I just bought this used 220. The salesclerk says this was made in 1994, and in that year, they came with a nickel hammer and de-cocker. I just figured it was aftermarket, or a Sig refurbish gun. Any info. on this?
Thanks.

I can't help you with the nickel hammer and decocker, but I am more intrigued by your swirled peen mark.
I have never seen that.



Although I think I found the explanation:
Is my “Made in Germany” (or West Germany) SIG Really German?

“Made In Germany” vs. “Made In Germany / Assembled In US” SIGs
Even though we’ve busted the myth that SIG’s stockpile of slides was 5 years deep, and I’m certain they tried their best to forecast parts inventory approaching the cutoff of the 5 year post-reunification transition period, it’s a certainty they had at least some amount of slides already manufactured with “MADE IN W. GERMANY” stamped in the slide.
It’s also almost certain that SIG even had some amount of assembled and proofed “Made in W. Germany” pistols in their inventory.
But selling goods marked “Made in W. Germany” past October 3, 1995 would be illegal, so what to do?
You do the same thing you’d do with a bad tattoo: you put something else over it.
SIG’s solution was to stamp something on top of the “W.”
Since striking a stamp into metal is called “peening,” this is referred among SIG owners as a “peened” or “peened over” slide.
There were two different versions of SIG’s peening, but how and why each was applied is still somewhat of a mystery.
The following information is based on photos of three different SIG P220 pistols provided for this article by the F. Leone Collection:
G 253 XXX – which bears German proof marks with a KF (1995) date code
G 254 XXX – no proof marks or date code
G 257 XXX – no proof marks or date code




I learned something today...

The overstamping of the “W.” used to be discussed here fairly regularly.

But why would it be “illegal” to sell something marked “Made in W. Germany”? That is the first time I’ve ever seen that claim, and if gun or even just the slide was manufactured before reunification, was it not made in West Germany despite what happened to the country later?
I have a pair of Zeiss binoculars marked “Made in West Germany” that I purchased there in 1983 or ’84; would it be illegal for me to sell them?

quote:

The salesclerk says this was made in 1994, and in that year, they came with a nickel hammer and de-cocker. I just figured it was aftermarket

Just typical salesclerk bullshit.

Oh, and I recommend that folks stop quoting that article’s explanation, when it comes to “MADE IN W. GERMANY” until 1995, like it’s gospel. Follow his reference for the explanation, and it tells you nothing of the sort. He called the other theory a myth and acted like his version is fact, when it’s no more fact than the other.

Sometimes its a hard fact but you bought a gun not a line of bull shit.

quote:

Originally posted by Mustang-PaPa:
Sometimes its a hard fact but you bought a gun not a line of bull shit.

Yeah, I know the sales guy and he usually knows his stuff, but I always like to verify info. My best guess is it dates to 1995. Still don't know why it has the nickel accent parts. Although he told me it was traded in by an LEO, so maybe an LE armorer added those parts for some reason?

And I'm also not sure what time period these hammers were used?

It came with newish N/S & 5 mags (2 of which are factory 10 rounders) for $499.

quote:

Originally posted by 12131:

quote:

The salesclerk says this was made in 1994, and in that year, they came with a nickel hammer and de-cocker. I just figured it was aftermarket

Just typical salesclerk bullshit.

Oh, and I recommend that folks stop quoting that article’s explanation, when it comes to “MADE IN W. GERMANY” until 1995, like it’s gospel. Follow his reference for the explanation, and it tells you nothing of the sort. He called the other theory a myth and acted like his version is fact, when it’s no more fact than the other.

Oops, that's what I get for trusting the internet.
I've never seen the peening before, and it did explain what it was, physically.
Although to its truth or not, I haven't read every thread on the forum since 2008, when I joined.

Thank you for the clarification, and I'd never trust a gun salesman.

I’m not talking about the blotted out “W”. I’m talking about his explanation for the West Germany marking on SIGs until 1995, although West Germany no longer existed after 1990.

quote:

As part of the 1990 Reunification Treaty negotiations, West German manufacturers expressed major concerns about diluting their reputation for “West German quality” as a result of the flailing former East German economy and manufacturing sector (famous for bringing you such manufacturing missteps as the Trabant) combining with theirs under a common market and currency. So when the 1990 Reunification Treaty was ratified, the German government allowed West German manufacturers to continue referring to their products as “West German-made” for a 5 year transition period. That made it legal for SIG Sauer to continue producing and exporting products marked “Made in W. Germany” through October 3, 1995

He wrote it like it was fact. I have not been able to verify this anywhere. Also, the statement might hold some weight, if there are similarly marked 1995 HK, or Walther, pistols. But, there aren’t, as far as I know.

I admit that I also used to think that it was true that there was a 5-year period of allowing (but not requiring) goods to be marked “Made in W. Germany” to distinguish the more sophisticated manufacturing of the western half of the then newly-reunified Germany. After all, it was completely in line with my own observations. I have owned several German-made products (cars, firearms, electronics, household items, etc.) manufactured after 1990 (but before 1995) marked both “Made in Germany” and “Made in W. Germany”. It would be natural to assume that the “Made in Germany” products were all East German, but this is not the case - 12131’s example of HK and Walther pistols is excellent because both companies manufactured products in West Germany, but were often marked (both pre- and post-reunification) only with “Made in Germany”, no mention of “West”. I could also say that I really never have seen anything post-1995 marked with a “W.”, but that’s not really saying much either.

