the serial number of an existing gun which had been damaged with the need for a replacement body??? Thanks for all the information.