Benji showed me this Micromag from his collection. Strange thing about this “Micromag” is that it likely wasn’t machined by/for PTP. Some research shows this Aluminum rail / body combo was supposedly built as a project by Diamond Labs founder Francois Louvet, and as Frizzle Fry on AO writes, it was “likely milled in Bulgaria.”
You can read about the unearthing of these bodies that lack PTP detents and were uncovered raw in this thread on Automags.org:
http://www.automags.org/forums/showthread.php?203803-Micromag-Bodies-Information-and-Order-Topic&p=2226858#post2226858
The user that posted these Automag bodies, “SpitFire1299,” was located in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin but it’s not clear how they were uncovered. Louvet’s other companies supposedly sold products that originated in Bulgaria (Diamond Labs), but there are no actual posts from users on AO or mcb that cite references as to these bodies being made there, other than the Micromag identification guide.
These bodies could have been made anywhere in the world and then made their way to the US through Louvet’s company Toxic Toys. I see references to Chicago as Toxic Toy’s location which isn’t far from WI.
After their discovery These bodies were take to proper spec by HaveBlue and sold through his website, Airsolder. Find more details in this Micromag guide on AO:
And while these still have a bad reputation, Automag tech Scott “BigEvil” Fertitta replies to this video on youtube that, “I haven’t had too many issues getting them to work properly. Ive seen a few with wobbly vert ASAs though… :)”
And some more details on mcb:
http://www.mcarterbrown.com/forums/ask-experts/5788-air-soldier-micromag-clones.html
Unfortunately I can’t seem to find the text from Air Solder’s for sale page on them.
If anyone has additional details please post!
And find what Benji currently has for sale on ebay at:
http://www.ebay.com/usr/bigb_pb
Wow, what a throwback! I’m not sure if Benji’s example is from the same batch, but in early 2002 I visited the folks at Mako Paintball in Lombard, IL to acquire all the Tribal parts that they had in the warehouse (they had been renting space to Francois, apparently without realizing his reputation). In a box next to the Tribal and Joker stuff were around 20 of these MicroMag-ish looking bodies: http://imgur.com/cBaCpYi
Well, I took all of the Tribal stuff they had (their dealings with Francois had apparently left them with ‘Frenchie’ owing them around $100,000), and also snagged the MicroMag looking bodies as well as some Joker parts (grip frames and bodies, mostly – many of which went to Punisher for use in various custom guns).
I split the bodies with my good friend who ran BFG Paintball in Germantown, WI. I’m not sure specifically who “SpitFire1299” was, but he was assuredly one of the guys who worked at the field. They did the detent drilling/tapping and some honing on bodies.
Myself, I didn’t yet have the machine tools I now do, so I sold them as-is on my website with this description (around 2006):
“We picked these up many years ago in a dusty warehouse. They are of unknown origin, though there’s a good chance that they were one of Francois Louvet’s products (remember that character?)
These are not PTP MicroMag bodies as you might guess, but appear to be an attempt at cloning the PTP product. Quality isn’t the greatest – a given barrel may fit one body just fine and fit the next one a bit tightly. Likewise, a bit of fitting may be required to get a valve body to slide in happily. Great platform to experiment with milling and anno.”
With that admonition, I sold all 9 of the ones I had!
I have no idea how many of these were made, how many made it into circulation, etc. I can’t imagine that the 20 or so I found were all that existed – there must have been more! Also, we have no proof that these originated in Bulgaria. However, since they were packaged in the very same sort of polybag that some Tribal parts were packaged in (and located only 10 feet away from), which were known to have come from that country, it is most logical to surmise that their origin is the same.