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The first version produced for commercial sale by Colt was the SP1 model AR-15 Sporter in .223 Remington, with a 20-inch (51 cm) barrel and issued with five-round magazines. [21] Initial sales of the Colt AR-15 were slow, primarily due to its fixed sights and carry handle that made scopes difficult to mount and awkward to use. [84]
ArmaLite, or Armalite, is an American small arms engineering company, formed in the early 1950s, in Hollywood, California.Many of its products, as conceived by chief designer Eugene Stoner, relied on unique foam-filled fiberglass butt/stock furniture, and a composite barrel using a steel liner inside an aluminum sleeve, including the iconic AR-15/M16 family.
Stoner was born in Gosport, Indiana, on November 22, 1922.He moved to Long Beach, California where he graduated from Long Beach Polytechnical High School.In 1939, after the Depression, there was not enough money for him to attend college, so he went to work as a machinist for Vega Aircraft Company, the forerunner of what became Lockheed Airplane Company (now the Lockheed Martin Corporation).
Colt has since made many different models of AR-15 rifle and carbine models, including the AR-15, AR-15A2, AR-15A3, AR-15A4, and others. Sale of new AR-15s in the US was banned by the Federal Assault Weapons Ban from 1994 to 2004. Colt and others continued to sell legally compliant versions during that period. [8]
Colt's first two models produced after the acquisition of the rifle from ArmaLite were the 601 and 602, and these rifles were in many ways clones of the original ArmaLite rifle (in fact, these rifles were often found stamped Colt ArmaLite AR-15, Property of the U.S. Government caliber .223, with no reference to them being M16s). [51]
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Weapons patterned on the original ArmaLite AR-15 design have been produced by numerous manufacturers and have been used by nations around the world, some of which created their own variations. The tables here are split into a variety of categories and provide an overview of different subtypes.
1,034,462 of the Model 760 alone were made from 1952-1980: Vetterli M1870: Bolt-action rifle Italy: 1,500,000 Remington Rolling Block: Single-shot rifle United States: 1,500,000 [121] Pattern 1853 Enfield: Rifle-musket United Kingdom: 1,500,000 [122] [page needed] MP 38 and MP 40: Submachine gun Nazi Germany: 1,100,000 [123] 1,500,000 [123 ...