The grinding off or just defacing of the Imperial crest (the chrysanthemum) was a "saving face" gesture. The rear sight is a simple fixed peep, being the most obvious. The pic of the Hiroshima rifle shows the differences clearly. The last production guns had none of those features, and also deleted some others as JamesK has mentioned. The rear sight was a ladder/peep, with the AA wings, and there was a wire monopod mounted on the fore end. It was unpopular with the troops (it rattled) and was often removed in the field, and thrown away. The sliding "dustcover" over the action, that traveled with the bolt, was the first thing dropped I think. The early rifles all had "all the bells & whistles" that were later dropped from production to simplify, speed up, and reduce production costs. Quality of the work changed over the course of production due to wartime pressure.
ALL the originals were polished and blued. the nice matt gray finish on the metal is a dead giveaway. It's a real Arisaka, and it's been refinished. Those are actually dangerous if they will fire live ammunition. None have the Imperial seal (chrysanthemum) or normal markings, and for the most part will not accept live ammunition. They were made of cast iron to be used in firing blanks. There are also Japanese training rifles, made for their equivalent of high school ROTC. I know of no reproductions of any model of the Arisaka, but some Japanese pistols were copied as non-firing replicas those should not be capable of firing and should never be modified to do so. The very late rifles are rough, but for the most part are safe to shoot. Unnecessary finishing steps, such as knurling of the safety, were skipped a simple peep sight replaced the elaborate rear sight, a tacked-on wood buttplate replaced the steel one, chrome plating the bore was discontinued and so on. There are a number of variations in the Type 99, mainly due to its undergoing modification and slmplification as the war went on and Japanese resources dwindled and the need became more acute.
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