I'll add some more to your article.
The safety id flipped down, not up, to fire the weapon.
When the safety is turned up, it blocks the trigger bar.
If you pull the slide back, it will lock open on the safety provided the gun was actually built to the contract specifications and had the slide lock cut on the slide proper.
Many, or most, actual French Issued weapons will have a metal stud braized to the slide just above the safety.
It was placed there by the French Armorers to prevent the back leather of the holster from pushing the safety in to the down, ready to fire, mode.
Apparently the French carried these guns fully loaded with ten shots and there were some accidents arising from this practice.
It is always wise to keep a Ruby chamber empty until actually ready to fire and then, just as quickly, unload the chamber when you stop.
Many of the guns will slip the hammer if they are jarred or mishandled and there is no half-cock safety notch on the hammers of these guns.
Esperanza Y Unceta (Astra)
Gabliondo Y Urresti( Later interests from this firm formed Llama)
Alkartasuna (Alkar) (Factory burned to the ground in 1917 or 1918 and they never recovered.)
These are the three primary contractors for the French.
Contract guns will all have nine shot magazines and these three manufacturers magazines will interchange as a general rule.
I own a genuine French issued Alkartasuna that has been in this families possession since 1942 or 1943 when it was acquired from a French Resistence fighter in a poker game.
The gun has been fired a minimum of 50 rounds per year since first being acquired and has never needed any parts replaced short of a hammer spring and a couple recoil springs.
That puts the round count at over 3400, plus whatever number of shots it fired in the 27 years before coming into my Dad's possession.
It will also reliably feed Winchester Silvertip hollowpoints.
I do have one original magazine for the gun and five magazines of the three manufacturers listed that are replacements.
The second original magazine flat wore out decades ago and the surviving original isn't in great shape.
The five replacements all work fine and are still in very good useable condition.
All the rest of the contract guns shipped are a literal crapshoot as to quality and that 500 round service life can be more truth than fiction in many cases.
The French were fairly careful to pick through and inspect the guns upon arrival.
I have been told many thousands were dumped into the ocean and payments were never made for the really bad stuff.
One must remember that after World War One the Spanish jumped to the forefront in producing small pocket automatics as the Germans and the Belgians were in no shape to produce these guns at that time and American manufacturing interests couldn't keep up with demand either.
All sorts of garbage guns were produced and dumped on the market in a desperate bid to gain hard cash sales.
Quality suffered.
I believe many people confuse these rather substandard postwar guns with the fairly high quality guns produced, at least initially, for the French contracts.
As an addenddum I will tell you that Spanish made Ruby pistols of good quality were still being issued to French Police Forces as late as the early 1980s and many hundreds still remain in reserve stocks.HTH
