AR, M-4, M-16 stuff

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11C1P

Yellow Jacket
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So I just ordered a second batch of probably the best kept secret in AR mags and surprised to find out some of the types are still on backorder. The lancer system advanced warfighter mags (AWM) is a helluva magazine, I put it above both the P-mag and the troy battle mag. When I first found out about them through some guys who are still in, they had some in "off color" for a discount price, iirc around 8-9 bucks each. I ordered 4 or 5 and was expecting to get a mix of oddball colors. I got all of them in the flat dark earth and they were all consistent color with each other and looked fine to me. While I haven't had to put them through the strenuous use I put gear through when I was in, they still get knocked around and used heavily. They have been used down range in those hard ways and have been received well, not that you can't find a complaint here or there, but usually a lot less than the others. I gave a few away to friends and family since I got them so cheap and wanted them to see how well they worked. I now went to order some more and there were no more of the off color ones left so I had to spring $16/ea for the colored ones and $24/ea for the clear ones, and it is the clear ones that are backordered. Anyway I think they are probably the best AR mags on the market right now. Here are some links to them.

http://www.lancer-systems.com/

http://store.lancer-systems.com/

http://www.lancer-systems.com/advan.../magazines-2/l5-advanced-warfighter-magazine/
 
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Yeah, I've heard about those, and they are supposed to be pretty much the top shelf ammo mags for the platform. I have mostly P-mags and the standby tin mags from the olden times. Those have to be torn down from time to time, cleaned and tuned, then re-assembled. Also, the tin ones tend to need the lips to be adjusted over time because they will bend out and periodically fail, so I won't pre-load them too often. They aren't my mag of choice, but I keep two dozen of them just because. I do wish I could afford to have three or four dozen of those Lancers though.
 
I had a crap load of GI mags, many still new in the bag with NSN numbers and mfg info when I got out, but a year or two after the "assault weapon" ban I sold many (not all) of them for $20-$25 each, and in '95-'97 that was a lot for a mag. For regular use including a bit of mild knocking around they are just fine, rarely had to do a complete disassembly cleaning unless it got a bunch of sand in it, but that's true of most mags. I still have several of the GI mags and other brands too. I'm going to be keeping my eye peeled if they have those "off color" ones available again, I'll be snatching up a large batch, and I'll let ya know, AFTER I get my order in of course. :grin:
 
I have recently discovered assembling AR's is a lot like eating potato chips. I ordered 4 stripped lowers. I ordered 3 PSA LPK's, I PSA complete upper with BCG and CH along with another partially complete PSA upper and they had complete nickel boron BCG's on sale for $90 so I had to order 2 of them. I would like to build one into a pistol and also one into a 300 blackout. Maybe I'll do the pistol in 300BLK not sure yet, but I am already eyeing getting some more lowers. They are crazy easy to put together without a whole lot of tools. I haven't put together an upper yet, but if they are even only 1/2 as easy as the lowers, I may not be able to stop building them. My all in cost for the 2 I have finished is about $440. If I start building the uppers I can get it down to probably under $400. I know AR's aren't going what they were going for a couple years ago, but back then you also were hard pressed to find stripped lowers, especially for $40. I guess if the market did shoot back up on them I could be sitting on an aluminum alloy gold mine! What's really crazy is the first handful i've built my wife was totally for, I think now she is starting to realize she created a monster. I feel kinda like I did when I got my first LEGO kit when I was about 7 or 8.
 
So how does this happen? My parents were asking what to get the wife and I for our anniversary. They know we like prepping (as they do), and I am currently building a bunch of AR's. So we tell them get a gift card from PSA (Palmetto State Armory.) They use the web, but my mom especially has trouble finding stuff, so she asks for a link. So I look for the cards, and they sell them in $25, $50, $100 and $500 flavors. The $100 and $500 ones say "sold out!" Now I am used to seeing this for stuff like guns, parts, mags, ammo etc. But for a gift card? Seems to me they can print those up by the bushel full, and since it is basically pure profit, and often times at least a small amount, if not all of gift cards go unused, and that it is money in the bank, until a product is ordered/shipped it seems pretty foolish to run low on them. Especially the higher denom. cards. While they are kind of slow in getting it ready to ship (5-10 days) (they advertise 3-5 usually) and it always takes at least a full 7 days to get here once it does ship (From S.C. to N.D.) I have been happy with the price and quality of what I've ordered. So as long as you aren't in a hurry and know you are going to wait, they are worth it, so far.
 
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PMBug said:
Shut up and take my money! /Futurama

That is odd.
Click to expand...

Yeah, imagine walking into a brick and mortar store announcing you want to spend gobs of money, and they say, sorry we can't help you we're out of paper for the cash register..:doodoo:

I guess with PSA, at least if you really wanted to buy more than $50 of gift card, you could buy 10 to get $500 worth of credit. Of course, they'd probably say they only have 7 left in stock.
 
