I have a question regarding factory finger groove combat grips. While looking at pictures online, I noticed that some of the factory combats are recessed on the top of both panels and some are recessed on just left panel.

What is the reason for the difference? Is it depending on which frame they are used on or is this something that S&W started doing recently as far as recessing both panels.

Am I correct to assume that it is a way to tell newer grips from older grips in that the newer grips are cut to accomodate the thumb of right and left handed shooters?

I beleive that sometimes it was dependent on where S&W was placing their logo at the time.The factory didn't ship guns with the logo partially obscured,which would happen if the logo was on the right side with a full panel.

Many times the grips with cut outs on boths side were used on presentation models. I am sure that many of them were used on standard models as well.