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AR Sponsor: bravocompany
Posted: 6/1/2017 7:07:42 PM EDT
I have two square forge carry handles. Im familiar with the forge codes and makes. My question is, are all square forge, keyhole, etc. marked carry handles mil spec height or could they be commercial height as well? I dont have a tool to measure that precise difference in height to check them. thanks
Link Posted: 6/1/2017 7:42:51 PM EDT
[#1]
Can be either.  Mil spec height will be ~0.040" taller at the sight assembly.

The presence of a forge code does not designate milspec automatically, as some tend to think.
Link Posted: 6/1/2017 10:05:54 PM EDT
[#2]
Discussion ForumsJump to Quoted PostQuote History
Quoted:
Can be either.  Mil spec height will be ~0.040" taller at the sight assembly.

The presence of a forge code does not designate milspec automatically, as some tend to think.
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Interesting....now I need a caliper to measure these
Link Posted: 6/1/2017 10:32:51 PM EDT
[#3]
Milspec

Commercial


Note that the milspec also has visibly  taller ears on the sight assembly.

Also, not sure if it is standard, but all of my comm. handles have the forge mark left side, and milspec on the right?

Good luck.

These 2 are off Colt carbines.
Link Posted: 6/2/2017 12:38:25 AM EDT
[#4]
thanks for the help. it seems to be a visible difference so no need to measure
Link Posted: 7/30/2017 11:24:46 PM EDT
[#5]
Of two detachable carrying handles I'm looking at, one with a Split-A and "A" on the left side is the commercial height.  The other with a Split-A and "B" on the left side is the mil-spec height.  There's also a Colt branded Square Forge and Cardinal Forge one I've found being the commercial height.

To identify without a caliper, a person can just use a ruler to measure the rear shelf area.  It's about 20mm from the bottom to the top for commercial and 21mm for the mil-spec.  The area of note is below the roll pin that secures the elevation knob.  After a while, you can tell just by looking.  If it's the commercial version, you'll see that space is just under 4mm with the mil-spec being just over 4mm.

Seems the military could have forgone the whole 'F' marked FSB and stuck with a regular A2 FSB and combined it with the lower height detachable carrying handle.  Maybe that would have alleviated some of the confusion.
Link Posted: 7/30/2017 11:32:31 PM EDT
[#6]
Link Posted: 8/5/2017 5:36:20 PM EDT
[#7]
The forging may not make any difference.  That 0.04" height difference isn't enough to require a different forging...
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AR Sponsor: bravocompany
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