I believe it was whatever bayonet was issued by that arsenal at any given time. Since there were multiple companies manufacturing M1 Carbines and bayonets, it was just whatever was in stock at that time.

 

I didn't want to spend the fairly big bucks on an original M1 Carbine bayonet so I picked up a repro bayo. from SARCO for about $30. I tried it on my Inland Motors Div. and my Saginaw S.G. (both with a bayo. lug on the front barrel band) and it fit very well with only a slight bit of wobble. But it is very secure on the carbine. My older Std. Pod. M1 Carbine has barrel band without a bayo. lug. I was issued a M1 Carbine for a short time while I was a guest of Uncle Sam and I liked the little piece. It had the bayo. lug and it came with the bayo. too. If you don't care to spend the almost outrageous price for an original bayonet, I'm sure you would be just as happy with a repro., unless you are purest at heart. My two M1 Carbines with the repro bayo. attached is a MEAN looking weapon. A friend of mine and his wife came up to my range last year to burn some powder with me about a year ago. The wife took one look at the Inland carbine with the bayo. attached on the lug and said "Oh what an evil sexy looking weapon, can I shoot it". I handed it to her and she proceeded to burn up three 15 round mags. with it. She turned to her husband and said "I want one just like that". Shooting at an old shot up propane bottle at 50 yds. distant she hit it almost every time she pulled the trigger. I don't know what there is about a M1 Carbine with a bayo. attached but women just seem to have yen for such stuff.

 

I love mine it is such a great shooting gun. Low recoil, fast trigger, quick sights! Can't beat it. I like the idea of trying a repro. For 30$ i can still afford to save and buy an original.
I did buy some 30 rnd repro mags for it from numrich. They seems like a quality product and the price was great, 4 in a canvas repro pouch for 100.00.
Lol i haven't made any shooter lady friends with it yet

 

There are places online where Italian models can be had for under 100$ and they look great even if they aren't completely original.

 

marine ------ Man what sweet pieces you have there. To my eyes the M1 Carbine with bayonets attached are meaner looking than a M1 Garand with bayo. attached. During my Army days when we ran the bayo. course I thought I could do more damage to the bayo. dummy with the Carbine / bayo. combo than I did with the Garand / bayo. combo. That was 70 + years ago and maybe memory has dimmed a little over time.
Is that an original folding stock on your carbine? I have a repro folder on my Inland Motors Div. M1 carbine. From what I've read the Inland carbines were the only ones supplied with the folding stock. I'm sure that other makes of the M1 carbine would easily take the folders as well.

 

marine ------ Man what sweet pieces you have there. To my eyes the M1 Carbine with bayonets attached are meaner looking than a M1 Garand with bayo. attached. During my Army days when we ran the bayo. course I thought I could do more damage to the bayo. dummy with the Carbine / bayo. combo than I did with the Garand / bayo. combo. That was 70 + years ago and maybe memory has dimmed a little over time.
Is that an original folding stock on your carbine? I have a repro folder on my Inland Motors Div. M1 carbine. From what I've read the Inland carbines were the only ones supplied with the folding stock. I'm sure that other makes of the M1 carbine would easily take the folders as well.

They do, but not as mean as an WW1 1903 with a 16" bayonet attached.

 

perchman ------- For my informal plinking I reload for my M1 carbine using 110 or 115 grain hard cast lead bullets from Rim Rock Bullets. Their facility is only about 100 miles from my front door (which isn't too bad here in Montana) and I buy about 800 bullets for about $40 . They feed and function very well and aren't bad for accuracy too. I have a couple pounds of H110 powder that I use for reloading.
I too have a Swede Mauser, M1 Garand and a Model 94 30-30 I bought new in 1952. That little piece has accounted for many Montana whitetails over the past 70 years. I suppose it will account for several more at least for the next two or three generations.

 

perchman ------- For my informal plinking I reload for my M1 carbine using 110 or 115 grain hard cast lead bullets from Rim Rock Bullets. Their facility is only about 100 miles from my front door (which isn't too bad here in Montana) and I buy about 800 bullets for about $40 . They feed and function very well and aren't bad for accuracy too. I have a couple pounds of H110 powder that I use for reloading.
I too have a Swede Mauser, M1 Garand and a Model 94 30-30 I bought new in 1952. That little piece has accounted for many Montana whitetails over the past 70 years. I suppose it will account for several more at least for the next two or three generations.

