03A4 Production

[Chuckindenver]

i read in hatchers note book, that they received the first 2 A4,s for testing in late Feb, and didnt start getting the first lot till March.
he didnt say if it was do to issues with scopes, or paperwork, they were supposed to get the test rifles early Jan, but that didnt happen.
maybe bolt issues? i know early A4 bolts are pretty darn hard, and fit rough.

[Hollywood]

What is the first serial number block?

[Chuckindenver]

i remembered that the first 1000 or so A4,s were held up do to lack of C stocks being delivered from Keystone, so Springfield modified some early C stocks by hand to get them done.

[JGaynor]

What is the first serial number block?

In Dec 1942 ordnance placed an order for 20,000 M1903-A4 rifles. In mid January 43 Ordnance Ordnance requested Remeington to divert 20,000 receivers frrom M1903-A3 production and assigned the serial number block 3,407,088 to 3,427,087.

Its interesting to note that no allowance for scrapped receivers appears to have been made.

In June of 43 when the second order of 8,365 A4's was placed a range of 4,000,001 to 4,015,000 was created but only the first 3000~ were used and due to a numbering error in the plant, were prefaced with the letter "Z".

The last 5000~ rifles in the second order were assigned to the so-called third block of 4,992,001 to 5,784,000. The highest numbered A4 has been calculated to be in the neighborhood of 4,998,59X - The highest number reported was in the CMP's 1999 inventory and was 4.998,512.

The calculated high end number of about 4,998,59X correlates well with the real world. Most of the published references seem not to have taken scrapped receivers into account and vary from 4,997,045 to 4,999,045.

Regards,

Jim

[Chuckindenver]

makes you wonder how many ended up as subcal, pressure test ect guns.
RIA Museum has a few such items on display, and most are made from A4 receivers.
maybe they didnt meet target standards??or were out of spec?
iv also seen more then a few A4,s converted to regular A3 rifles, some were pictured on the old Jouster forum over the years.

[Hollywood]

Anybody have a picture of an early A4 barrel, dated 2-43? I was wondering if the lathe marks on the barrel are very rough.

[Chuckindenver]

dont have a handy pic, but the ones i have seen. look like any other early A3 barrel, other then sans front sight, and a punch mark on the bottom side of that area.

[JGaynor]

Anybody have a picture of an early A4 barrel, dated 2-43? I was wondering if the lathe marks on the barrel are very rough.

I'm not sure what the question is but if you have a rifle you are trying to authenticate a better way of going about it might be to post or email us pictures of the rifle in question. In any case there never were many Feb 43 barrels - those that exist should have four grooves.

Following is a "photoguide" showing the important areas on an A4. (IMO anyway )



Regards,

Jim

[xarmor]

I have an A4 barrel that is dated 1-43, it is on an early 340 sn rifle. It does not have a punch mark on the bottom but it is machined as an A4. The barrel is original to the rifle. IMHO I think the machining on this earlier barrel is better than the later barrels that I have seen. This particuliar rifle was brought back from Vietnam in 1970 and does not look like it has ever been rebuilt.

[Jim Tarleton]

Nice A4 - very nice. Do you know what unit was using it in RVN?

Jim
USMC
RVN
1970-1971
I Corps