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11C1P said:
Yeah, imagine walking into a brick and mortar store announcing you want to spend gobs of money, and they say, sorry we can't help you we're out of paper for the cash register..:doodoo:
Click to expand...

THAT has actually happened to me.
Another time, a restaurant was turning away customers because their computer was down...

[ame="https://youtu.be/h1zF3ZCirhA"]https://youtu.be/h1zF3ZCirhA[/ame]
 
The scarcity of parts availability for AR's and the prices trickling back up while PM's are coming down, must mean it's time to stop the AR assembly line and start concnentrating on pm's
 
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My first 80% Lower receiver arrived in the mail! So nice just to be able to have it shipped right to your door! I believe it came from Ancona's neck of the woods, Daytona FL. Probably be a couple more weeks till I have everything I need & set up to finish it, but it is a good feeling to know you got the star of the show on set! :banana: Here's a few pics of it & a few with a 100% Anderson lower & a polymer TN Arms Co. lower for comparison. I like that it came with the safe/fire indicator markings stamped on both sides, instead of just the left. Lack of roll marks & SN's is nice too! :grin:

80 - 16 by ndpreppers, on Flickr

80 - 10 by ndpreppers, on Flickr

80 - 9 by ndpreppers, on Flickr

80 - 4 by ndpreppers, on Flickr

80 - 22 by ndpreppers, on Flickr

80 - 20 by ndpreppers, on Flickr

80 - 19 by ndpreppers, on Flickr

80 - 17 by ndpreppers, on Flickr
 
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Good luck with your project. I know someone that built a "glock" using an 80% assembly. The final product was not very successful. When tested at the range it fired one shot and then had sufficient issues that it could not be relied upon to fire successive shots. Definitely not something any sane person would rely upon in a life or death situation. Hope you have better luck!
 

While I'd like to build a Glock too, I have not been very impressed with the jigs available. I don't know if they are all built by the same company, but every one I've seen is all plastic, which means you could drill right through the jig as well as the frame. Then the area that needs to be cleared out is done by hand with a dremel, which seems to leave a lot of room for "artistic license" when doing it. There are all also one time use jigs & every 80% frame I've seen comes with the jig & vice versa. I think that's a market begging for a better jig. They also have 80% frames for AK's, 1911's, 10/22's, AR-10's, Sig's & I think a couple others. The thing is I don't know how long the Feds will let this go on. Especially as 3D printers will eventually become more common & printed receivers of all makes & models become a reality, they will probably crack down on all of it.
 
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Yeah, the frame my acquaintance used was all plastic. I guess yours is metal? That seems like a more viable prospect.
 
Was going to mill it out this weekend, but was shorted 2 guide pins. I emailed 5D Tactical Fri. morning, but they were closed. They did send it out bright & early this AM (Mon) though with a tracking number. Excellent customer service. Everyone makes mistakes & they were great in fixing it. Here's a clip of me yakking about it after I got bummed out I couldn't finish it this last weekend.

 
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Well, I started working on milling my lower this weekend. First tried on Sat eve. when the temps outside finally dipped to the mid 80's, but inside the garage felt like an oven & was sweating like a pig after just a few minutes of organizing. Decided I'd try Sun morning before it got too warm & it was supposed to be cooler that day too. The jig & end mill worked great. I had a hiccup when the depth adjustment started getting harder & harder to adjust. I thought maybe because the router was heating up the case had expanded more than base had & was causing it to stick. I loosened it a bit, still wouldn't adjust very easily, loosened it a bit more & still too tight. I decided it must be something else, pulled the sleeve off & noticed an aluminum shaving had gotten lodged in the adjustment track. So I was relieved to see it was something so simple, especially as by this time I was starting to get pretty warm in the garage. So I re-set the depth, hit the power & about 2 seconds in Ka-chunk! I forgot to re-tighten the sleeve in my joy of finding such a simple fix to my problem, I forgot to undo my previous attempts at remedying it. Luckily the only part ruined was the end mill. Now I'll have to either order a complete new end mill $45 (I got it the initial one for free on 4th of July sale) or buy just the business 1/2 & use a torch to take the old one out & re-install a new one which is only $25. Here's my after action review of the debacle.

[ame]https://youtu.be/_sz8rcrSGow[/ame]
 
It seems like a project like this is going to have a learning curve and there are definitely tricks to learn ad pitfalls to avoid. I wouldn't expect the first attempt to go smoothly. But the time, effort and costs are really an investment in learning how to do it.
 

