Hi Zooma,
You're welcome
and appologies for the delayed reply.
Further research:
Regarding the blued "F series" that Hiller refers to in his book "Airpistols" - At the time of writing his book, Hiller had seen just 2 examples:
Both had 3 figure 'batch' numbers (on the front).
Both had the letter "L" stamped on the frame (behind the trigger guard).
"8 72" and "10 72" respectively under grip.
Elsewhere Hiller mentions seeing one example of a blued Premier, frame stamped "F" with "1 73" under grip. This he supposes is a D - E series over-lap. This example is the best fit with your pistol.
With my limited resources:
I have found a blued Premier (brown grips) with grip number "3 73" that was auctioned in 2000 (sold as a "F series" Premier).
I think it far more likely that blued 'post- D series' Premiers (assuming grip numbers of 3 72 - 3 73) were simply blued "E series", as it seems obvious to me that they were marked the same as early Lacquered pistols. i.e. batch numbers of 2,3 or 4 figures - Dated grip numbers - And various frame stamps, the most common being "F"!
Either way around, a blued 5 pin Premier (boxed) is a nice model to have!
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Personally I wouldn't worry too much about changing barrels and using it carefully, unless it's condition was very near 'mint'. If you can find a .177 barrel that is!
To buy a new barrel & linkage as spare parts would cost a fair bit (£70-ish?). If you can find the parts in-stock.
You may also need to buy a new breech seal, and fettle it to fit a .177 barrel (as it has probably formed to fit the .22 barrel). And you could buy a new barrel axis pin & locking screw, if you wanted to preserve the original.
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I don't see an advantage from using an alloy mk2 pistol for 10M, unless the later version mk2 has better (bigger) sights.
The early mk2 seems to have the same barrel (and tiny foresight) as the mk1 Premier.
Later mk2s have what looks more like a Tempest barrel. But I don't know if the sights are bigger.
As you can probably guess - I struggle with the small size of the foresight. And personally I struggle with the distance from my eye to the foresight. Its too close for my distance glasses to focus on it.
Phew - sorry for the long post - HTH - Phil