All posts tagged Smith & Wesson upper Receivers

Firearms may become easier to get, but parts is another issue

AR15 complete upper receiversI spoke to several of our Reps for that work and various high end gun manufacturing companies and they told us that they are no longer taking orders for upper receivers, only complete firearms.  We pretty much figured that out when we saw the panic buying and the surplus of gun parts just disappeared.  I was involved with a company called Section 8 Tactical several years ago and we sold an M4 parts container kit that I would love to revive again someday.  I would hold a bolt, extractor and all of the parts you need if something on your bolt carrier group goes down.

If you snoozed for the last 4yrs and didn’t get a spare parts kit, you might have issues for several more months and possible years trying to acquire them.   Trying to find AR15 Complete upper receivers in a climate like this is going to be difficult but keep your eyes open for reasonable deals.   Prices will eventually come down to some degree but trying to get the good stuff is going to be difficult.  Some of the higher end products tend to not be made in high volumes so those waits are probable close to 1yr if you are lucky.

 

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Gas piston guns, are you going to get a good one for under $1000?

I have some very wise friends and when we first started to see the piston driven AR15s show up on the market “again” about 7yrs ago, it was mostly debates about the AR18, the LWRC piston driven firearms and the POF guns.   I think POF did a good job of staying in the market up until about 2yrs ago.   Now everyone and their dog is making one but I would still caution anyone from jumping in the fire and expecting theirs to be up to what LWRC is making.   The only argument you can make against LWRC guns is probable the H&K 416 variants.

Even with some of the earlier LWRC M6 rifles, there have been some changes, modifications and uprgrades.  I was fortunate enough to have been able to go to the LWRC factory and upgrade on of my LWRC AR15 upper receivers and get the new bolt carrier group without any altering of the firearm I have.  My LWRC M6A2 is a much older version compared to what is out now the barrel life is about 4x’s more.   There are still large variations in piston driven uppers and I got to shoot a Ruger 556 last year and was very impressed with the quality of the firearm, there may be more choices in 2012 and many of them look nice, but will there be modifications or changes to them and getting parts for yours might become harder and harder in 2-3yrs.

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Uppers and Lowers and endless modifications, what’s the answer?

The simple answer is get more guns.   The real problem I see with many people that tinker too much with firearms is that they can really mess stuff up.  I remember seeing this with guys that overly modified their 1911s and put springs in the guns that they should not have and they ended up with an accurate POS.   I don’t know how many times i’ve say behind a guy on the firing line that continuously informed me that his firearm was reliable but I’d watch them clear malfunctions all day and they would just blame the ammunition.

In my opinion, that is like watching a guy put tires on a car that are  not the same size and saying the only reason he crashed the car was because when he made the wide turn the tires that were not uniform made him loose control.   Well, stop messing around so much with your AR15 lower receivers and your AR15 upper receivers and make sure that once you get something that is reliable, stop screwing around with triggers and springs.   You are better off with multiple firearms that do different things than trying to push a firearm to do everything.  There is a trade off between reliability and accuracy and rarely does a firearm do both for very long.

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Remember when everyone and an AR15A2?

Remember how long ago it was when an AR15 meant the long 20inch barrel and it was virtually impossible to find an M4 style firearm.   AR15 firearms have come a long way, both the upper receivers and the lowers.   Trying to find a firearm now that does not have staked parts or is not chrome plated is getting harder and harder.   Even the machining on bolt carriers has improved to the point that Direct Impingement firearms are 10xs more reliable than before.  All you have to do is pop the bolt carriers out of the guns and you can feel the difference.

Even the average AR15 now is a minute of angle firearm and can still run like a military rifle.   Barrel technology on your average AR15 upper receivers has doubled and tripled.   I have an LWRC M6A1 rifle that supposedly has a barrel life of about 7500rds but the newer ones are close to 20,000rds.   The bolt carrier group is a  one piece unit and there has been absolutely zero broken parts on it.   Hopefully the only things that will eventually where out anytime soon are the extractor and springs.  It’s always wise to keep some of the basic spare parts around no matter what AR15 you own.

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