can anyone tell me approximately how many m16's were built by gm hydromatic? what about H&R?  would there be any value in a gm hydromatac lower rebuilt as an ar 15 semi?
 thanx
  john in houston

None as far as I know...but I could be wrong.  Where did you hear this?  I have heard and SEEN GM made M1CARBINES, M3's, and .50 BMG, but never any AR's.  H&R did make M14's, but I didn't hear anything about AR's from them either.  

Hydramatic made some back in 60s IIRC but I don't have a quantity.  There are pics of the Hydramatic receiver in later editions "Small Arms of the World" edited by the late Ed Ezell.

Noah

I don't know about AR15s, but when I was in the service (US Army Infantry, 1981-1988) I was issued an M16A1 that I distinctly remember had "GM HYDRAMATIC TRANSMISSION DIVISION" stamped on the lower receiver. I still remember visualizing my rifle on the same assembly line as transmissions for Chevy Silvadados.....

The Black Rifle covers both the H&R and The GM guns.
It does not however give production figures.
They were part of the "sole source procurement"
contract during the Viet-Nam War.

Don't know if you could build one as an AR anyway,
due to the ATF's "once a machine gun always a machine gun"
stance.
I could be wrong however.
 

Sorry to hi-jack but does anyone know the value and production numbers of Ruger AR-15's?
Maybe I'm just remembering bullshit someone told me long ago but it just came back to me.

Glockdog

Airborne!!

You're not wrong.

g,dog,
I don't remember Ruger building any AR-15/M-16's.  Maybe you're remembering that James Sullivan, who was half of the design team that designed the AR-15/M-16, also designed the Ruger Mini-14 (and the Ruger Model 77) ???

as  far as the "once a machinegun always a machine gun" you CANNOT take a functioning machine gun and make it into a semi-auto gun.... however ... you CAN take a demilled (read that as functionally destroyed) machinegun and build it into a semi-auto... the reason .. once it is demilled (functionally destroyed)... it is simply scrap metal that ANYONE can purchase as easily as as a box of corn flakes at the local grocery...  please DO NOT take my word for it .. and do not assume that someone else is telling you the "absolute finite definitive answere"  go to batf web sight and spend some time reading .. or do as i did and simply make a call  to the  technical/legal branch of batf.. they will glady  answere all of your questions and as i called and asked them this very same question several years ago, no jackbooted thugs have kicked my door in  (yet )   : )
depending on the date of the build into a COMPLETE firearm ,the gun can be an evil "assault rifle " (pre ban configured) or a post ban pcr homeland defense gun.. key word being "date manufactured into a COMPLETE firearm" but again i stress DO NOT TAKE MY WORD ..OR ANY ONE ELSES (WELL MAYBE CIRCUITS)
GO TO THE SOURCE (batf) and ask
john in houston

I carried a GM Hyromatic rifle for some time when wearing o'the green... As I recall, there were quite a few of them in the armory, I would say about 15% of our rifles were GM.

FWIW: The "boonie voodoo" was that the GM rifles were better, I think it was more a cool factor, but if you got in good with the guys in the weapons room, they would get you a GM.

The coolest, by far, were the sterile guns!

H&R about 200,000 +/-(Colt Grey)
GM 325,000 +/-(Early ones were Colt Grey the rest were Black like the current M16A2/A4's. The GM's were all in the 3 Mil serial range. Used to be a lot of them on the West Coast especially in NG units in Northern CA.

Quite a few GM, Colt and HR lowers were demilled in the late 1970's early 80's. A few of the lowers were rewelded and made into Auto's pre 86 and some were made into semi-auto only Sp1/A1 clones. Some of them were done by H&H Enterprises, Redwood City,CA(Also made AR10's) and by Jim Bosse(Passed away a couple of years ago ...Known for his work in the Movie industry) of Wayne's Gunshop in Dublin CA.  

This must be the truth. The BATF is/was not concerned in anyway about the company that took cut-up (demilled) M14 receivers and rewelded/reworked them into semi-auto configuration and sold them to the public.

DEVIL;  < very heavy sarcasm>
batfs claim was that they were not COMPLETELY demilled!.. and that after remanufacture some of the rifles were able to be fitted with the  selector and PART of the lever assembly..... thus they were NEW MANUFACTURED MACHINEGUNS!!!  batfs position was .... NEW manufactured weapons.. (not a pre-existing machinegun...) but  since they could still accept PART of the full auto assembly  (namely the selector and PART of the trip lever assembly then they  ... which is totally diffent  than a weapon that has been demilled to all gubment specs and then can be sold as SCRAP to any one .. and yes there are several companys who made complete rifles out of demils ( and still are   have you noticed the soviet ppsh clones ( made from demils) the mg 42's (made from demils) the new bren gun on the market (made from demils) all of the ak's out there (made from demils) the hks(made from demils) the fn-fal's and L1-A1's (made from demils)... all of them were considered scrap.. ..
and i mean no disrespect and i hope you take this in the spirit it is intended   but.......... call batf and ask... i did!

No. New AR 15 lowers are not very expensive.

Rebuilding demilled full auto receivers, you have to modify the receiver so it is not easy to convert to full auto and cannot take the full auto parts then you you have to summit to ATF for approval. With the M16 lower about the only way to do this is to take the front half of a dimilled lower and attach to the back half of a AR15 lower. A lot of extra expense for no gain except you wind up with a M16 marked AR15 lower.

Mack

i guess what i reall ment as far as "any value" was more alongthe line of it being unique...
and of course it would have to be totally unable to accept any original full-auto parts
one of the batf statements i received was that you CANNOT simply weld up the searpin hole and call it a semi auto.. underthat scenario the "once a machinegun always a machinegun" statement applies.. you would have to demill it so that it was considered FUNCTIONALLY DESTROYED.... then you could reweld it (and the sear pin hole filled in) and you would have a legal sem-auto.. and also per batfs answere it would depend on WHEN it was manufactired into a COMPLETE firearm.. if it was done pre-sept 94 your good to go .. post 2004 (hopefully  and fingers crossed) it would again be able to be in "pre-ban" configuration..post sept 94 it is a homeland defense rifle....
i was really curious as to the uniqueness of it makeing be desired
 thanx for all the feedback
john