AR15 Retro Parts In At Brownells

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Mosin Bubba

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Very interesting stuff. I've been wanting to build an A1 clone for a while, but expensive, crappy furniture always held me off. Looks like Brownells has come up with an answer for that.

http://www.brownells.com/search/index.htm?avs|Newsletter_1=AR-15+Retro+Build

It will be interesting to see how good the A1 buttstock is in particular. The only game in town right now for those, aside from USGI surplus, is Cav Arms stocks, and I've heard some not so great things about them.
 
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Thanks for the heads up. An A1 build is still on my to-do list. The prices aren't bad, either, considering that you'll spend North of $500 right now for a beat up parts kit less receiver and barrel.
 
The textures on the stocks don't look quite right.
It's hard to tell about the texture, but the buttstock is misadvertised as an "A1" stock. The "A1" stock contains a storage compartment and door in the buttplate. What is pictured is the original (pre-"A1") stock without a trap.

Actually, I prefer the "A1" stock for all my builds, compared to the longer "A2" stock. The shorter stock is better for smaller-framed people, those with short arms, or those wearing bulky clothing.
 
The unfortunate part for me is that these are black anodized instead of the original "XM gray" anodizing. I personally like the look of the NoDak Spud gray finished A1 receivers. NoDak does provide Brownells with the raw A1 forgings but they are machined and finished by someone else.
 
Yeah and I don't know, that green color they chose to represent the green found on some of the very early guns just doesn't seem of the right hue.

Seems they aren't going for true replicas, but just good representations of these old war girls.

Meh. I'd rather have real anodizing.
 
The textures on the stocks don't look quite right.

IIRC, the original M16s used wood in the composite for their plastics, in some kind of weird 1960s technology. I guarantee that these are rubber and ABS, so they're going to look and feel different.

They still look pretty good to me though, considering that the furniture is selling new for what surplus is selling for on Ebay. It's not authentic or purist stuff, but I'm fine with that.
 
Thank you for the heads-up. I would like to have a fixed buttstock on an AR since its what I got used to in the Army.
 
The textures on the stocks don't look quite right.

From the pics I'm suspecting that the new stocks are nylon instead of fiberglass and resin.

Which means that they will be tougher than the originals but won't look and feel right.

BSW
 
IIRC, the original M16s used wood in the composite for their plastics, in some kind of weird 1960s technology. I guarantee that these are rubber and ABS, so they're going to look and feel different.

They still look pretty good to me though, considering that the furniture is selling new for what surplus is selling for on Ebay. It's not authentic or purist stuff, but I'm fine with that.

Rumor was you'd have to talk to Mattel about that, at least that was the rumor in the Army when we were still using M-14's. The Mattel reference was not a compliment.

Did Mattel actually make early M-16 furniture?
 
Rumor was you'd have to talk to Mattel about that, at least that was the rumor in the Army when we were still using M-14's. The Mattel reference was not a compliment.

Did Mattel actually make early M-16 furniture?

No, they didn't: http://www.snopes.com/military/m16.asp

The M16 was designed using techniques common to aircraft manufacturing at the time, which is why the receiver is forged 7075 aircraft aluminum and the furniture is composite that's similar to how helicopter blades were constructed.

BSW
 
Update: I bought a Brownells A1 stock for a lower build. I might take a picture for you guys later.

The good: It looks good and definitely passes the ten-paces test. I also like the length of pull; I shoot my M4 knockoff with the stock on the fourth notch, and the A1 stock matches that length almost exactly.

The bad: The quality leaves something to be desired. The buttplate shifts around on the rest of the stock, and it doesn't fit that tightly to the lower. The buttplate doesn't have checkering, so it kind of slips around when you shoulder it. Overall, it feels less steady than even my cheap Delton telestock.

Overall, I'd use it for an A1 clone build, but for actually shooting, I'd much rather have a telestock or an A2.
 
Thanks for the info. I actually like Delton stuff. Being a Vietnam combat vet I would be interested in a clone build. I have a A2 style rifle but it isn't close to feeling or looking the part.
 
