Ohio Ordnance Works Colt M1918 BAR - Number 107

Ohio Ordnance Works still builds semi-automatic BARs today, but this isn't one of them. In 2015, OOW built a separate series for Colt, marked with the Colt name, finished to a higher standard, and sold in a fitted presentation case. The run was planned for 1,000 rifles. Only about 200 were completed before it closed, and Ohio Ordnance has stated no more will be made. That makes this a finished chapter, not a catalog item.

The difference from OOW's regular 1918A3 shows the moment you open the case. The standard rifle copies the later A2, with a bipod, a carry handle, and a phosphate finish. Colt built the rifles as early-production M1918S instead. The receiver is machined from solid steel and deep blued, and the small parts are niter blued, so the levers and pins flash purple in the light. The profile is slim and clean, and the walnut stock and checkered forend were patterned on original examples.

Up top, the receiver bears the Colt address, model, and caliber, with a rampant Colt on the raised insert. The sights are a fixed front blade and an M1917-pattern folding ladder rear, and the left side wears crisp F and S fire control markings. It's a closed-bolt, semi-automatic .30-06 Springfield, so it's a BAR you can actually own and shoot.

Then there's the package. These rifles shipped in a fitted Negrini case from Italy, Colt embossed outside and lined in navy velvet, and this one still has it all: two OOW 20-round magazines, an M1907 pattern leather sling with brass hooks still bagged, the rampant Colt accessory box, a sealed cleaning kit, and the Colt manual written for this run, still in its factory wrapper.

With so few made, most collectors will never handle one. Finding one this complete is harder still."