The closest that I’ve ever been able to come to an answer on this subject is that around this time (1994-1995), a higher court in Germany established a few new legal precedents (i.e. common law, not statutory) basically saying that consumers have a right to expect that a product bearing the words “Made in Germany” (in English by the way) must be primarily made of German raw materials and processed in Germany. The establishment of this precedent really had nothing to do with banning the use of “Made in W. Germany”. Rather, it was about preventing manufacturers from misleading consumers. However, because the text of the court document specifically mentioned the words “Made in Germany” (in 1995, there would have been no reason whatsoever to use any other phrase), we can infer that it may have de facto codified the phrase “Made in Germany” itself, but more importantly, we know for certain that it would have rendered any other terminology (such as “Made in W. Germany”) meaningless (though maybe not illegal) simply by existing.

What readers of Ferrari Steve’s article need to know first is that Germany’s legal system is different from ours, and their laws (which again, don’t necessarily have to be codified, they can just be common law) regarding country of origin marking requirements are also quite different from ours.

Of course, the above brings up another question. Assuming that “Made in W. Germany” was rendered meaningless, but not illegal, why then did Eckernförde go to so much trouble to peen over the all of the “W.”s?

The answer might actually be in our own laws in the USA, where unlike Germany, we basically require a country-of-origin marking on almost anything that you buy with money, and we have written (i.e. codified) rules about it too. And the particular marking we are talking about here is written in English. What I’d be curious to see is if any of the relevant pistols have a peened W (or improvised triskelion) if they weren’t originally slated for US importation.

When I was stationed in West Germany in the 80s, things made in East Germany were marked GDR or East Germany.

I purchased a lot of Phot equipment and learned of that early on so I did not by the equivalent of "Chinese crap" on the local market.

But the distinction was a big deal to the West Germans. (Although we rarely used "West" we almost always said "German" unless the distinction was needed for clarification.

Nice!

Sounds like $499 well spent.

A while back, the nickel parts could be had separately, but some were easier than others.

A nickel decocker could be had from an SRT kit or ordered by itself.

A nickel spur hammer was a lot more illusive. I can't recall seeing them available separately unless they were pulled from an existing firearm.

They may have been swapped out if it had been refurbished, but at least you are halfway to having all nickel controls.

Can't help you with the whole West Germany thing...

quote:

Originally posted by .38supersig:
Nice!

Sounds like $499 well spent.

A while back, the nickel parts could be had separately, but some were easier than others.

A nickel decocker could be had from an SRT kit or ordered by itself.

A nickel spur hammer was a lot more illusive. I can't recall seeing them available separately unless they were pulled from an existing firearm.

They may have been swapped out if it had been refurbished, but at least you are halfway to having all nickel controls.

Can't help you with the whole West Germany thing...

Yeah, this thing is just a mystery. Based on my research, a spur hammer wouldn't be unheard of on this year of gun, but nickel? Unless they were just trying to use up the last of the old hammers in stock.

It also came in a newer Sig case, so maybe a refurb? I'm not sure if Sig does refurbs anymore, but I remember buying a few in the mid 2000's.

The fun part is that Numrich has a nickel slide stop and takedown lever in stock.

Couldn't leave things alone. Already had the grips from my last 220 I got rid of, so I figured I'd update this one. Also cleaned-up the slide with touch-up bluing.

Make sure you look for MIM parts. You never know. They are evil parts, you know.

[Of course I jest.]

quote:

Originally posted by sigmonkey:
When I was stationed in West Germany in the 80s, things made in East Germany were marked GDR or East Germany......

Yes, both GDR for "German Democratic Republic" and DDR. The official name of the country was Deutsche Demokratische Republik (DDR), which is the German acronym for the GDR. So Zeiss Jena binocs from East Germany were marked DDR.

I have no info on the gun, but I bet it shoots great. Someday that stamp may be worth a lot of money due to it's rarity and historical interest.

I got out and shot this yesterday. It ran 100%. I ordered the reduced power MS kit from Wolff to lighten the DA pull. They seemed to offer 3 choices. The kit for the newer guns, a kit pre 21xxxx serial number range, and the 226 kit that also included older pre-98 220 guns. Not sure which of those two kits to use?

And a new 15 lb. recoil spring. I'm not sure what's in the gun, but I heard 15 was the original weight for the folded slides?

I also ordered 2 factory 8 round mags and 2 ACT mags. Not sure these are the same quality they use to be, as I guess they're now being made by Armscor? But for $13 each from Lanbo's, I think I did all right.

I just realized something when looking at your gun again that I completely overlooked initially. That spurred hammer (also referred to as non-rebounding hammer) only appeared on pre-1994 P220s. The hammer rests directly on the firing pin, when improperly manually lowered by thumb while simultaneously squeezing the trigger. This carries the potential risk of the gun discharging when dropped directly on the spur, if the firing pin block somehow fails. Yeah, people being people do make this dumb and potentially fatal mistake. The transition to the new (current) hammer took place in 93/94. Don’t know why previous owner would have wanted to put this hammer in.

Anyway, your main spring-strut-seat assembly should be of the old style, if previous owner didn’t swap it out for the new style. So, you need the Wolff main spring for the early style. Can you show a photo, with a grip panel removed, of the strut/main spring assembly?

I also wondered about the hammer and thought it should have been rounded.

Yeah, it only further confirms that the salesclerk was talking out of his ass.