HOW TO TELL WHEN MY GUN WAS MADE- Reg/Lot No. code

[Begin quote] "Mark:  Daisy made the 1000 exclusively for Western Auto Stores from 1965 until the late 1980s.  It is a lever action, 700-shot BB repeater that is very similar to the Daisy Model 95.  Register No.s were first stamped on Daisy guns in 1952. 

"Registers numbers for the 1000 all began with A, B, C, or D, and the last Register number stamped on a Model 1000 was a D-prefix number stamped on April 14, 1972.  There were no further Model 1000 frames stamped after that date and before the last Register Number stamping was recorded on 10/31/1972 (italics mine, see text & photo following quote).  As you know, in November, 1972, the company transitioned from Register Numbers to Lot Numbers in which the initial letter represented the month (D = April) and 2 = 1972. 

"We have seen numbers that were stamped as Register Numbers which were not in our database and, based on the date of manufacturer, were actually coded like Lot Numbers (italics mine, see note below photo).  I checked with a long-time Daisy employee who told me that the process of stamping the frame and all of the information was one step, then adding the actual Register or Lot Number was a second step.  This make sense in that the company might stamp several thousands of frames at a time, but only number those for which they had demand from a retailer that month. 

"I believe your gun's frame had already been stamped with all required markings and the words Register Number then, in November of 1972, after they converted to Lot Numbers, it was pulled and stamped with a number which was, essentially, a November, 1972 number." [End quote]

In yet another example of why dating the Daisy BB gun is not cut and dried, I was going through my photos and came across a Model 1000 that doesn't follow the rules above. It has a REG. NO. beginning with "L" (see photo). The prefixes were supposed to only be A through D.

Also, the records indicate that the last Model 1000 REG. NO. was Oct. 31, 1972 (formatted "K2xxxxx") but the gun below shows it was stamped Nov. 1972 (formatted "L213006"):