Three Serial Number Questions.

[Treo]

Ok here are my questions; Who assigns serial numbers? I assume the ATF.

When did serial numbers start?
( as a side question was the first one 0000-0001?) & as a bonus question what happens to guns made prior?

And finally how do they work? To clarify I read somewhere that there are upwards of 80,000,000 guns in this country not including military owned weapons ( and probably not cop guns either) am I really supposed to believe that somewhere out there there's some Cray two that knows that the serial number of my old M-16 was 9351827? I have 26 year old Ruger Mini-14 that sat in some kids closet until I bought it private sale, given that Colorado law specifically forbids the police to track gun sales is the serial number just outthere somewhere in a folder?

Extra question is there really any point to serial numbers?

 

[dfariswheel]

Who assigns serial numbers?:
The manufacturer.
The ATF does set some standards, such as how deep the stamps must be and that they be located on the receiver or other key part.

When did serial numbers start?
Probably about the same time that firearms started to be made to a standard pattern.
When the military started buying guns that were as much alike as possible, serial numbering started.
Some makers, like Colt started serial numbering with their very first gun.
How the gun are serialed is up to the maker.
Some started with 0001, other started at 1000, other used letters in the number, in other words however the maker wanted to do it.
Serial numbers became mandated by law on all firearms in America in 1964.
Prior to that, many guns, especially .22 rifles and shotguns were un-numbered.

The point of serial numbers is so that in all the millions of guns made of the same brand, model, and caliber, it's possible to identify a specific gun by it's unique number.
This is especially needed on military weapons so who has a specific gun can be determined.

 

[Bubbles]

1) The manufacturer.

2) Legally, 1968 for all firearms as part of the Gun Control Act of 1968. Some manufacturers started their serial numbers earlier than that.

3) Not sure I understand the question - the manufacturer starts with whatever number they want, and incriments from there. The point (from my perspective as an 07/02) is so that if a customer calls about a problem with a particular gun, we can look up the serial number and see its service history.

 

[Tommygunn]

Some of those questions are a little sketchy. Before 1968 for example, guns were not required to be serial numbered. (atleast rifles). I have a Remington .22 semiauto with no S/N made in 1950, and the only way to tell that is the barrel markings Remington used. Still, even before a lot of companies used serial numbers. Winchester repeaters made in the 1800's are serial numbered and can be dated by the ## and model when you have the information.
As to how they begin ... AFAIK that is largely up to the manufacturer to decide, though the 1968 law might have imposed certain parameters or restrictions on how it's done.
I am sure there are more than 8 million guns in this country, though how many would be hard to determine. There were about 5 million M-1 Garands made, and 6 million M-1 Carbines. They used to be military, but are no longer. Some of these were given to other countries, and of those, some returned here. How many? Don't know for sure. How many were destroyed in WW2 and Korea? Does anyone one know?
Then there are of course the companies that make sporting guns. Sometimes throughout history they kept records...sometimes not. Keep in mind that gunlaws now require more precise records than say, one hundred years ago.
Then there's the vagaries of fate. Colt, a well known maker of handguns, was sabotaged by a Confederate spy in 1863 during the Civil War and burned down, and some records were lost. Dating or quantifying what was made by Colt before that point might -- or might not -- be difficult.
As to who knows the serial number of your guns? Depends how you got them. I own a M-1 Carbine my father owned and a shotgun ... I know the carbine's serial ## but no one else "knows" I own that particular gun. Inland and thus some research book on Carbines could tell that gun was made, roughly when, but it would be next to impossible to trace where it went.
Are you beginning to see the difficulties?
If you buy a gun from John Q. Citizen's Sporting Goods, and he's a FFL, then that store records on a form (it has a specific ## but I forget it offhand) the store keeps until it goes out of business, then the BATF gets the forms.
Now, when you bought that gun from Mr. Citizen, did you send in the gaurantee registration card? Did you put the serial ### of the gun on it? Well, that company knows you have it. Or atleast their warrantee registration dept. does.
Could go on and on about this .....

 

[Jorg Nysgerrig]

Who assigns serial numbers?

As stated above, the manufacturer.

what happens to guns made prior?

