Chris Rhines
Member
A couple of months ago, I decided to buy an AR15-style rifle; being a tinkering sort of somewhat limited means, I decided to build one up from a parts kit. My favorite semi-local gun store, Quantico Arms, was having a sale on the excellent Eagle Arms AR15 stripped lowers. I bought two for $75 each. After some consultation with folks on THR and elsewhere, I selected a J&T Distributing EM-4 parts kit, with a standard A2 stock and chrome-lined barrel. I think I paid $540 for the parts kit, all told. I also bought some assorted tools from Brownells, including a set of roll-pin punches, a reversible vise block, and a DPMS barrel wrench.
I received the parts kit from J&T in about three days, quite fast by my thinking. I soon found out why: someone neglected to include the bolt carrier assembly in the package. Oops. A quick phone call to J&T resolved the matter (very good service, BTW) and I soon had the complete parts kit in my hot little hands.
The parts in question seemed to be of very good quality, with no casting voids, pits, or grinder marks. All the major part groups went together without binding or sticking - so far, so good.
Assembly was uneventful as the upper was already put together. I used the instructions from ar15.com to put the lower together, and had no problems (note - if you want to build an AR15, drop the thirty bucks for a set of roll pin punches. They'll save you a lot of swearing.)
The first major problem I ran into was while drilling the barrel for the muzzle break (I ordered a pre-ban upper, which was forty dollars cheaper.) Somehow, I managed to drill the "blind" hole for the muzzle break roll pin all the way into the bore.
Damn.
After the red haze of rage cleared from my vision, I considered my options. I could probably cut down the barrel to remove the newly perforated section, crown it, and then weld on a muzzle break to increase the barrel length up over Randy Weaver territory. That would work, but in the meantime I ordered a Bushmaster 16" Superlight post-ban barrel. Congratulating myself for my foresight in ordering that barrel wrench, I got it installed in a long afternoon. Not too bad.
Any idea of saving money by building a kit was by now swirling down the drain, but hey, I had a functioning rifle! I headed out to the local IWLA range to sight this monster in.
Well, sort of. Right from the start, I was plagued with constant failures to eject. Very annoying. I stripped the bolt down, relubed, and checked the ejector function. More failures to eject. WTH? Back down into the basement to try and sort out what is quickly becoming a real black hole for time.
I noticed, while dry-racking the rifle, that it was possible to hang up the bolt carrier by pulling the charging handle halfway back. Hmmm. Inspecting the inside, I found some strange wear marks on the tip of the hammer. I stripped down the lower, broke out the Swiss-pattern files, and took a little metal off the hammer. Reassembled, no more hang-ups. In fact, the entire bolt travel was much smoother. Hand-cycling some dummy rounds produced no more ejector failures.
Oh yeah, since I had the rifle apart, I decided that a quick trigger job was in order. I measured the trigger from the factory at a gritty 7#. I set the trigger in a small watchmakers vise, reduced the angle on the trigger nose about five degrees, then broke the corner and went over the engagement surfaces with fine, then extra-fine ceramic stones. The disconnector got cut down by about 0.100", and the engagement surfaces were polished with a bit of 600-grit sandpaper glued to a popsicle stick. Finally, I drilled a small hole 0.125" in front of the trigger slot, tapped it, and installed a small hex-head grubscrew as an overtravel stop. I applied a bit of moly-disulfide paste to the engagement surfaces, put everything back together, cranked the overtravel screw all the way in, then held the trigger back while backing out the screw. Once the trigger released, I backed the screw out a quarter-turn farther and fixed it with blue Loctite. Finally, I remeasured the trigger weight. Whew! 3.75#, smooth as glass, and no creep or overtravel.
So today, I head back to the range with 200 rounds of Q3131 and three Singaporean-surplus steel magazines. After I got to the range, I realized that I left the eyepiece for my spotting scope in my other shooting bag. Nuts. Still, I started out at 25 yards, just to get sighted in.
I loaded and chambered single round. BLAM!
Two rounds, this time. BLAM! BLAM! No full-auto, that's a good sign...
Five rounds. BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! I headed down to check out the target, and found a nice little 1" cluster, just about six inches low. Not bad for shooting off my elbows.
I cranked the front sight down eighteen clicks. Five more rounds, this time in another magazine. BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! All in the X-ring. Yes!
Full magazine this time. BLAM! x 28. No malfs. Bolt locked open after the last round. All my empties ejected into a two-foot circle. YES!
I only put about sixty rounds thru the AR today, and never got out to 100 yards. I'll save that for later. I'm pleased as punch with how my carbine performed.
I'd strongly recommend to anyone wanting an AR to try building up a kit. It's not hard at all, as long as you can manage not to put holes in the barrel, and you can save a few bucks and really learn how your rifle goes together. Plus, it's ten kinds of fun...