I just don't care to use cast. Had a bad experience with cast in a S&W 629 shortly after getting into rolling my own. And just say no. However I did run some .30-30 coated that worked very nicely.

 

perchman ------ What kind of bad experience have you had with cast bullets ?? I've been shooting cast for several years in plinking rounds and have never had a bad time with them. No I wouldn't use them for hunting or defense but for just informal plinking they work for me just fine.

 

Tried lead in a 6" S&W 629 and had terrible leading. Little ribbons of lead in the grooves. I wasn't doing full power .44 mag loads. I imagine if I'd played with it longer and worked on matching powder burn rate, bullet weight, BHN, I could have fixed it. I put it away for a time and then decided to sell the pistol, and accoutrements, and buy something else.

 

Adam ----- Yes the hard cast lead bullets I'm using have about 20% antimony content. I used to cast my own bullets but gave that up many years ago. I've had such good luck with Rim Rock bullets and no casting hassle or breathing lead vapors that I long ago decided to just buy my plinking bullets. For hunting and / or defense loads I'd never use reloads but only commercial ammo. If I ever had to defend myself or family with a firearm, the problems in a court of law could be very bad for me if reloads of my own making were brought up.

 

like was stated, there was no particular manufacture of bayonet that was sent out with a particular manufacture carbine. it was whatever was in stock.

now, if you want to dig deeeeeeeeeep in your pocket, get the one that was manufactured during WW2, but be careful there a ton of repros out there.

or just buy a repro and put a period at the end

1943 Style M4 bayonet for the M1 Carbine | Keep Shooting

 

like was stated, there was no particular manufacture of bayonet that was sent out with a particular manufacture carbine. it was whatever was in stock.

now, if you want to big deeeeeeeeeep in your pocket, get the one that was manufactured during WW2, but be careful there a ton of repros out there.

or just buy a repro and put a period at the end

1943 Style M4 bayonet for the M1 Carbine | Keep Shooting

Thanks for the link. Its a nice looking reproduction. I'm sure i'll be pleased with it

 

marine --- I agree the shorter bayo. blade just seems better and more maneuverable in close quarters fighting in my opinion. If a bayonet charge were coming at me a longer bayo. on the end of a rifle might be a better weapon. But the old mass bayonet charges have been pretty much abandoned. The close quarters face to face, eye ball to eye ball is more the order of the day.
As I mentioned above I remember being able to do more damage to the mid-section of the bayo. course dummy running in the bayonet course with the M1 Carbine & its bayo. than I did with the M1 Garand and its bayo. I could swing and twist the carbine's bayo. much easier. Of course that was many many years ago (1954,'55) and I guess I don't recall as vividly now as I did back then. At that time us ground pounders were told the shooting in Korea could start up again overnight and we had better be good and ready for it because we'd most likely be right in the middle of it again.

 

perch ----- Were the lead bullets you were using "hard cast" or not? I've never had leading problems when I used the hard cast bullets. In all my loading for .45 caliber ammo I've always used a fiber wad under the bullet to protect the base of the bullet from heat. As I mentioned I've never had had a leading problem when using hard cast and fiber wads.

 

Did you use gas checks on your bullets?

I don't recall now the BHN of the bullets. This was not too long after I started loading in 2011. And I'd only started playing with guns a couple years before that. I was late bloomer, at 55. I was aware of the relationship ship between powder and bullet, gas checks, etc. Had it excited me I'm sure I could have made it work. I'd say I just didn't want to mess with it? I've learned that's a fairly normal stage for newb's. Buying a big gun and deciding it's not for you. A lot of you guys that are my age, or older, that started doing this as kids had very specific reasons for using lead. It was cheaper than jacketed. And it was easy/cheap to get scrap lead and make your own. That's one aspect of this great hobby that I can pretty much say I'll never get into though.

 

With an original folder you have some very valuable pieces there and especially with original bayonets to boot. I'm sure glad I was a ground pounder for Uncle Sam when we were still issued steel weapons with walnut furniture back in those days. We'll never see that kind of fighting materials again. I'm mighty glad I have those same pieces stashed in my gun safe for my kids, their kids and their kids to look at enjoy and hopefully fire occasionally.

