Contention (and facetiousness) aside...

[Nature Boy]

I love your writes ups Slamfire. I always learn something.

But what if you never have FTF/FTE issues with the AR15, or they're so rare as to be no different than any platform?

I know it's anecdotal, but I've had a good bit of experience with it and lead men who carried it and has proven to me to be an outstanding, reliable weapon.

 

[Slamfire]

But what if you never have FTF/FTE issues with the AR15, or they're so rare as to be no different than any platform?

I know it's anecdotal, but I've had a good bit of experience with it and lead men who carried it and has proven to me to be an outstanding, reliable weapon.

Well the M16/AR15 has been out there for over 45 years and the US Government has spent hundreds of millions of dollars fixing what they could. When the weapon was first introduced into combat in Vietnam, a lot of good American boys died with jammed M16's in their hands. However, the last round of tests, the "dust tests" conducted at the behest of a Senator, magazine/feed issues were the primary failure mechanism.

I have shot out three barrels on my M1a, using old surplus GI magazines. Never had a mis feed. I have had them on the AR15, and I went through my magazines till I found a reliable combination. Because of the magazine limitations and the round's limitations, I am of the opinion that the AR15 platform will never be as reliable in feed or extraction as the AK47, for example.

 

[RainDodger]

Weird. I can't remember the last problem I had or heard about, with an AR. I have more ARs than any human should have, and I don't think I've ever had a real problem with one.

The "bottom" one is an original/very early M&P "Sport", and the classiest one is expensive for a 5.56. No problems with any of them!

Watch... now one of them is going to break, and it's your fault for making me say it.

 

[barnbwt]

The 223 round is very straight and it drags on extraction.

To be fair, a portion of this is due to the integral ejector design itself, which forces the extracting cartridge over to the side against a rather sharp, toothy barrel extension (until some smart folks recently figured out clever a trick to stop it, this effect made DI 9mm ARs nearly impossible to run reliably)

I believe the vast, vast, vast majority of AR mechanical issues stem from people pressing the rifle into roles it was not intended for with unrealistic expectations; far more powerful chamberings, comically abusive maintenance/firing schedules, and wildly diverged operating conditions (uber-short suppressed carbine vs long-range match sniper). That's not even getting into the highly-advanced wear & tear the guns receive compared to others from people fiddling with them (gee, I wonder why all those takedown and FCG pins keep ovalling out?) as well as drop-in mods totally out of step with the original design (blowback conversions, belt feed conversions, 50BMG conversions, etc)

The AR's greatest strength --it's modularity-- has led to enormous amounts of experimentation (and failure), and it's unparalleled post-ban availability means that experimentation has more commonly taken place in the public. The HK roller-delay series has similar levels of modular capability (SMG to belt-fed LMG) but has seen its experimentation/failure take place almost exclusively behind the veil of HK corporate perfection and has never really been so widely available for public customization. The stupid-short HK51k and MP5-45acp are the only two publicly-developed models I'm aware of, and both are quite obscure themselves.

TCB