Nothing.

When did serial numbers start?

They were mandated in 1968, but prior to that, many makers used them. Scroll down to the bottom of this page and you can see dozens that used them pre-1899.

And finally how do they work

It's a unique number assigned to each firearm made. That's how they work. Just an ID number. When I say unique, they are supposed to be unique within that manufacturer or model line.

am I really supposed to believe that somewhere out there there's some Cray two that knows that the serial number of my old M-16 was 9351827?

Uh... no.

Extra question is there really any point to serial numbers?

Yes. You might notice there are serial numbers on things other than guns as well. There is probably a reason they are on things.

 

[Wes Janson]

Let's be clear, by the way: there may well be dozens of firearms with a serial number of "16305" for instance. That number has to go along with a firearm type, caliber, manufacturer, model name, etc.

 

[Treo]

So there's over eighty MILLION privately owned firearms in this country. Nobody's really regulating who gets what number, as well as the fact that there may actually be dozens of guns with the SAME number. And nobody's really keeping track of which guns where.

I am officially no longer concerned W/ the ATF confiscating my guns in the middle of the night.

I guess I forgot we were dealing W/ another government beuracracy.

 

[Jim K]

One important point to remember when involved with serial numbers is that there are lots of duplicates. The "worst case" involves pistols like the Luger or P.38. The Germans started numbers at 1, went to 9999, then 1a to 9999a and so on, each year for each maker. So a Luger should not be registered or reported stolen as "Luger # 1234" as there will be many Lugers with that number. The correct way to uniquely identify a specific Luger would be "Luger, Maker's code byf (Mauser), 1942, 1234b".

Legally owned guns have been confiscated as "stolen" weapons because the owner of a stolen gun reported only the four digit serial number.

Also, Colt was notorious for continuing serial numbers over models or changing numbers in the middle of production of the same model.

One of the rules BATFE did lay down after 1968 was that from that point on, a serial number must be unique within that maker's line. That led to two approaches, incorporating the model within the serial number (Ruger prefix) or simply numbering without regard to model (S&W).

It may be of interest to note that military factories, like Springfield Armory, kept poor serial number records; they considered the serial number a means of inventory control at the using unit, not a means of tracking manufacture or shipping.

Jim

 

[Rugerlvr]

Serial numbers are perhaps useful to Law Enforcement if the gun is recovered as part of a criminal investigation (i.e. they can track it to the dealer who first sold it.) Otherwise, they are far more valuable to you, the consumer, who should have an inventory of your guns by serial number for insurance purposes.

On the gun confiscation thing... The logistics of trying to do mass gun confiscations are staggering. Mind blowing. It simply can not, and will not be done. (At least that's what I'm counting on...)

 

[Regen]

In regards to Rugerlvr's comment about gun confiscation on a mass scale, how was this done in Australia? Did they have millions of guns or only a few hundred thousand to confiscate?

Did they just declare them illegal and expect owners to turn them in or become felons?

 

[Rugerlvr]

how was this done in Australia?

Honestly, I don't know. I believe they had FAR fewer guns in circulation than we do. Their population was only 20.7M people as of last year.

Since they have never had a 2nd Amendment, they don't have any notion that they have a right to own guns. I'm guessing it was probably a mass turn-in. Honor system. There are probably still a lot of guns hidden away.

 

[TEDDY]

confiscation

British subjects are more docil than Americans and they obey orders of the government.Canadians have picked up our bad habits and are more inclined not to be sheep.I think the Assies numbers were 650,000 guns autos and pumps.not bolt guns.
as to our guns numbers most 22 rifles were not numbered.win/rem did number target rifles.al pistols seem to have been numbered as I have had $2 pistols that were numbered.(some pistols sold for 50/75 cents.)

 

[SDC]

Did they just declare them illegal and expect owners to turn them in or become felons?

Basically; they declared a "buyback" period, during which you could turn it in and get paid for doing so, but even if you look at only one specific model (SKSs), they had fewer SKSs turned in during that entire country-wide buyback than were imported into Australia IN ONE SHIPLOAD from China; where did the rest go? Maybe magic elves ate them all?