 

Being a 0311 I mostly carried the plastic rifle, but also carried a Remington 870 trenchgun and a 1911A1. I did carry a M14 on special details. I own a 1913 dated 1903, a 1917 and 1918 dated 1917s, a 1942 dated 1903A1, 2 1943 dated 1903A3s, a 1944 dated M1 Garand, and the 2 1944 dated Inland carbines, in my US rifle collection. I also own a Springfield M1A National Match.

 

I have FOUR of these gorgeous carbines all from different makers but only 2 "real" bayonets. I got them all from CMP back in around 2008-ish. One weird thing was they shipped them directly to ME without using an FFL dealer. All of them shoot fantastic, all have nice barrels and other equipment and all have bayonet lugs. I have shot any kind of ammo you can think of through them and have NEVER had a misfire, misfeed, fail to eject etc on ANY of them. They work so well I am convinced they would shoot rocks if I could get them into a magazine. I HAD 5 of them but gave 1 to my son because,well,he's my son and loves them as much as I do. On the OTHER HAND I also have a Universal carbine (blech--bad taste in my mouth saying it) that is a basic POS that will ONLY fire with any continuity things like Remington and other more expensive rounds. Do that and it does everything just fine. Try TULA or any off brand I am lucky to shoot maybe 5 rounds before I get a jam or some other problem. And NO bayonet lug.But I hardly paid anything for it plus got my first Makarov in the deal. Also one of my favorite guns. I gave up expecting to find a REAL bayonet for them long ago as they are way to expensive. Last gun show was about a month ago here in Western NC and one was going for over $200. If I were rich it wouldn't be a problem but I'm not. The carbines were going for $1200 and UP at the show but I only paid about $450 for each one. One b urns me is way bac k in about 1981 I had the opportunity to buy a CASE of them for $110 a piece. And my (former) wife wouldn't let me buy even ONE!! AND she wanted me to get rid of my Mini 14 that I had had since about 73 or 74--right after they first came out! OH THE HUMANITY!! (Notice I said FORMER wife--not a gun fan but she refused to give me back my S&W .38 Chief's Special in stainless when we split up--out of spite. She probably sold it like she did so much of my stuff. LOL) The M1 carbine is what my dad carried in WW2 as a Navy CPO detached to the Marines assigned to the Seabees (or something like that). He got me started on liking them even though he never bought one himself.

 

Pretty much the same for me, only removed back a decade or two.
When I went hunting for one, originals (WWII, post war or Korean era) were priced in the stratosphere (probably cheap by today's standard but up there for me!).
Eventually repro's appeared and I went for it.
Strangely enough, just as I figured the matter settled, a large block of returns came in from Korea and original prices took a bit of a drop, not high end examples, of course, but "issued" samples most definitely.
IIRC, for a short while, issued example prices dropped to less than the repros.
I looked them over but, while they were affordable, they were, for the most part, What I graded as "Well issued" (to be kind).
Mine still sports the repro...........

 

I wish the repros were high carbon but still will get one

 

I enjoyed reading about your GI carbines and the new repro. carbines. My first M1 carbine is (still have it) a Standard Products dated '43 and it is all original, even the sling. It came with two 15 round original mags. and is NOT equipped with a bayo. lug and never had one. I've had it since 1965 and gave about $60 for it. My second carbine is Inland Motors Div. (still have it). I've had it since the early '80's and I believe I gave about $120 for it. It has the bayo. lug but the stock is a replacement so this M1 is my shooter piece. Since the Inland Motors Div. was the only mfg. issued with a folding stock during the war, I just had to have a folder with a sling on it. It's a repro. but looks mighty good . My third carbine is a Saginaw S. G. (still have it) I bought in the late '90's from a friend. I gave $1000 for it, twenty 15 round mags. and three thirty round mags., all are original GI mags. and 500 rounds of GI ammo. This M1 has been refurbished at a military arsenal and is in pristine (can't say 100% mint since I've shot one mag. through it) condition but everything is perfect and matching. Anyhow that is the extent of my M1 Carbine stash. I did buy a repro. bayonet & sheath and have it on an original pistol belt with an original 2 pocket mag. pouch dated 1943. I've had the belt and mag. pouch since the mid '70's..
I bought an excellent Springfield M1 Garand through the DCM back in '91 for less than $100 (if memory serves me it was $92 back then). I've fired one full 8 round clip through it just to verify every functions properly. I packed one of these around for Uncle Sam back in the mid '50's and learned to appreciate what a fine rifle it is.