Colt AR15 Magazine Cage Code = Date ?

[GOTURBACK]

Hello All,
I have a question and was hoping someone here might be able to help out, anyone have knowledge of the cage codes. I want to know if the cage codes stamped on the inside of 30 round Colt AR15 magazines corresponds to the year of manufacture.
I have some that are stamped K1, K2, K3, K4 on the inside.

Thank You, Chris

[Dragon88]

An interesting question, I would be curious as to what those K codes mean as well. Do your magazines have markings on the outside of the body? A Colt 30 rounder I acquired recently shows:



This cage code of 33710 returns as Okay Industries from a database look-up. Even though the magazine also has a Colt marking below this on the body, and a Colt floor plate, I have heard that Okay makes the magazines for them now. From what I have seen of other defense supply chain markings, I'm guessing this mag was made in Feb 2008.

I recently came across an Okay magazine body with a Colt floor plate on it. I assumed this was a mismatch and that someone had swapped the floor plate, but maybe they do go together after all. An overrun situation or what have you at the factory.

[GOTURBACK]

Hello All,
I have a question and was hoping someone here might be able to help out, anyone have knowledge of the cage codes. I want to know if the cage codes stamped on the inside of 30 round Colt AR15 magazines corresponds to the year of manufacture.
I have some that are stamped K1, K2, K3, K4 on the inside.

Thank You, Chris

*There are no markings on the outside other than the Colt information on the floorplate.

[Dragon88]

I have a Colt marked magazine body with an Okay Industries cage code, born in Feb 1999. Inside, it has 66 and K2 on one side and 66 02 on the other.

Another magazine is an Okay marked body with Okay cage code, born April 2006. 90 K4 and 90 04 on the insides.

Both had Okay floor plates.

Sorry no answers there for you, just data points. Since these are on the inside of the body, I don't believe they are codes meant to be tracked anywhere. Probably just assembly codes used by Okay to mark the two halves of the magazines bodies through production.

This is assuming Okay made your magazines, I don't know when they took that over. Any idea how old these are?

[DESERTFOX]

Here is some mag info.

http://www.ar15.com/content/page.html?id=331

http://www.biggerhammer.net/ar15/magazines/

[GOTURBACK]

I purchased these and was told that they are old stock from the 70's, I was told that the codes stand for 1972 = K2, 1973 = K3, 1974 = K4 etc

UPDATE: I have received all the information I had been looking for Thank You everyone for the help.

[gjb1124]

codes stand for 1972 = K2, 1973 = K3, 1974 = K4 etc

Is this correct?
I, too, recently bought some "new old stock from the '70's".
On the inside they are stamped K1 on one side and 01 on the other side.

Thanks in advance for your time and help.

[GOTURBACK]

Hello All,
I have received this information from what I would say is a very reliable source, I hope it helps.

In the 1970’s Okay / Colt stamped there mags for the year with the K1 - K2 - K3 - K4 - K5 code.
1971 - 1972 - 1973 - 1974 - 1975 - ect, ect - This ( K ) code stamp is only on 1 side of the mags in the
1970s, and it is only stamped 1 time. On the other side of the mag is the month code - 01 - 02
03 - 04 - 05 - 06 - 07 - 08 - 09 - 10 - ect, ect. And again it to is also only stamped 1 time.

K5 / 04 which = April of 1975
k5 = the year of production
04 = the month of production
This is a typical 2 stamp code from the 1970's

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The mags from the 1980 have the ( K ) code for the month and the 87 code for the year.
This code say ( K4 - 87 ) will be stamped on one side of the mag,
and ( 04 - 87 ) will be stamped on the other

K4 - 87 / 04 - 87 which = April of 1987
K4 - 04 = the month of production
87 = the year of production
This is the typical 4 stamp code from the 1980's

GOTURBACK