Here's a pic of the rifle in question, fully tricked out:
It's wearing Trijicon tritium sights, a DPMS detachable rear sight, and a Wilderness Single-Point sling on a GG&G mount. Next accessory will be a scope of some kind. Any suggestions?
- Chris
I received the parts kit from J&T in about three days, quite fast by my thinking. I soon found out why: someone neglected to include the bolt carrier assembly in the package. Oops. A quick phone call to J&T resolved the matter (very good service, BTW) and I soon had the complete parts kit in my hot little hands.
The parts in question seemed to be of very good quality, with no casting voids, pits, or grinder marks. All the major part groups went together without binding or sticking - so far, so good.
Assembly was uneventful as the upper was already put together. I used the instructions from ar15.com to put the lower together, and had no problems (note - if you want to build an AR15, drop the thirty bucks for a set of roll pin punches. They'll save you a lot of swearing.)
The first major problem I ran into was while drilling the barrel for the muzzle break (I ordered a pre-ban upper, which was forty dollars cheaper.) Somehow, I managed to drill the "blind" hole for the muzzle break roll pin all the way into the bore.
Damn.
After the red haze of rage cleared from my vision, I considered my options. I could probably cut down the barrel to remove the newly perforated section, crown it, and then weld on a muzzle break to increase the barrel length up over Randy Weaver territory. That would work, but in the meantime I ordered a Bushmaster 16" Superlight post-ban barrel. Congratulating myself for my foresight in ordering that barrel wrench, I got it installed in a long afternoon. Not too bad.
Any idea of saving money by building a kit was by now swirling down the drain, but hey, I had a functioning rifle! I headed out to the local IWLA range to sight this monster in.
Well, sort of. Right from the start, I was plagued with constant failures to eject. Very annoying. I stripped the bolt down, relubed, and checked the ejector function. More failures to eject. WTH? Back down into the basement to try and sort out what is quickly becoming a real black hole for time.
I noticed, while dry-racking the rifle, that it was possible to hang up the bolt carrier by pulling the charging handle halfway back. Hmmm. Inspecting the inside, I found some strange wear marks on the tip of the hammer. I stripped down the lower, broke out the Swiss-pattern files, and took a little metal off the hammer. Reassembled, no more hang-ups. In fact, the entire bolt travel was much smoother. Hand-cycling some dummy rounds produced no more ejector failures.
Oh yeah, since I had the rifle apart, I decided that a quick trigger job was in order. I measured the trigger from the factory at a gritty 7#. I set the trigger in a small watchmakers vise, reduced the angle on the trigger nose about five degrees, then broke the corner and went over the engagement surfaces with fine, then extra-fine ceramic stones. The disconnector got cut down by about 0.100", and the engagement surfaces were polished with a bit of 600-grit sandpaper glued to a popsicle stick. Finally, I drilled a small hole 0.125" in front of the trigger slot, tapped it, and installed a small hex-head grubscrew as an overtravel stop. I applied a bit of moly-disulfide paste to the engagement surfaces, put everything back together, cranked the overtravel screw all the way in, then held the trigger back while backing out the screw. Once the trigger released, I backed the screw out a quarter-turn farther and fixed it with blue Loctite. Finally, I remeasured the trigger weight. Whew! 3.75#, smooth as glass, and no creep or overtravel.
So today, I head back to the range with 200 rounds of Q3131 and three Singaporean-surplus steel magazines. After I got to the range, I realized that I left the eyepiece for my spotting scope in my other shooting bag. Nuts. Still, I started out at 25 yards, just to get sighted in.
I loaded and chambered single round. BLAM!
Two rounds, this time. BLAM! BLAM! No full-auto, that's a good sign...
Five rounds. BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! I headed down to check out the target, and found a nice little 1" cluster, just about six inches low. Not bad for shooting off my elbows.
I cranked the front sight down eighteen clicks. Five more rounds, this time in another magazine. BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! All in the X-ring. Yes!
Full magazine this time. BLAM! x 28. No malfs. Bolt locked open after the last round. All my empties ejected into a two-foot circle. YES!
I only put about sixty rounds thru the AR today, and never got out to 100 yards. I'll save that for later. I'm pleased as punch with how my carbine performed.
I'd strongly recommend to anyone wanting an AR to try building up a kit. It's not hard at all, as long as you can manage not to put holes in the barrel, and you can save a few bucks and really learn how your rifle goes together. Plus, it's ten kinds of fun...
Here's a pic of the rifle in question, fully tricked out:
It's wearing Trijicon tritium sights, a DPMS detachable rear sight, and a Wilderness Single-Point sling on a GG&G mount. Next accessory will be a scope of some kind. Any suggestions?
- Chris