I have been waiting for the retro game to pick up with ARs since that’s about the only thing that’s not been hot. When it gets reasonable I will build one. I just can’t convince myself that it’s worth double (or more) the money of another home-build.
 
What I was thinking of doing is buying a Delton 20" lightweight rifle kit, order it with an A2 upper, and buy a Brownells retro furniture pack. It wouldn't be authentic, but it would give you the look and feel of an A1.

Whole thing would cost about $700.

http://www.del-ton.com/Rifle_Kit_p/rkt110.htm

I've thought about doing that, but it's tough to justify $700 for a plinker that shoots just like my Delton Sport.
 
Rumor was you'd have to talk to Mattel about that, at least that was the rumor in the Army when we were still using M-14's. The Mattel reference was not a compliment.

Did Mattel actually make early M-16 furniture?
All the experts say no but I have talked to one veteran who believes he did see a mattel m16.
 
Thanks for the info. I actually like Delton stuff. Being a Vietnam combat vet I would be interested in a clone build. I have a A2 style rifle but it isn't close to feeling or looking the part.
One route some guys go is to get the Colt SP1. My dad bought on NIB about 15 yr. ago. Darned nice old find.
 
The M16A1 rifle used the solid rubber butt plate into the 1970's. I used rifles mareked XM16E1 and M-16A1 with such a butt and resisted changing the butt on my then assigned rifle to the trap door design in Europe in the mid 1970's. The frap doors started coming in as a replacement part in about 1974 and chipped and cracked Rubber Butt Plate stocks got replaced as needed with the "new Stock". The early trap doors seemed much more fragile when dropped butt first on concrete, especially in the cold where they would crack around the heel and into the area of the screw hole that held them on to the recoil spring tube.

The trap was supposed to house a sort of triangular cotton pouch with a cleaning kit in it, but did not come with the kit as a replacement part. Troopers found a partial pack of smokes (about 75 percent of the guys were smokers) and a book of matches fit in there with room to spare, Other notice there was room for various types of pogie bait.

The cleaning kit before the butt trap stocks was a rectangular nylon pouch with an LBE ALICE clip on the back that rode on ones pistol belt or stuffed in one's butt pack. Some contained a medium bottle of LSA (Lubricant, Small Arms) a petroleum based lube I blame for most of the M16A1 failures in Europe. But there was ample room for all the rod sections, the handle rod, the patch eye, at least one bore brush and one chamber brush (lucky folks still had the paper tubes they came in as brass bristles could puncture the case and you shirt and under shirt and emidermis) and the Green tooth brush (which I once actually saw some one use as a tooth brush, uugh) I also stuffed into my a Lube and grease tube from an M-14 cleaning kit with the small end full of grease (the M-1 and M-14 lliked a bit of heavy grease in a couple of spots) and the big end full of PL Special (the Petrolium Lubricant, Special used for our M-60 MGs and which worked MUCH better below freezing than LSA on the -16s) There was even room for a piece of wash rag and some patches (7.62 patches we precut into quarters) and a uncut patch wrapped around one each of firing pin retaining pin, extractor retaining pin and extractor spring the most lost parts ( and yes they came in handy when a member or three of my squad lost one.

Our E6 Squad leader insisted we carry as a piece of squad equipment and ammo can (on marches that thing seemed all edges and seemed to be full of Tungston or Uraniium) that had two rifle cleaning kits, an M-60 Cleaning kit, M203 Brush and thong, a demo kit knife, Two spare 20 round magazines and a spare 1911 mag and as many and a variety of M-16A1 parts as we could acquire, the retaining pin for the cap on the back of an M-60 bolt group, a trigger group pin and the retaining spring and the Firingpin, its spring and the "hammer" (a steel tube that went in the bolt of the M-60 to position the firing pin and spring properly) for an d M-60. A towel cushioned the stuff to prevent ratting. He also insisted we carry one of the large ammo cans 5.56 ammo came in full of water. Weird guy that one. Boy that second can WAS heavy.

