I'm never selling a Rock River again!

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George Hill

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Rock River and I just separated ways.
I've build and rebuild many an AR. Replacing stocks is easy. On a Rock River, not so much so.
Admittedly it's been awhile since i last swapped an AR stock - like maybe a week and a half.
So I get this Rock River and this chap wants a Vltor stock on it. No prob, I'll throw that on for you. 20 minutes later, it's kicked my trash. I can't get the stock screwed in deep enough to engage the recoil spring capture pin (whatever the heck you call that little bit) to keep the pin in place to hold the recoil spring and plunger in position.
I'm thinking I did something wrong. Smoked some Crack or something.
So I called up James at FBMG to ask if I may have smoked some crack or if Rocker Rivers are SNAFU'd from the start.
He just laughed. Said he has a pile of Rock River parts that he's replaced because they are not MilSpec.
So I'm going to ship this gun out there to FBMG and let James and Larry wrench on it, hit it with a bigger hammer, do their thing... because I'm not even going to touch this thing again. Sure, it shoots fine... clover leafs at 100 yards easily... but dang it's given me more headaches than any other rifle ever.
I'm thinking we are going to stop selling Rock River's and get in Saber Defense instead.
We've had no problems with the new S&W M&P's and I like them... the M&P 15 T has been a great selling unit with nothing coming back to bite us in the arse like Rock Rivers have. Armalites have even been trouble free for us. Any known issues with those M&P's and Armalites? Other than they being AR-15's and all that jazz.
 
Is it a new RRA LAR-15? Mine was a pain in the ass to get together but after putting about 200 rounds through it, it kind of loosened up and everything goes together alot better now. As for the stock, I didnt have any trouble putting a magpul CTR on mine.
 
I have been told by a ex Ordnance Officer that the M16 technical data package has enough errors, inconsistencies and omissions that if you exactly follow the drawings you cannot build a rifle where all the parts will line up. It was not in the benefit of Colt to put all the information into their drawings.

The guy on the line knows what he is doing, everyone else just guesses what he does.

Apparently the detail "fit" of parts is something that Colt only knows, and that FN, Rock River, Bushmaster, and everyone else has to figure out on their own. So aftermarket manufacturers have to play with dimensions, and once their parts all fit together, that is their "fit".

I understood that there were actual lawsuits between Armalite and maybe Bushmaster, one claiming that the other was copying its "fit".

I have run into the problem of one manufacturer's upper not fitting the lower of another. But every manufacturer makes sure that its parts interfaces with its parts. That's all they can promise.
 
Wasn't Armalite a very early entry into M16s/AR15s? I thought I read somewhere that they were one of the original manufacturers during the Vietnam period.
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Corporations are immortal, and and they sell names and trademarks they own decades after the original entity is long gone.

Armalite falls into that category, so is Winchester. I don't think Springfield Armory had to buy the name, but I am certain they had to protect it.

Anyone can buy a name. There are hundreds of American brand name products coming out of China.
 
Wasn't Armalite a very early entry into M16s/AR15s? I thought I read somewhere that they were one of the original manufacturers during the Vietnam period.

Or am I smoking crack here?
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Armalite (the original company that was a division of Fairchild Airplane & Engine) invented the AR-15. Armalite sold the rights to the AR-15 to Colt's back in 1959, and other than a few prototype AR-15's, all the AR-15's and M16's up through the mid-1980's were Colt-made.

Fairchild divested itself of the Armalite name somewhere in the 1960's, and as an arms maker, they went out of business in the 1970's. The Armalite brand name was purchased by it's current owners (Eagle Arms) back about 10 years ago. Eagle was already making AR-15 clones, and capitalized on the brand name recognition factor of Armalite. The current Armalite, however NEVER was involved in supplying early AR-15's or M16's. All they share in common is the name.
 
Eugene Stoner (and James Sullivan) both worked for Armalite in the late 1950's. Stoner is credited with a NUMBER of designs for Armalite, the most long-lasting of the bunch being the AR-15.
 
If it helps any. I know I haven't smoked crack. :evil:

When I can't figure something out, I just figure I'm a moron and keep working at it until I get it anyway. :)

And I really like my RRA, but have no dought there are better AR's out there.
 
Armalite sold the rights to the AR-15 to Colt's back in 1959, and other than a few prototype AR-15's, all the AR-15's and M16's up through the mid-1980's were Colt-made.
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Wow! That sounds like a whopper of a bad business decision.:eek:
 
Quote:
Armalite sold the rights to the AR-15 to Colt's back in 1959, and other than a few prototype AR-15's, all the AR-15's and M16's up through the mid-1980's were Colt-made.

