Got the AR15 bug.....

[Jlr2267]

CeeZee,

I'll leave it to others to debate the +/- of building your own.

To finish it out, you'll need:

(1) stripped lower (also can be found at PSA...and AIM Surplus had Anderson lowers at one point for $40). This is considered the actual firearm, so you'll have to ship to FFL, do the 4473, etc. Everything else can ship to your front door.

(2) a rear sight...decent and inexpensive sights can be found almost any place that sells gun accessories. I have found good deals on Amazon of all places

(3) magazine...the kit does not come with one but they can be had for $8 from PSA

That gets you into a functional, quality rifle..you can upgrade and spend as much as you want from there

Building the lower is not difficult. There are decent videos on Youtube that walk you through it. One trick I use is squeezing the roll pins into place with padded channel locks rather than using a punch/hammer. You'll need to be careful and go slow so you don't lose any parts...lots of small springs and plungers and they're easy to lose. It really helps to mount the lower on a vice (I use an old magazine to hold the lower and grip the magazine in the vice). The whole job can be done in 30 minutes after you've done it once.

 

[Cee Zee]

One big problem I have is a lot of my tools are back at my house in my building. That includes every vice I own too. I have been meaning to get one down here for a while but I don't really have anywhere to mount the thing and I'd hate to have to buy a table for it. It's mounted really secure at home too and with the health issues I've had I may not even be able to get the thing loose. It's gonna take crawling under my work bench. These are the reasons I've been thinking I would go ahead and get one already built. I generally like doing that kind of stuff but I'm in sort of a bind at the moment. I can work on a second AR maybe next year or something. I've been thinking it would help to have one around so I can see how it goes together so I won't have to go into a build blind except for net videos. Those can be good but they can be flaky too. I know I have the tools to do the work. I just don't know if I have enough of them with me at the time. I have a building at home locked up with a bunch of my tools just sitting there. It's got me kinda bummed to be honest.

At the same time I don't want to be wishing I had spent my money somewhere else later on. I can always sell my first AR I guess but I have trouble selling guns. I hate it. If something works well I want to hang on to it no matter whether I really need it or not. I could already have my AR if I wanted to sell something I'm not even using but I can't bring myself to do it. Every firearm I own works really well right now so I just want to hang on to all I have. I sometimes sell guns that I have more than one example of but I can't do that all the time.

 

[tiamat]

My suggestion is don't go as cheap as you can; you'll end up spending more in the long run. Go with the parts you want the first time around.

But see, here's the thing. As newcomers to the AR platform, they usually don't even know what they want to end up with yet, unless they have a very specific purpose in mind and that's typically not the case. So, buying parts or assemblies that will have parts swapped out later is going to happen, and yes, in the end it will have cost more than just buying whatever that end result is in the first place. AR's morph and change over time - that's part of the attraction, after all. Or the owner just decides they need another one to fit that specific purpose and THEN they can piece together (or buy in whole) exactly what they want with the knowledge they gained about what they like and don't like during their first run. It is for this very reason that I think it's wise for beginners to start with something low cost if they think they will stay with the platform.

I'm not advocating to go as cheap as they can though, but in my opinion it's hard to find 'bad' AR parts these days.

 

[Jlr2267]

One big problem I have is a lot of my tools are back at my house in my building. That includes every vice I own too. I have been meaning to get one down here for a while but I don't really have anywhere to mount the thing and I'd hate to have to buy a table for it. It's mounted really secure at home too and with the health issues I've had I may not even be able to get the thing loose. It's gonna take crawling under my work bench. These are the reasons I've been thinking I would go ahead and get one already built. I generally like doing that kind of stuff but I'm in sort of a bind at the moment. I can work on a second AR maybe next year or something. I've been thinking it would help to have one around so I can see how it goes together so I won't have to go into a build blind except for net videos. Those can be good but they can be flaky too. I know I have the tools to do the work. I just don't know if I have enough of them with me at the time. I have a building at home locked up with a bunch of my tools just sitting there. It's got me kinda bummed to be honest.

At the same time I don't want to be wishing I had spent my money somewhere else later on. I can always sell my first AR I guess but I have trouble selling guns. I hate it. If something works well I want to hang on to it no matter whether I really need it or not. I could already have my AR if I wanted to sell something I'm not even using but I can't bring myself to do it. Every firearm I own works really well right now so I just want to hang on to all I have. I sometimes sell guns that I have more than one example of but I can't do that all the time.

A vice makes the job easier, but it can be done w/out one, especially if you use the channel lock method for the roll pins. 3 hands helps too.

 

[Cee Zee]

I think I could maybe get my older vise fairly easy. It would probably be good enough to do that work but just finding the time to go get it is a problem for me. I figure I probably have enough tools to do it without the vise. My neighbor probably has one I can use if nothing else.

I guess I was mainly wondering if it would be hard to do without having done it before or even seen it done.

 

[MachIVshooter]

You do not need a vise unless you're building an upper or changing out barrel/barrel nut. Only thing you need to torque on the lower is the tube, and that can easily be done by installing grip and inserting a mag, then holding it between your knees and cranking the castle nut, plus a couple whacks on the wrench with a small hammer for good measure.

 

[firme67]

A lot of good info guys. I think I will get a stripped lower and a parts kit just to have and wait til I get my "gun room" finished in the garage before I buy the other components. I will just keep watching what you all are building until I see exactly what I like and have the money saved up. Because I honestly don't know how I want to do it yet, and I am not in a hurry.

SO.....keep putting your awesome pics in the Picture Thread!

Thanks Again.

 

[Cee Zee]

You do not need a vise unless you're building an upper or changing out barrel/barrel nut.

Yeah I got that it was more a matter of convenience than anything. Again I think I have the tools here to do it. My main concern has been how hard it will be not being familiar with the process and not having an example to go by. Plus all the friends I know that could help me all live back in my home area. I'll get something done though.

 

[skywalkrNCSU]

Building a lower really is super easy with the resources you can find online. There is a great walk through on ar15.com that I used 7 years ago to build my first lower. I was a total newb to the AR platform, had hardly shot one, and I built it with ease. You certainly don't need to build you own but I am really glad I did because I learned a lot about how the gun works and I was very comfortable doing any modifications I wanted down the line.