Any idea who manufactured the first clone after Colt lost their patent?
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Any idea who manufactured the first clone after Colt lost their patent?
Colt did not hold the patent, Fairchild Armalite did. Colt held manufacturing rights. Those rights were never exclusive. Colt did trademark the name, AR-15. During the Vietnam war other companies produced AR variants in the U.S. for the military and several other companies produced variants internationally under license.
For clarification...
Anyone know who produced the first complete rifle, AR clone available on the US commercial market?
Either Palmetto Arms (not the current one) or SGW (now Olympic).
GM Hydramatic and H&R both made M16A1s early on for military contract. I carried a GM as late as 1988 in the National Guard.
The first civilian clone I saw was an Olympic, but I wasn't that in tune to look. Tis would have been 1991, in a gunshop in Washington State.