Serial Number Question

[Treo]

This might sound stupid but here goes. I have a Ruger PC -4 , I read online that only 16,200 were ever made. Assuming that 0000-1 is sitting in a display case at Ruger somewhere, I would THINK my serial number couldn't be any higher that 16200 but my gun starts out 480-XXX. so how do they come up W/ serial numbers since it's (obviously) not numerical order.

 

[BlackBearME]

Ruger seems to generally use a prefix to indicate the model, and the suffix to indicate the specific serial number. However, even Ruger admits it's not necessarily sequential:

Ruger does not produce firearms in serial number order. There are occasions when blocks of serial numbers have been manufactured out of sequence, sometimes years later. Also, within a model family the same serial number prefix may be used to produce a variety of different models, all in the same block of serial numbers. And in some cases, models may be stored for a length of time before they are shipped.

According to their chart, however, it seems that they did number those 480-00001 through 480-16000 or so.