#Ar-15

High Threat Concealment is coming out with a battle belt (war belt, bat belt, patrol belt, utility belt) that is MOLLE compatible and is a step up from their Low Pro Gun Rig, that Military Arms Channel has a good review of. Essentially it is a cloth material, that has a space in it, so you can insert a belt through to actually use as a belt, that’ll hold it to your waist. However the outside is all MOLLE, with a raised portion in the rear for admin pouches, radio pouches, or magazine pouches that take up more MOLLE space. The inside of it is velcro, so it can snap onto an existing velcro lined belt that you might have on your pants, to prevent moving around. Unlike the HTC Low Pro rig, it looks a little larger, and thus is Low Vis, instead of Low Pro. Not as concealable as their simple Cobra belt with all plastic accessory parts, but I can see where this one is more for people who want the versatility of MOLLE, while not getting too bulky with it to begin with. It also can be neatly folded in half to store it somewhere while not in use. It comes in either Black or Coyote Brown and is $105 on their website.

We’ve all heard the line about how the AK-47 is so simple a child could use it (usually followed by a nod and a wink and a dark joke about child soldiers), but how does it really shake out as a simple-to-use weapon of poorly educated peasants? William of The Wound Channel explores that idea with a recent video, where he takes Amber, a volunteer who had never shot a rifle before, and after a brief safety instruction hands her both an AR-15 and an AK rifle and records how long it takes her to figure each rifle out:

Dust, mud, dirt, sand: Ideally, a firearm should be kept clean and free of debris so that it functions optimally at all times. After all, the user’s life may depend on the firearm working properly!

I don’t usually read The Daily Mail for its authentic and informative stories about the world, but some pretty interesting stuff does sometimes come out of it. Such as this story about a British parish council chairman in Suffolk who amassed over five hundred firearms in his house. We a story earlier back about an American in California who had thousands of firearms confiscated from him when he died, and in a similar case, this British gentleman passed away before any legal ramifications could be had for him. Comparing gun ownership in Britain to the U.S., that’s alot of firearms! Apparently most of them were illegally owned, but I’ve got a hunch that there might be more to the story than this. This might be a long stretch, but I’m willing to hedge a small bet, that the overwhelming majority of these “firearms” were actually deactivated. Although the problem is that I can’t see any evidence to support this in the pictures, and it doesn’t say so throughout the article. What makes me say this, is that the guy has over five hundred firearms, but apparently not a single round of live ammunition. The report claims that there were “200,000” rounds of ammunition also found, but in all the pictures of this “ammunition”, they either show just bullets without shells, or shells without bullets/powder/primers. Knowing English gun laws are extremely strict, I wouldn’t put it past the police to simply say these were firearms, because maybe they had been deactivated in the 1990s or so, but hadn’t followed any of the additional deactivation laws. For more information on this, see my article on the London Proof House. But essentially, Britain has passed a number of deactivated firearms laws, and with each law, the deactivated firearm has to be brought up to standard, by filling the barrel with lead, or slotting the chamber, or any other such method. Maybe this guy had all these deactivated guns, and just got tired of following each new law, and thus simply didn’t. Because I can’t see how even illegally, one has a huge amount of firearm

The technology of 3D printing has begun to proliferate in the firearms world, and designs that were once essentially novelty project guns have evolved and been further refined into actual working, shooting firearms of reasonable effectiveness. 3D printed guns have come a very long way from the first 3D printed handgun released by Cody Wilson in May of 2013. 3D-printed AR-15 lower receiver designs have been perfected through new materials selection, dimensions better suited to those materials, and more creative use of 3D printing and other manufacturing techniques. 3D printing has proven suitable for making some basic components of firearms, such as housings, receivers, and furniture, but not others, like fire control groups and, of course, barrels. For those parts, makers turn to existing firearms components, most popularly the AR-15 fire control group, and, in the case of the Shuty MP-1, Glock barrels:

Most of us own at least one AR-15. We may have different reasons for owning them thanks to their versatility – plinking, hunting, competition, home defense – but we have them. And of those many, many AR-15s there probably are not many that remain as they were the day they first came out of the manufacturer’s box. After-market additions are, after all, a wonderful thing because they allow us to tailor our guns to our specific use and to our personal needs (and also allow us to give our rifles a bit of our own personal flair). Now Hogue is giving AR-15 owners another option for grips with their new G10.

