Forward bullet assist really needed on AR 9mm?

[BSA1]

I was at a LGS and the dealer offer to sell me a DPMS or S&W AR 9mm or 223 for the same price. The DPMS does not have a dust cover and the cartridge assist button to help chamber the round.

My question concern is the forward bullet assist necessary for the 9mm round?

If there is a thread that answers this question please direct it to me.

 

[Al Thompson]

IMHO, the forward assist is not needed at all. It's a vestige of the failed fielding by Big Army of the M16 in the mid 1960's.

I've been shooting the AR platform since 1977 and the only thing I've seen a forward assist do was turn a minor malfunction into a major one.

DPMS is not in the same county as a S&W AR. IMHO, get the Smith.

 

[jim243]

My question concern is the forward bullet assist necessary for the 9mm round?

Not if you clean your rifle on a regular basis.

The oginal foward assist was put on the M-16 to help with dirty chambers that would not go to full battery because of dirty ammo and chambers.

You and I don't shoot our guns at full auto and put a lot less rounds down the barrel so we should not have that problem.

If however, you don't clean your rifle and fire 1,000's of rounds down the tube, you might need that foward assist.

My first AR didn't come with one and 45 years of shooting them, I still have never needed to use one.

Jim

 

[R.W.Dale]

9mm = blowback non bottleneck case

FA doubly not needed over being largely superfluous for 223




posted via that mobile app with the sig lines everyone complaints about

 

[meanmrmustard]

Not needed, period.

 

[Ehtereon11B]

The only thing I have ever used the forward assist for was to conduct a quiet press check. Pull back on the charging handle while holding the dust cover, checking for a chambered round, ride handle, push forward assist to lock bolt. Other than that it has been useless.

 

[Welding Rod]

The usefullness of a FA is to over come the bolt's resistance to rotate into battery and to over come the bolt carrier's resistance to slide foward over the bolt when the charging handle is pulled back (normally slightly) and then rode forward slowly enough that full battery is not achieved due to friction in the BCG's moving parts.

The 9mm is a blow back operation and doesn't use a seperate rotating bolt or gas rings, so a FA is much less likely to be useful.

I would still like to have one just to KNOW the bolt is all the way forward after doing a loaded chamber check.

 

[VA27]

The F/A is not needed. I wish more uppers were made without it.

 

[tryshoot]

Helpfill changing carts. and checking loading status quietly, never used one for anything else.

 

[HJ857]

It probably doesn't even work. If it's like mine, it's a standard upper with a FA port and something that looks like the assist button to fill up the hole, but it doesn't move and the bolt carrier doesn't have serrations for the FA to push against anyway. Nothing to worry about.

 

[BSA1]

The forward cartridge assist feature is a bit confusing to me. If I have to manually push a relutant cartridge in the chamber without knowing the reason it would seem I am increasing the chance for a malfunction.