Bear Creek side charging upper

reviews look fine on the web

4.7 star rating 69 Reviews
https://www.bearcreekarsenal.com/bca-ar-15-side-charging-upper-receiver-bcg-combo-223-5-56-nato

What specifically is the malfunction? What ammo are you using? Have you tried switching ammo?

I have 5 of them, no issues with any.

What specifically is happening?

Need more info of the malfunction. Just simply stating you have a side charging upper doesn’t give us much to work with.

And yes you can take the bolt handle off and use it in another rifle. You can also use a bcg from one of your other rifles in your side charging upper. The only difference is they drilled and tapped a hole in it.

Have you contacted BCA? It's possible they could help you either with tech advice or a replacement.

Waterboy3313 said:

I don't know exactly what I would call the problem because it doesn't do the same exact thing every time. It will not shoot more than 2 times without either not picking up another round, bolt hanging up and not closing, it has also double fed one time.

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Does any problem occur on loading the first round on an empty chamber or only during firing utilizing the rifles gas system?

What type of double feed? New unfired round being fed into an empty case? Or two unfired rounds feeding at the same time?

You said bolt hanging up. With a new round clipped into the extractor, empty bolt coming forward?

Is the magazine you are using a known one that feeds well?

Need more information.

Things to check:
1. Try a different magazine
2. Gas block misalignment
3. ARs love to be ran wet, is the inside of your upper receiver and BCG sufficiently wet with lube?
4. Extractor not grasping spent cartridge and/ or not staying on spent cartridge?

AR diagnosis over the web needs a person to be really descriptive of what is occurring from start to finish when problems arise.

If you are getting two live rounds attempting to feed at the same time you need to look at the following:

1. Oversized gas port
2. Weak buffer spring
3. Too light of a buffer

What buffer weight do you have? Did you use the same buffer as when it was setup as a rifle length gas ported barrel? This very well could be your problem.

What a double feed of two live rounds tells me is that there is excessive jarring happening in your rifle when firing causing rounds to bypass the feed lips. This can be caused by excessive gas port size (too much pressure), weak buffer spring (not slowing the BCG enough), or too light buffer weight (not enough ballast to slow the BCG).

My guess at this point with the information I have is you need a heavier buffer.

Waterboy3313 said:

That makes sense to me. Sometimes when being totally frustrated it makes things harder to figure out.

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Don't beat yourself up, part of learning. Once you get the hang of what makes AR's tick they really start to make sense and one can really start to appreciate how ingenious they are. What helped me when I was first getting into them is picturing in my mind like a flowchart of what is happening from the point the primer is struck to the chambering of the following round. There are parts that must be considered. Especially, when you change one item such as your rifle length ported barrel to carbine length.

Let us know what you find out and if it isn't the buffer post back and I'm sure THR will get you back up and running.

Another thing to pay attention to is ejection pattern. I'm guessing your first round that fired would have been ejecting forward as in 1:00 - 2:00.

A good gassed rifle should be ejecting from 3:30 - 4:30 or so.

To me what you describe sounds like it is under gassed and the bolt is short stroking. Usually you get this from a leaky or loose gas key on the bolt carrier, or a leaky gas block on the barrel. Is there any soot marks coming from around the gas block?

Waterboy3313 said:

Everything is clean and lubed. When I changed barrels I used a different gas block and went from rifle length to carbine length. I've changed out everything but the upper and BCG with no change.

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Did the rifle function correctly before you swapped the barrel? If yes, then we can very likely assume the BCG is not the issue. Instead focus on what changed.

Do you have an H2 buffer and carbine spring? Throw them in there and try it. Your rifle length buffer likely is an H buffer and sprung for a rifle length gas as well.

Still think the most logical problem is overgassing your buffer system as you've moved the gas port 5" closer to the explosion.

<*(((>< said:

Do you have an H2 buffer and carbine spring? Throw them in there and try it. Your rifle length buffer likely is an H buffer and sprung for a rifle length as well.

Still think the most logical problem is overgassing your buffer system as you've moved the gas port 5" closer to the explosion.

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Unless I miss read he said he is running a rifle buffer tube so you can't put an H2 or carbine spring in that.

someguy2800 said:

Unless I miss read he said he is running a rifle buffer tube so you can't put an H2 or carbine spring in that.

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I don't see where he said rifle buffer tube? Unless I'm missing something, he said he went from rifle length gassed barrel to carbine length.

I think if you buy an upper from a company, and it doesn’t run correctly, the first thing you should do is contact the company, not play gunsmith and start swapping things out with out the proper knowledge on how to diagnose the problem first. You will likely create more problems than you fix.

BigBore44 said:

I think if you buy an upper from a company, and it doesn’t run correctly, the first thing you should do is contact the company, not play gunsmith and start swapping things out with out the proper knowledge on how to diagnose the problem first. You will likely create more problems than you fix.

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I think the OP bought a stripped BCA side charging upper receiver. Based on his original post he said "I put it together" I assumed (and maybe I shouldn't have) that he assembled the upper from parts.