Wow! That sounds like a whopper of a bad business decision
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Actually, not at all, at the time. Fairchild's Armalite division was NEVER intended to be an arms manufacturer. They always either sold their designs or licensed them to existing firearms manufacturers. (Witness how they had the original AR-10 licensed to made by Artillerie Inrichtingen in Holland.)
 
I used to be one of the biggest fans of RRA.

Now, I don't hate them or anything, I think they make a decent rifle...

However, they do some strange things that just don't make sense and have really turned me off with them as a whole... It would be easy and simple to make a completely milspec gun... but many manufacturers don't...

Personally, I like Stag Arms and LMT the best.

Sabre and S&W both make good AR15's as well, much closer to milspec than the Bushmasters, RRA's... etc... I don't really care for Armalite all that much. Be sure that you know that the Armalite of today is not the Armalite (a division of Fairchild Engine and Airplane Corp.) that invented the AR15.

P.S. I don't do crack... :)
 
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Crack for everybody!!!!

Did you check the threads on the buffer tube? I have seen where they have not had the die nut run back far enough. Compare both tubes side by side and see if the OAL of the threads are the same.

Usually if something starts to thread, then stops before reaching the desired point, it means that the male threads are the ones deficient.

Do the threads on the RRA tube looked boogered? Like they were cross threaded?

Does the RRA tube screw back in?

Do a little problem isolation before you give up.

My understanding, the difference between Mil-Spec and Commercial-Spec is tube diameter. Nothing to do with the lower receiver. Some say Mil-Spec (which is a slightly smaller OD) gets better thread engagement. I dunno Ford/Chevy


BTW S+W is a Stag with a different stamp. Both are of fine quality. (Stag uses Mil-Spec tubes)
 
Any known issues with those M&P's and Armalites?
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They're more expensive than DPMS/RRA/Stag. I personally will pay the extra for my Armalites. Love 'em, and an awesome company to deal with; the epitomy of courteous and expedient service in my experience.

Wasn't Stoner designing for Armalite for the original AR design? AR == Armalite, not Assault Rifle.
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Correct. AR=Armalite Rifle.

Now, AR=semi-auto Mr. Potato head.

Wow! That sounds like a whopper of a bad business decision.
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They simply did not have the facility to meet the damands of the military. Not even close. Probably recognized that the military could simply take the patent if they tried and kept coming up short, so opted to at least make some money by selling the rights.

Armalite did manufacture and supply some of the earliest, but when the dream team decided to outfit the entire armed forces with the rifle, Armalite realized it was a much bigger untertaking than they could hope to handle.

BTW, it was my understanding that Stag makes many of the RRA lowers.
 
FWIW, I've just had the exact same problem as you George, using a DoubleStar stock on a Gunsmoke Enterprises lower. The suggestion given on arfcom was to rotate it another full turn in, and then file off anything protruding/binding. *shrug* Haven't tried it yet..
 
It sounds like Colt is running true to form.

When they turned in the original 1911 pistols, the government required another source which was Springfield Arsenal - the real one, not the phony and Remington UMC.

Springfield made design drawings of the pistol but could not build workable pistols. Colt had to send experts down to teach them how to do what the drawings did not show.

That's why I only buy Colt 1911s or AR15s. They know what the drawings do not show. Everybody else is just a hacker with a machine shop trying to follow a drawing.
 
"Correct. AR=Armalite Rifle."

Which is why I have no idea why they list their Turkish CZ copies as AR-24's. Should be AP-24's. I suppose they may consider AR to be ARmalite instead of Armalite Rifle. Who knows.

Ash
 
Me too

I'll never sell my RRA varmint gun--it just delivers too much fun.

Yep, I knew it wasn't mil spec when I got it, so I got it the way I wanted it in the first place.

If I wanted to put a collapsible stock on it, I'd have to get a new tube also. But I don't, so I won't.

I agree that with all the arfs on the market and more coming constantly, RRA is going to have to distinguish itself positively or fade away. Their trigger sold me years ago, but DPMS would probably be my choice today.
 
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I have put commercial and milspec CTRs on RRA lowers (changing out the receiver extension as appropriate), I have also put on full VLTOR emod kits, and PRS stocks.
I have built up complete rifles where the only RRA parts were the stripped lower and their 2-stage.
My only problem with RRA is that it takes 4-6 MONTHS :eek: to get a stripped lower.
So unless the customer is stuck on brand name I just use CMMG or DS.

Pete
 
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