CAI Garand

[aerod1]

I have a friend who has an M1 Garand with no manufacturers stamp on the top of the reciever, like most Garands. However, on the left side of the reciever there is a stamp , "CAI". This gun has a Bushnell scope mounted.
My questions are: Is this gun made by Century? I thought their name would be "CIA", for "Century International Arms". How much is this gun worth? He claims he has been offered over $1100.00 for this gun. Is that possible? Maybe it has a NM barrel or something? What is the quality? I have heard Century's quality is hit or miss, at best.
Thanks for any info you can give.

Jim

 

[The Deer Hunter]

My Hungarian M44 Mosin Nagant was imported by CAI, I beleive its century.

 

[Hoppy590]

it is century

i donno, baybe they cant use CIA?

 

[Avenger29]

Century's quality on the imported milsurp boltguns are usually OK- all they do is electropencil the serial number on it. But if you do have any problems with the rifle, good luck getting it fixed by Century

Their semi-autos that are assembled by them, however, are a different story. Be very wary of them. IIRC, the Garand recievers were made by an Austrailian company and are prone to problems. I'd run away from that deal. Someone will of course pop up on this board and say that the Century rifles are OK. But for the most part, Century's are crap.

For that price, you could order a Garand from The Garand Guy or Orion 7 Enterprise and be good to go with a rifle with a USGI reciever and parts.

If you go Garand shopping, beware rewelds.

 

[Onmilo]

The Century M1 Garand rifles came out about ten years ago.
They are not considered to be of very good quality although some very desireable parts have come off these part kit rifles.

I have heard the receivers were made by Caspian Arms or investment cast in Spain.
These receivers were finished and the rifles assembled by Century Arms stateside from Danish M1 Garand rifles that were imported into Canada and broken down.

We brought several of these rifles into the shop and not a one was built to Mil-Spec standards.

The rifles sold for $575.00 when we offered them, I considered that to be too expensive even then and your friend should have immediately sold his rifle for the $1100.00 and never looked back.

I would be frankly amazed if a gun shop offered more than $400.00 wholesale for the rifle.

 

[Swampy]

CAI stands for "Century Arms Intl".....

As already stated, Century made up their own m1 receivers some years back and assembled them onto cheap (then, not now) and readily available Danish parts kits.

Many of the receivers (but not all) had problems. Some problems were simply function related, some were a definite safety hazard. Getting help from Century for these problems seems to have been pretty problematical too... from what owners have said.

Unless the rifle in question has some VERY RARE and desirable collector parts on it there is NO WAY it is worth anywhere near $1K. If I owned a CAI M1 (I don't) and somebody offered me anything over $600 I'd grab the cash and RUN.

Just my thoughts,
Swampy

Garands forever

 

[aerod1]

Thanks for the info!!

Jim

 

[Redhat]

Just as a side note,

I bought a CAI M1 back around '96 and it is a SA receiver and parts...all except for the trigger guard which is WRA. It has all the markings where it should on the top of the receiver behind the rear sight.

Shoots good too!