A few years later after I was commissioned I put together a duplicate of that squad can that went to the field in my jeep trailer.....actually caught flak for it,believe it or not.

-kBob
 
The solid rubber butt plate had no checkering on it, only horizontal raised lines. It was slippery from side to side. One guy I knew took his pocket knife and cut notches out of the raised lines and it seemed to work......until a Butter Bar noticed and took offense at "Willful destruction of government property."


As much as I despised the issues with the pencil barrel, like using a sling, which some marksmanship committees still taught, could make the rifle shoot a foot to the off side from the prone at 100 meters compared to the sand bag or no sling prone and like the rifle shooting high when used with the bipod if the trooper tried to pull the sling at the front swivel down and to the rear as was taught with the M-14, the rifle handled and pointed very well for close up and personal. This is why I would like to have been able to find a LW barrel for my Carbine build.....but I got caught by the election panic. I had played with a 16 inch LW carbine with XM177 stock in the very late 70's and very nearly bought a complete upper and complete buttstock assembly (remember Old Sarge Parts in Shotgun News?) to take where ever they sent me after Officer Basic.

Using the M-16a1 rifle as a seat could really screw it up with that light weigh barrel. Guys would shove them across a corner and sit on them and some would squat with the butt on the ground and the barrel laying across their crossed arms on their knees (never saw how this could be comfortable). I considered this proof positive that if something can be screwed up a GI will figure out how. Of course we did teach using the rifle as a means of reaching high windows, either as a step held between two men or across one's hips or sticking it through a window at a corner and turning it so you could pull yourself in. Both could ruin a zero. Also one could break the recoil spring tube and so have the entire butt fall off doing these stupid GI tricks. An M-16A1 so broken is usless as the buffer group in no longer held to the rifle and the rear take down pin's spring and plunger is just gone and now that take down pin is free to go its own way as well. There's an AR failure no one ever mentions!

-kBob
 
Please put a decent barrel on it; That was the A1's Achilles Heel; The pencil-thin barrel kBob mentions. I was issued an A1, but borrowed A2's for a post-wide rifle match for a friend I went to AIT with. That explained why I wasn't getting hits on the qual. tip over targets at 300m, until I learned to shoot low and 'skip' them into it. I could do head shots at 300 with the A2's!

and the big end full of PL Special (the Petrolium Lubricant, Special used for our M-60 MGs and which worked MUCH better below freezing than LSA on the -16s)

Learned that lesson the hard way the first time I fired an A1, in ROTC. Issued the A1 from an NG Armory, where it had been stored dripping wet with LSA. I got off three rounds before ti gummed up.

Of course we did teach using the rifle as a means of reaching high windows, either as a step held between two men or across one's hips or sticking it through a window at a corner and turning it so you could pull yourself in. Both could ruin a zero. Also one could break the recoil spring tube and so have the entire butt fall off doing these stupid GI tricks. An M-16A1 so broken is usless as the buffer group in no longer held to the rifle and the rear take down pin's spring and plunger is just gone and now that take down pin is free to go its own way as well. There's an AR failure no one ever mentions!
And a lot more where that comes from; I've seen them all.
 
I liked M-16's but they sure were not the sturdy weapon the M-14 was.
 
Thanks KBob!
That explains a lot. Back about '03, my agency received some M16's through GEMA, that were assigned to members of our special response team. My captain was the unit leader, who found that his M16 would not zero.
I asked to look at it, pulled it apart, and sure enough, barrel was obviously bent.
I contacted David Sams, who I had met when he was still in Phoenix City, Al. He graciously offered to replace the barrel with a take-off from an M16. I took repaired rifle and zeroed it, and returned it to my captain. The next week, he attended a range qualification for those assigned the guns. He shot highest score. Seems most of the other guns also had barrels bent to some extent.

I already knew about the sling/bipod and LSA issues as my older brother was in Army ROTC in early '70's, and later a career AirForce security officer who shot on AF teams.
Thanks for your contribution.
 
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