BriR,
The Made in USA barrels are clearly marked as such, so that in itself will tell you if your barrel is one of them. It appears that these barrels were included with the 45/50 caliber percussion MR rifles and kits made from sometime in 1975 to sometime in 1978. The flintlock MR's were not a catalog offering until at least 1978 (not offered in my '77 catalog, I don't have a '78 catalog, but they are in my 1979 catalog). Speculation only I know, but it comes from my fair collection of old CVA cataogs, price lists, and company letters, and my MR data base that I've assembled from several ML forums (including one member on this forum who is certain he got his MR as a Christmas present in 1975). About all I can suggest that is certain is that the MR's were not yet a catalog item in the 1975 CVA catalog, and by their 1979 catalog the MR's were no longer advertised as Made in USA (and some embellishments on the rifles had been changed to a different design by then). So I assume the transition between MR generations started sometime in 1977 or 1978.
As for the barrels themselves, a lot of speculation has been passed on for years that the Made in USA barrels were made by Douglas or Sharon or other US companies. I am guilty of trusting and so passing on some of the same in years past with only the explaination that I had put my trust in what a CVA employee that had been with CVA from the very start that I talked to several years ago told me about all the models I discussed with him, including the early MR's. About 3 years ago a member here who knew Don Kammerer from before when he designed and built the first MR protype for CVA until his death offered some great detailed history on the birth of the CVA MR's. Per Steve the first protype rifle built by Don had a Douglas barrel, but he believes that the production MR rifles offered later by CVA did not. Instead he suggests they had Spanish made barrels copied from a Douglas barrel sample taken to Spain by Don and CVA's Dave Silk for the CVA MR project, and to teach them how to make better barrels. The fly in the ointment with Steve's version about the early barrels for me is that my early Made in USA MR's barrel has no Spanish proof marks, while all the other barrels on the other 6 CVA models I owned at the time did have Spainish proof marks. So even though I've found no positive proof I'll trust who made the first MR barrels for the Made in USA production MR's, I still have to believe that these rifles did not have Spainish made barrels.
It has also been said that a very few much higher end MR's were made early on that went to folks in CVA's inner circle. Whether that is fact or mistaken idenity of examples from the Premier Grade MR's CVA offered in the late 80's, or standard early production MR's that had been upgraded by their owners I have no idea.
Regardless, its a dark web we weave when we speculate without proof positive data. Memory alone doesn't provide that IMO.
