I posted this over in the Retro forum before I noticed this forum. Thought you guys might also appreciate it. This would make an interesting build with the restamp marks and all.

Here's some pics from the National Matches at Camp Perry a few years ago.

This is a Colt built M16A1 that was later rebuilt into a M16A2. Note the overstamp of "A2" over "A1" and "Burst" over "Auto."

Note also the "lock out" on the selector to prevent full-auto fire.

This was one of the Ohio National Guard rifles used by competitors during the Small Arms Firing School - Rifle range portion.

I also used a GM Hydramotic one day, but forget to get a pic. Based on the wear patterns these uppers and lowers looked like they'd been together a long time. I wouldn't be surprised if these were rebuilds from the 80's.

Based on the markings, when do you guys think this lower was originally manufactured?

This would be an interesting build for someone who wanted an A2.

Serial#   1947314



Serial# 943370

Very cool thanks for sharing!

curious what setting is marked in blue on the elevation wheel and why?

My jaw dropped seeing that "lockout," I had thought those were ancient history.

Back in the mid to late 1990s (if i had to guess, maybe 1997?), as a young enlisted national guard schmo, I spent damn near an entire drill weekend removing those from our 300+ rifles.  My undertsanding at the time is it was part of an Army-wide directive.

Maybe use now is limited to places like Perry and the SAFS?

At the time, we had a mix of Colt and GM Hydramatic M16A1s.

If you ever see them again, you can look on the right side of the receiver on most of them - they should have a marking that says:

"A N A D" and four numbers:

ANAD is the Anniston Army Depot, which refurbishes the Army's weapons, and the four numbers are the month and year in an "MM YY" format:

Depending on what the date of the rebuild is, however, it could designate the receiver having been rebuilt still in A1 configuration -

There may also be an "X" marking, also with numbers, which could designate when the weapon was rebuilt as an A2.  I don't have the exact dates for when the A2-conversions were done, so I couldn't give you a range if it only has "A N A D" markings.  



Old thread:

http://www.ar15.com/forums/t_3_123/541618_.html&page=1

~Augee

High Power competitors will mark their zero settings to easily return to zero after adjusting their sights.

These guns are "owned" by either the Ohio National Guard or the Army Marksmanship Unit (I think ANG, but could be AMU, and either one makes sense) and are used in the "All Army" matches and then later in the year are used for civilians to shoot in the Small Arms Firing School - Rifle range portion.

That's why the zeros are marked and also why the 20 round mags are still used. These are essentially "box stock" A2's, with standard military triggers, but they are set aside for competition use and SAFS.

I'm sure the lockout is installed because they don't want civilians who aren't as familiar with the M16 to accidentlly go full-auto on the Camp Perry range.

About 10 years ago, the USAF did a weapon modernization program by converting old M-16 rifles into the new A2 configuration with a parts kit.  When I was at the Hurlburt Field CATM shop, we had a couple training rifles that were the original green 601 series AR-15 rifles.  Of course, these had the removable pivot pin and slab-side lowers.  I used to love to see them come out into the classroom since when we would have the students get into the disassembly stage, sure enough the pin would come out and the student would be sitting there with that puzzled look on their face,  I would start into a rant about how "Oh my god, you broke it!  We can't repair that particular part!  We're going to have to write out a statement and they will probably charge you with destruction of government property and take that out of your pay!"  As soon as they looked pretty panicked, I would let them know that this rifle is so damn old you can still smell dead VC on this one and that these early guns like this had a removable pivot pin.  Not a show stopper, but if you get one from LRS (and they had plenty of old 601 and 602 series rifles that were converted and are being deployed) just make a note of this feature and make sure you don't loose that pivot pin when you clean it.  I seen those old rifles as excellent training aids of what they might see and they really helped lighten the mood in the classroom and boost the rapport with the students with the "you broke it" joke I would play.

Ya you'll see much older Mod 01/02 AF rifles that got converted into A2's esp in the ANG , We had a bunch of 4 digit Mod 01's and most M16's were under 400k.
The AF A2 conversion was a Boondoggle....

Our CATM used to use a bunch of wore out and tired Mod's for qual before replacing them with new FN A2's when the cops went to M4's.

At qual one time back in the 90's I got one that had lost the detent in the front pin, After the CATM guy got done stumbling through the class portion totally wrong about how a M16 works... I walk up and say " Hey could I get a piece of tape to keep my front pin from falling out during the qual ? " It was like handing a calculator to a chimp, the CATM idiot ( kid prob just out of Tech school ) was completely baffled by the Mod 01 take down pins...he stuck the pin in turned gun sideways and pin falls out.. he does this three times calls in second CATM guy and they repeat the process again ! ..tried to explain the problem and simple tape fix  but they were lost and after with a huddle with three other CATM dudes they made me use a different rifle

They did that too our rifles at Lakenheath back in 02. even EP'd burst inplace of auto, it looked like shit.

When my brother and I were kids, my dad would take us up to Perry every summer to shoot the SAFS and the Presidents. I remember one year, my brother and I were on the same rifle, with him shooting first. After he shot, I started shooting, and noticed that every once in a while, I would have a short two or three round burst. Shooting it left handed, I must have knocked the selector off of semi. So, I told the instructor, who took it back and had a lockout installed on it (or got a different rifle with the lockout). My brother then went to shoot, and to his dismay, it no longer would go into auto. Seems he figured out early on that it would go into auto, and had been playing with it. Still not sure how the instructor didn't notice that.

It's your fault we can't have nice things!

So this guy probably zero'd at 400 then?

Dunno. Kinda looks that way, or the actual zero and markings don't match.

Found this image during a Google search  It looks like Air force reworked early partial fence A1 lower and an FN A2 upper using Anchor Harvey (splintered A) forging.

Ugh....

I'm so hard right now.

If Air Force, it probably started life as a Colt model 604 (XM16 or M16) with no fwd assist.