Arisaka Type 99 Year of Mfg. I own a Type 99 that my father-in-law brought home from WWII. From what I have been able to determine, it is a series 20 made in the Kokura arsenal. Kokura manufactured series 20's from 1939 - 1945 and produced 100,000 series 20's. The serial number of my rifle is 55897. I have a Arisaka gun in my. Rich 46 says: 10 Jun 2013 03:13:36 PM I just purchased an Arisaka model 38 rifle. Full mum but I do not know the date of manufacture (serial number is 2028618). I am also missing the hand guard and that is a bit confusing for me since the exposed barrel is faded from the top of the rear site to four inches of the muzzle. Spelling of Col. Arisaka's name updated, based on information supplied by his great-granddaughter. Markings on Japanese Arisaka Rifles and Bayonets of World War II The Japanese manufactured over 6.4 million rifles and carbines in the 40 years from 1906 to 1945.
Hi guys!
'Tis the season, and the Christmas presents have begun to find their way into my collection! I will start with this little beauty here. Don't mind the cat hair.
My girlfriend bought this for me for Christmas. It's an entirely original and matching Japanese Type 38 Arisaka rifle. It was made by the Kokura Arsenal, I believe sometime in the late 30's. The rings stamped on top of the mum, as well as the extra character on the receiver and extra '0's and '1's that precede the serial number indicate that it was taken out of Imperial Japanese military service, and given to a school. The bore is bright, but the stock has a small crack in it.
It came with a seriously MINT bayonet. I don't know if Arisaka bayonets typically come in this condition, but the thing really is beautiful. It was made by 'Toyoda Jidoshoki Seisakusho' (Toyoda Automatic Loom Works).
I plan on acquiring all of the goodies that come with it, starting with a sling. If anyone dares to make my Christmas even better then please do not hesitate to send one!
My collecting goal has always been to acquire a rifle, helmet, field jacket/tunic, and flag from each of the five major powers during WWII. With this rifle, I now have 14 of the 25 items on the list. Onward...
Type38 Carbine
At a gun show in September, 2005 aguy who knew I was into Japanese stuff offered me this Type 38 carbine for agood price. I had never seen one before, but loved it. It’s a really light,handy little package. The barrel length is just 480 mm, or 18.9”. The bolt hadbeen modified into a turned-down configuration, so I replaced the bolt withanother one from a junker Type 38 carbine I bought (see below) and found a dustcover for it.
Here is the right side with the dustcover. You can see it still has the original cleaning rod. The overallcondition is only so-so, but it does still have the original cleaning rod. Ihave read that their handy size and light recoil made these carbines popularcapture weapons among US troops. It sounded a lot different than a Garand,though, so they had to be careful not to be mistaken for the enemy.
Arisaka Serial Numbers By Year Chart
The left side with the dust cover. Note thatthe sling swivels are mounted on the left side, not the bottom as with Type 38rifles.
Here’s the right side without the dust cover.
The left side without the dust cover.
All the Type 38 rifles and carbines I have seenhave this notch in the right side of the stock. I have no idea why.
The carbine sights are much shorter and “only”go to 2000 metres.
The mum has been ground off, as isusually the case, and only faint traces remain. Below are the
The serial number and arsenalmarking are on the left side of the receiver. The serial number of 196610 isfairly late, as the highest known for this arsenal is 211825. The “fourcannonballs” mark, which looks like a cloverleaf, indicates the Koishikawa Arsenal in
In the Honeycutt & Anthony book,p. 15,it says the triangle in a circleindicates 10% overload proof. The plain circle is listed as an indication ofacceptance according to a special wartime inspection standard.
Here is another of the triangles ina circle. The S is supposed to have the same meaning, i.e. 10% overload proof.
Arisaka Serial Numbers By Year
This design on the back of thesafety is similar to the one on the bolt lock/striker spring guide on PapaNambus. As a purely decorative image it seems somewhat extravagant for a militaryrifle. This is the proper small-tang safety for this series of Type 38 carbine.Others used a larger tang or a notch.
The cleaning rod.
A close-up of the interesting end of thecleaning rod. The other end is just threaded.
The most obvious flaw in the gun isone I didn’t even notice until I got it home: this crack in the top of theforestock, which has been rather inexpertly repaired with what looks likeplastic wood.
As noted above, when I got this carbine it hadthe bolt turned down. This is it as I purchased it.
The left side as I got it.
With the bolt replaced with one ofthe original configuration, the only external sign of the former modificationis this notch in the stock to provide clearance for the old turned-down bolt.
Inside there is one other left-overmodification: the rear of the magazine follower has been rounded off so thatthe bolt does not lock back on it when the magazine is empty.
I have purchased three other junkerType 38 carbines as parts guns. This photo is to remind me of what I have; it won’tbe of much interest to others. The top gun has a homemade stock, the length ofwhich is better for me than the original. The middle gun has a T38 carbineaction but the stock was cut down from a T38 rifle and the butt plate is fromsomething else, as it has a trapdoor in it. The bottom one is just the metalparts with no stock. Parts are very hard to come by up here and getting harderto import from the
The serial number from the top carbine with thehome-made stock. It is another Koishikawa (
The middle carbine has the seriesmarker ni in a circle at the far left(ni looks like an equal sign), thenthe serial number, then the Nagoya Arsenal mark, which looks like a top-heavy 8in a circle. Ni indicates the fourthseries, as it is the fourth symbol in the Japanese katakana “alphabet”according to the traditional i-ro-hapoetic arrangement. These prefixes were used to keep serial numbers down tofive digits. This series of carbine was made at the Chigusa factory of NagoyaArsenal.
Though the middle carbine has littleelse to recommend it, it does still have an intact mum. Since riflessurrendered to the Americans at the end of the war usually had the mum groundoff, ones that still have it were usually either captured in battle before thewar ended or surrendered to the Chinese and imported after the war.
The bottom carbine action has theseries marker ro (second series), the serial number, and the Kokura arsenalmark formerly used by
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Last updated: June 11, 2006. All contents arecopyright Teri unless otherwise specified and may not be used elsewhere in anyform without prior permission.