While I don't disagree, this one was easily avoidable if I had just not felt a rush to get back on track after wasting a bunch of time tracking down such a simple & I would say foreseeable problem. It's much easier to take when you can blame it on something or someone else, but this was my own eagerness & lack of patience that was the ultimate problem. Now usually Labor day around here, people like to go camping, so it either snows or is cold & rainy, but as I would be happy for that kind of weather, I'm sure it will stay hot & sunny until it does a complete 180 & goes to 20 below. I may just get pissed enough to buy a media blasting cabinet & finish it in the house!
 
Well I finally got the 80% lower finished. I'm pretty happy with the finished product. A small gouge from where I screwed up as I posted above, but that will be unseen on the finished product.

When I started going through the video, I realized it's going to take me quite a while to edit the video, so I figured I'd post a few pics so you could see the final product at least.



~ 1st 80 Lower Finished - 34 by 11C1P AirborneMortar, on Flickr

~ 1st 80 Lower Finished - 29 by 11C1P AirborneMortar, on Flickr

~ 1st 80 Lower Finished - 8 by 11C1P AirborneMortar, on Flickr

# 1st 80 Lower Finished - 13 by 11C1P AirborneMortar, on Flickr

1st 80 Lower Finished - 41 by 11C1P AirborneMortar, on Flickr

1st 80 Lower Finished - 36 by 11C1P AirborneMortar, on Flickr

1st 80 Lower Finished - 22 by 11C1P AirborneMortar, on Flickr

1st 80 Lower Finished - 21 by 11C1P AirborneMortar, on Flickr
 
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Finally got the Glock built. Took forever to get a slide I liked without paying a bunch. Messed around with one seller on ebay for about a month, finally gave up & then after Christmas found a new guy selling slides & he was great to work with. Matched the color perfect & even did the bull nose for no extra cost. The pics don't show the colors that great, but I think you can tell they match very well. The stainless thread protector will either get swapped out for a black one or I'll get a cerakoted one as well. Not sure about the barrel, maybe leave it but I would like the chamber area to be subdued, so haven't made up my mind 100% what to do. The first round I fed in was a FTF then a FTE but then I cycled (by hand) most of a mag through no problem. Trigger is HEAVY & has a ton of creep, but that can get fixed fairly easy too. Mags won't drop free, but that's the frame, cause there's nothing I work on in the mag well to screw up. They pull out quite easy, just won't drop free. Not sure when I'll get to test fire, but I feel pretty confident it will function. Might need a bit longer of a break in period than normal though. In the end I've got right about $440 in it. That's with no case or magazines of course, but it does have a threaded barrel. :banana:

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MVPW - 2 by 11C1P, on Flickr

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MVPW - 1 by 11C1P, on Flickr

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MVPW - 6 by 11C1P, on Flickr

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MVPW - 5 by 11C1P, on Flickr

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MVPW - 4 by 11C1P, on Flickr

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MVPW - 3 by 11C1P, on Flickr

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It looks tight. The FTF & FTE sound similar to what my acquaintance experienced, but your work looks more polished that what he (my acquaintance) had done. Hope the extra cycling does work out the kinks for you.

I certainly have a deeper respect for the engineering and QC that goes into commercial production of firearms after observing these projects second hand.
 

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Thanks Bug. Overall I'm pretty happy with the end result, or the end result so far, which is kind of like my home made version of a factory stock gun. I am definitely going to upgrade the trigger once I've confirmed it functions fine with the OEM parts. The bull nose job on the slide makes the frame seem like it's about an 1/8" too long, so I may look at doing something with that as well. The more of these projects I do, that going into them I thought would be pushing the limit of my mechanical skills, the more I'm finding out how relatively simple (for the most part) they are. They are also a lot of fun, for me at least. It just makes me wish I could sell some of my 80% builds, if for no other reason, to help fund the next build/s. I had been debating between a 27 or a 22 for my next build, but it looks like they will be releasing the frames for doing a 20/21 build soon & if so, I may go for building out a 20 as I've I wanted a 10mm since way back in the 80's when I watched "Miami Vice" as a kid. :grin: I can hardly wait to introduce my latest build to the wonderful world of boating in deep water. ffftt:
 
I finally broke down yesterday and got my first ar15. I've got bolt guns and an M1A in .308 and some 9mm carbines, but no midsized "battle rifles." As I get older the M1A seems to be getting a lot heavier.
I got a Sig m400 enhanced with a Romeo 3 red dot. It was used but looks brand new. soon as I shouldered it I knew I was hooked, it just felt right.
Next up I hope to build a super lightweight ar pistol.
 

AR's are like potato chips, you try one & you end up just wanting more. :wave:
 
My ar came with a holographic sight. When I look though it in low light conditions the dot turns into a star, even on the lowest setting. I thought something had gone wrong since I bought it used, but did a little research and read were other folks with an astigmatism were having the same problem. I wear glasses and just got a new rx about a month ago.
Anybody ever heard of this?
Guess I will have to change over to a regular red dot. I prefer a circle dot type reticle anyway.
 
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