In April of this year, I was fortunate enough to purchase my first Accuracy International rifle. I have been lusting over an AI for a long time but had not really put any thought into owning one because they were a bit out of my budget. A long time friend of mine, and member here @kRcu, purchased an AT and told me I really ought to own one. I laughed it off thinking that there was no way that it could ever happen. He pressured me, like good friends do, to sell off firearms I didnt need, or never used, and to dip into my "gun fund" and to just make it happen. He kept telling me, YOLO, YOLO, stop being a p****y.
He lives in Denver, not too far away from Mile High. He let me know that MHS on rare occasions will receive 'loaner' guns. The way I understand it is these rifles are loaned out to law enforcement agencies and may get past around to try and convince police departments to fill an order for multiple guns. These loaners are able to be purchased at a discount. The price they sell them for is more in line with what I am able to justify.
In April, several of these rifles were listed as used on GunBroker. I spent several weeks checking out the different rifles and trying to justify to myself that I needed one. Finally, after the last 'YOLO', I decided that I needed one. My friend was nice enough to drive to Mile High and put his hands on the few guns they had there. He called me back and said the one that felt best to him, and the one I should buy, was SN 19118.
I called Mike the next day and gave him my money. It shipped that day and was received by my FFL a few days later. I picked it up and brought it home and unboxed it. The first time I put it in my hands took any regret away from my decision.
Knowing that it had been handled by a bunch of cops, I decided to pull all of the skins and wash all of the plastics in soapy water. I stripped it down, cleaned it all up and put it back together. I took a bunch of photos of it all cleaned up and sent them to my friend. And that was that... at least thats what I thought.
A day or so later, kRcu sent me a screen shot of a youtube video. The video shows Frank, from SnipersHide, going over the features of the gun and showing all of its features and so on. The screen he sent me shows the SN 19118 on the side of it. I think, 'Cool! Frank touched my gun!".
That got me thinking, my gun was very likely an early model released to the U.S.. I did some further investigating to try and find out exactly when it came to the U.S.. It crossed my mind that possibly, it could have been the very first AT to make it into the states. I did Google searches for hours, trying to find an AT with a serial number before 19118 and came up empty. One picture I did run into was SN 19120. It was linked on some web page. I knew I was close, but not quite there. I checked Youtube again, and found the Demo gun at shot show was also my gun-
I decided, what could it hurt to email Accuracy International US and AI in the UK. I asked if there was any way to tell me if my gun was the first US model. Meanwhile I kept up my search. I ran into something really interesting! I found my rifle listed right on the accuracy international US website. You can go there and see it now- Here is the photo-
I got a response back from AI US who confirmed that my gun was not the first in the US, but the second. The first gun to hit the shore was SN 19119. It had come to the US two weeks before SN 19118. They also told me that the US distributors did not receive any production AT's until May of 2014.
The next day I got an answer back from AI in the UK. The were only able to confirm that my gun was shipped in 2013, and that my gun was the rifle used on the AI US website.
I thought, it my gun is on the AI website, where else in AIs documentation can it be found. I downloaded the AI USA brochure and got some answers. SN 19119 is on the front page of the AI brochure-
I knew my gun was at Shot Show early in 2014. I checked Youtube again and found that SN 19119 was also at the show, wearing tan skins-
I realized that a tan picture I had seen before was also in the AI brochure, but it was 19120
I found something else interesting. 19120 was also in the brochure, but it was black-
It was cool to find all this. It is also interesting to see how my rifle is different now than how it was received in the US. My gun does not have the high scope rail, the NV rail, bipod with spigot, and the barrel in the photo. Here is how it sits today-
The moral of the story- These 3 guns were the first into the US as pre production demos. 19119 and 19120 are certainly floating around somewhere. Its fun to know that my gun has been fingered by more people than the most famous female porn star in the industry. That doesnt really matter, cause it shoots.
He lives in Denver, not too far away from Mile High. He let me know that MHS on rare occasions will receive 'loaner' guns. The way I understand it is these rifles are loaned out to law enforcement agencies and may get past around to try and convince police departments to fill an order for multiple guns. These loaners are able to be purchased at a discount. The price they sell them for is more in line with what I am able to justify.
In April, several of these rifles were listed as used on GunBroker. I spent several weeks checking out the different rifles and trying to justify to myself that I needed one. Finally, after the last 'YOLO', I decided that I needed one. My friend was nice enough to drive to Mile High and put his hands on the few guns they had there. He called me back and said the one that felt best to him, and the one I should buy, was SN 19118.
I called Mike the next day and gave him my money. It shipped that day and was received by my FFL a few days later. I picked it up and brought it home and unboxed it. The first time I put it in my hands took any regret away from my decision.
Knowing that it had been handled by a bunch of cops, I decided to pull all of the skins and wash all of the plastics in soapy water. I stripped it down, cleaned it all up and put it back together. I took a bunch of photos of it all cleaned up and sent them to my friend. And that was that... at least thats what I thought.
A day or so later, kRcu sent me a screen shot of a youtube video. The video shows Frank, from SnipersHide, going over the features of the gun and showing all of its features and so on. The screen he sent me shows the SN 19118 on the side of it. I think, 'Cool! Frank touched my gun!".
That got me thinking, my gun was very likely an early model released to the U.S.. I did some further investigating to try and find out exactly when it came to the U.S.. It crossed my mind that possibly, it could have been the very first AT to make it into the states. I did Google searches for hours, trying to find an AT with a serial number before 19118 and came up empty. One picture I did run into was SN 19120. It was linked on some web page. I knew I was close, but not quite there. I checked Youtube again, and found the Demo gun at shot show was also my gun-
I decided, what could it hurt to email Accuracy International US and AI in the UK. I asked if there was any way to tell me if my gun was the first US model. Meanwhile I kept up my search. I ran into something really interesting! I found my rifle listed right on the accuracy international US website. You can go there and see it now- Here is the photo-
I got a response back from AI US who confirmed that my gun was not the first in the US, but the second. The first gun to hit the shore was SN 19119. It had come to the US two weeks before SN 19118. They also told me that the US distributors did not receive any production AT's until May of 2014.
The next day I got an answer back from AI in the UK. The were only able to confirm that my gun was shipped in 2013, and that my gun was the rifle used on the AI US website.
I thought, it my gun is on the AI website, where else in AIs documentation can it be found. I downloaded the AI USA brochure and got some answers. SN 19119 is on the front page of the AI brochure-
I knew my gun was at Shot Show early in 2014. I checked Youtube again and found that SN 19119 was also at the show, wearing tan skins-
I realized that a tan picture I had seen before was also in the AI brochure, but it was 19120
I found something else interesting. 19120 was also in the brochure, but it was black-
It was cool to find all this. It is also interesting to see how my rifle is different now than how it was received in the US. My gun does not have the high scope rail, the NV rail, bipod with spigot, and the barrel in the photo. Here is how it sits today-
The moral of the story- These 3 guns were the first into the US as pre production demos. 19119 and 19120 are certainly floating around somewhere. Its fun to know that my gun has been fingered by more people than the most famous female porn star in the industry. That doesnt really matter, cause it shoots.
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