The 300 Blackout caliber has become the second most popular caliber for the AR-15, after the 5.56mm/.223 Remington caliber. What the 300 Blackout caliber especially excels in is firing subsonic ammunition to use in conjunction with a suppressor. However, subsonic 300 Blackout ammo is expensive and due to it’s slow subsonic velocity, most loads have rather unimpressive terminal ballistic performance. The most popular projectile used in subsonic 300 Blackout ammo is the 220 gr Sierra Matchking OTM. While it’s a good bullet but it costs 55 cents each in bulk and it doesn’t expand.

While the Serbu break-action .50 cal rifle ( in collaboration with Royal Nonesuch) is putting .50 BMG sub $1000, I think Safety Harbor Firearms has taken the right approach with their SHTF .50 BMG upper receivers for an AR-15.

It is no lie that I am a fan of Primary Weapons Systems rifles. I own both their “Modern Musket” (which is the base of my 3-Gun Rifle), and the Mark 216 (which is actually my first AR-10). I stopped by their booth for a chat even though I wasn’t planning to cover anything related to ARs.

I run the RISE Armaments RA-535 trigger and RA-701 muzzle device on my 3-Gun rifle, both of which I love (and am nearly finished with a review on their “entry level” RA-140 trigger). So I definitely had to stop by their booth and see what was new this year (I only visited three AR builders in total this year).

Many of you know that Larue introduced their very own AR-15 trigger to the market this year. They call it the MBT or Meticulously Built Trigger. I am slowly becoming a bit of a trigger snob after installing a SSA-E into one of my rifles, impressing me with a trigger is getting harder and harder. Please do not take it lightly when I say that I am impressed. The trigger is a two stage unit with a very crisp break at 4.5 pounds. I might go on a limb here and say that it is just as good as my SSA-E even though it is about a pound heavier.  

ERGO Grips is giving away a custom AR-15 at their SHOT Show booth. The rifle is worth $2,500 and includes components from Viking Armament, LANTAC USA, Vortex Optics and of course ERGO Grip. It is a fine looking firearm.

Cobalt Kinetics is becoming known for their high end sci-fi looking rifles with a number of features that can significantly improve the speed of your operation, from automatic magazine and bolt drops, to an overload usage of the forward assist to operate as a bolt drop. Their distinctive look and operation comes at a premium, though.

We blogged about the new Talon Gyro-Stabilized Weapon Mount system from  Paradigm SRP last week. It attracted skepticism from readers in the comments who questioned how effective such a system would be in the real world. Yes, it is true that it does not track targets (although the hardware is fully capable of being integrated into such a system) but nor does it need too. It is fully capable of keeping a gun pointed in the desired direction during choppy seas, through turbulent air or over bumpy ground. After seeing it in action today at Industry Day at The Range I have no doubt it works in real world applications.

Windham Weaponry has entered a product onto the market, that is a reintroduction of a product that came out around eight years ago or so. It is also an expansion of their MCS1 upper receiver kits. The MGI Hydra was a proof of concept rifle that by changing out the bolt carrier, barrel, and magazine well, a shooter could switch from a number of calibers, from 5.56×45, 7.62×39, 9mm, and .45 ACP within literally minutes, by pulling out on a knob on the handguard, switching bolts, and then clicking in a new magazine well for the intended cartridge, with different adaptors for AK, Glock, AR15, and M3 Grease Gun magazines. There were a number of different versions as well, some in pistol form, and in more calibers. The product didn’t gain massive support, but it appears that Windham Weaponry feels that the company can make it work this time around, just in time for SHOT. They’ve added .300 BLK to the caliber availability and have expanded the types of packages that a customer can buy the conversion system in. The basic package comes with a 5.56x45mm and a .300 BLK barrel, that goes for $1738, called the RMCS-2. The RMCS-3 comes with a 5.56x45mm, .300 BLK, and 7.62x39mm barrel and goes for $2391. The RMCS-4 has all the above calibers, in addition to 9mm, and is going for $2971. All of these kits have the complete rifle in them.