Fn 1922 question

[Brantjohns]

I recently acquired a 1922 fn in 7.65. It has black plastic fn grips.has what appears to be normal fn markings on it. I have read on this forum that when manufactured when they got to 100,000 they added a letter suffix and started over. My sereal number starts with an "a" and has 4 numbers only, the first being a 0 followed by 3 numbers below 400. "A03xx. Anybody know anything about this gun. It is in very good condition and has been taken care of. Thanks in advance

[HisSoldier]

http://www.hlebooks.com/ebook/liste01.htm
He has an ebook on the FN 1910 and 1922 models.

[silvermane_1]

OP is it marked 7.65 Browning?, or 7.65mm cal?

[Brantjohns]

It says "cal 7mm.65". Really nothing more to say about it. Didnt I read somewhere that the earlier ones had plastic grips and then changed to wood. I'm thinking I have read everything on internet about the 7.65 and nowhere can I find a comment where someone has a letter in front of the serial number

[silvermane_1]

Well i do know that it's referring to 32 ACP aka 7.65 Browning, although i remember that some were chambered in 7.65 French Long.

[Brantjohns]

Thanks for the hookup with the e-book. It has a chart that says that the "E" with a star over it means it was inspected between 1924 and 1959. Still have no idea what the low serial number with letter in front means. Tks

[HisSoldier]

Didnt I read somewhere that the earlier ones had plastic grips and then changed to wood.

Earlier guns may have had hard rubber grips, or pressed horn, they would shave buffalo or other horn into thin layers like plywood I believe, then soak in hot water or steam, glue together hot and press into a die, which had the logo or checkering on it. I don't know if the FN Browning 1910 did either way, but the only plastics in common use were gutta percha, bakelite (1909) and celluloid, many of these appeared in the late 1800's. I'd like to know when the first true plastics were made into grips though.