[arisakadogs]

T-38 Rifle Slings - These slings typically have 8 adjusting holes with three above and five further down. They also have two slots cut for the buckle.
Photos 1&2 show two leather slings. The upper one came off a T-30 rifle. It follows the T-38 pattern but has a buckle made of thinner wire and welted edges. Early T-38 slings will have the welted edges as well.
Photo 3 shows another sling with more holes than normal in the upper area. They are not perfectly in line so some may have been added.
Photo 4 shows an early sling with an aluminum buckle. Buckles and studs may be brass, black or green painted steel or aluminum. Also, the "keeper" sewing is different on this sling.
Photos 5&6 shows a three layer laminated rubberized sling installed on a 1st series Nagoya T-99
(T-38 style slings are often found on T-99 rifles)
Photos 7&8 shows a rubber coated sling also installed on a T-99
Photo 9 shows the two slots that allow for different buckle placement.
Photos 10 - 12 show a cloth "wire bale" sling that is sometimes seen in original photos on T-38 rifles.

Edit; new information on the wire bale slings. These were made for rifle and for pistol holster shoulder strap. The shoulder straps are much longer than the rifle variant and are slightly more narrow. Here are some comparison photos of the two different straps and an original photo of a wire bale shoulder strap in use.

Oops! The addition of the wire bale photos got put ahead of the T-38 slings. Still good information

 

[arisakadogs]

T-38 Carbine Slings

These slings have a more massive buckle than the T-38 and is square shaped rather than rectangular. They typically have 8 adjusting holes, one slot for the buckle and two sliding leather keepers. The hardware I've seen is either brass (often marked with inspection marks), black painted steel or galvanized steel
The first photo shows some typical carbine slings
The second photo shows a four layer laminated carbine sling that was obviously installed on a T-44. The buckle on this sling is a T-44/T-99 buckle and the tongue is too large for the other holes.
The last photo shows a comparison of the T-38 carbine sling buckle to that of the T-44/T-99 buckle to show the size difference

Edit; Recently picked up two carbine slings that have roller buckles. One is iron and the other is galvanized iron. First roller buckles I've seen used on rifle slings

 

[arisakadogs]

T-44 & T-99 Slings

1) Shot of T-44/99 slings. The top three are identical to the standard T-99 sling except for the welted edges. Two of mine came from T-44s & one has the Tokyo mark with early inspection stamps. You can see that all of these follow the same pattern. The only difference I've noted is that some of the slings only have one keeper (the T-99 manual shows slings with one or two keepers). All of these in this photo have 10 adjustment holes in one area and only one buckle slot. Some have 6 holes in two groups of 3 A photo of this example is also included. Hardware has been noted made of brass, black or green painted steel or galvanized steel
2) T-99 rubberized sling variations. L-R, Laminated, Coated & Wrapped
3, 4 & 5) Woven hemp sling on a 23rd series Kokura
6, 7 & 8) Cloth "training rifle" slings that often show up on T-99 rifles. First one I ever saw was on a Nagoya T-99 Long I found in Albuquerque, NM in 1971 for $35 while I was in Nuclear Weapons School.

 

[arisakadogs]

Poop! My photos got scrambled during the upload for the last post :mad
The photos are labled so if you put your cursor over the photo that will help ya figgure it out

Ok, I'm done. Thank you!

 

[03man]

Well done thread. I'm going to put a link to it in the sticky for "interesting info" so we can find it in the future.

 

[Edokko]

Photo #4 on the first Dawgs post, re the aluminum buckled sling, I have this pet mindset that this sling is for the T-22 Murata (as Jareth would attest to). The thought being that the only other aluminum part used on any early rifle accessories are the strap down studs on the T-22 ammo pouch, so just natural to think that a very temporary use of the metal would occur at the same time. What do people think about this ?

 

[arisakadogs]

Photo #4 on the first Dawgs post, re the aluminum buckled sling, I have this pet mindset that this sling is for the T-22 Murata (as Jareth would attest to). The thought being that the only other aluminum part used on any early rifle accessories are the strap down studs on the T-22 ammo pouch, so just natural to think that a very temporary use of the metal would occur at the same time. What do people think about this ?

If that's the case, then this style of sling was around for a long time with only hardware changes.

 

[Edokko]

Yes, since the T-22 and T-30 had only 8 years in between, I would not be surprised that the particular sling style started off from the T-22 and got inherited by the T-30 and T-38.

 

[arisakadogs]

Just curious, is the sling swivel spacing about the same between the T-22 and T-30?

 

[monkeyboy]

The thought being that the only other aluminum part used on any early rifle accessories are the strap down studs on the T-22 ammo pouch

Some T30 bayonet frogs have aluminum buckles, so........

 

[Edokko]

Some T30 bayonet frogs have aluminum buckles, so........

Thanks for that info. Are they the early T-30 frogs ?

 

[monkeyboy]

Thanks for that info. Are they the early T-30 frogs ?

Form memory, mine and the other examples I've seen are early double loop style with the smaller square buckles. Jon

 

[Edokko]

Thanks that is very interesting, since that shows there was an overlap of aluminum use between the T-22 and early T-30. Do you happen to have a T-22 bayonet frog and see what material the buckle is made of on those ? Also, is the aluminum buckled T-30 frog early enough to lack the corner rivets. I kinda assume so if the buckle is the small square shape.
I gotta find early documents describing these material.....

 

[Edokko]

By the way, GO GIANTS !!!

 

[monkeyboy]

Do you happen to have a T-22 bayonet frog and see what material the buckle is made of on those ? Also, is the aluminum buckled T-30 frog early enough to lack the corner rivets. I kinda assume so if the buckle is the small square shape.

No I'm afraid a T22 frog isn't among the frogs I own, perhaps someday. Yes the aluminum buckled frogs I've seen all lack rivets. Jon

 

[Edokko]

Thanks again for all the revelating info ! Let's keep an eye open for T-22 frogs, small details it may be, but still would love to know these material evolution they had at those early years.

 

[arisakadogs]

Getting a lot of sling questions so I thought I'd "bump" this thread

 

[Dean]

Thank you AD. I had never seen those before. Very informative.

Dean (the other one)

 

[arisakadogs]

Thank you AD. I had never seen those before. Very informative.

Dean (the other one)

You're welcome. One of my favorites is the rolled up 'unissued' sling

 

[132169]

This is great - thank you very much for this informative piece.

D