The age of an APC product can be determined by the serial number however due to factored products and changes within APC to improve production, the serial numbers formats have changed over time.
Below are the four formats used. All the serial number formats represent the same date (1st April 2002).
- 0402-25684 – The first two numbers represent the month and the second two represent the year.
- 020401 – The first two numbers represent the year, the second two represent the month and the third two represent the day.
- 020401/6A – This format is the same as above but with the addition of a build standard.
- 1502123 – This format is only used for sounders. The first two numbers represent the week of the year and second two represent the year.
Detectors manufactured by Apollo which do not have a serial number can only have their age determined by referring to serialised records held at Apollo. The absence of a serial number though would mean that the detector was made before March 1981.