A few early and some rare U.S. manuals

[RCS]

The manual on the Browning Model 1917 is early, the manual on the M3 SMG is the second revision and the Stoner manual for service testing is very rare

[CCyooper]

Nice..thanks for sharing. That Stoner is a tough one to find. Others are out there but expensive. Thank you for sharing....

[RCS]

The Browning Manual on the Model 1917 is very early because after these machine guns were used in France during the closing days of WW1, a defect was discovered in the bottom plate. This was not because of the design but the type of metal used in production. A reinforcing stirrup was installed on all existing Browning and new production examples too. This changed resulted in the Model 1917A1.

The Stoner Manual even shows close order drill, it took awhile for the idea of using one basic receiver for all types of weapons to be forgotten.

Once the T48 program expired with the new M14 most of the Belgium FN rifles were returned. rumors indicated they went south of the US border after the markings were scrubbed. there are a large number of US H&R T48 rifles still in store by the USMC in VA

[CCyooper]

There are some drawings in my test reports I have from WRA on the BAR I will have to see if they mention the failure. It is interesting in the test reports they are working with Wallace barnes to improve the springs even back in 1917 etc..

[CCyooper]

Here are some interesting publications. The 39 B-21 SNL with all the appendixes plus change 1 is a hard one to find. I do not know if that many survived. I believe this was the precursor to the FM/TM's of the 1940's. The 1939 SNL supersedes the two shown in Pyle's Book.

[CCyooper]

I was looking thru the notes and I believe I have many of the draft pages for the BAR manual as well as all the tests and lines drawings for the springs for the BAR..

[RCS]

The Browning Model 1917 water cooled m/g was first manufactured by Westinghouse in early 1918, later around June 1918, Colt started manufacture. Colt was began manufacture of the BAR Model 1918 too. Winchester never manufactured the Browning Model 1917 water cooled m/g.

What I find interesting is that in 1918, Winchester, Colt and Marlin-Rockwell all manufactured the BAR model 1918. Colt also manufactured the BAR for civilian & military sales and developed the Colt Monitor for the FBI and police. Some BAR's in the US military were converted to the Model 1918A1 in 1937. After adoption of the new Model 1918A2 with New England and IMB production the old Model 1918 from WW1 was up-graded to 1918A2 during WW2 and remained in service with National Guard units into the late 1960's early 1970 period. These BAR.s lasted a long time -

[CCyooper]

The BAR did last a long time. Here are two still NIB with all BII. I searched thru the paperwork last night and he has copious notes on the Lewis, Chauchat, Hotchkiss, Vickers, and Colt potato digger but I didn't see anything on the 1917. I thought I had read notes on the M1917 but I guess I was mistaken. These are the last two I have in my collection (its a joke), still in the Army inventory. Thanks again for sharing your wisdom.