Before I talk about my favorite gun from SHOT Show’s Media Day, I need to make a confession in order to set some context: I’m completely new to the AR platform. I grew up hunting, and until very recently, all of the guns that I own and shoot are classic hunting guns with wooden stocks.

So to set the scene, my entire body was frozen (it was 23F on the thermometer, and probably below zero with the wind chill at the range), and the all-stainless, .308-chambered Black Rain Norguard that company president Justin Harvel handed me was to be the second AR-style rifle I’d ever shot. I then proceeded to put 8 out of 10 shots onto the small steel at 100 yards, and that was with me flinching a bit on the first two because I wasn’t sure what to expect from the gun. Yeah, the Trijicon scope helped (I’ll find out tomorrow exactly which model this gun had on it), and the AR-15 itself is legendary for being newb-friendly, but a lot of the credit has to go to Black Rain for making a .308 that’s this insanely shootable. The Norguard is a very accurate, fun-to-shoot, finely finished firearm, and the moment I got up from the bench I asked how soon I could get hold of one of these.

Right now, Black Rain’s order queue is backed up until November, so it’ll be a while before I see one. However, another Black Rain rep that I talked to said that the company hand’t quite finalized its release schedule and plans for tackling the order backlog, so I may be able to get more color on availability later in the week. If I do, I’ll be sure to post an update.

I was also gratified to hear Harvel say that Black Rain isn’t jacking up prices to the moon in order to cash in on the current panic, and that any sky-high prices that people are seeing for his guns in the channel are the dealers’ fault. I think this is noble, and as someone who picked an epically bad time to get into black rifles, I certainly appreciate any efforts to keep costs down. But I’m also a capitalist who finds it hard to fault a manufacturer for charging what the market will bear, so if Harvel does decide to goose his prices up, I won’t hate him for it.

Hands-on with the Black Rain Norguard .308 originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on January 17, 2013.

The new Stag Arms 8T is based on the established piston carbine that’s been out a few years. Call this an upgrade if you will.

What Stag has done is change some previous standard parts. The primary difference is in the modular free-floating VRS-T rail system they designed. The new rail is a one-piece unit on this carbine whose shape resembles the old M-16-A1 foregrip. Make no mistake it’s a lot smaller. In fact it’s about the smallest diameter rail system I’ve ever held.

The construction is in aluminum with a mil spec finish. It has cuts along the bottom and side for a more secure grip that also serves to make the rail feel smaller. Four holes have been drilled and tapped on each side so the user can add six inch or three inch rails. The six inch rail addition is $22 while the three inch runs $15 each. Stag attaches the VRS-T to this new carbine by using a proprietary barrel nut then using two bolts to tighten the rail system to the barrel nut.

The other addition is a BUIS set from Diamondhead who also made the VRS-T for Stag. The rifle really looks nice with this new rail system. The MSRP on the 8T carbine is $1245.00.

On another note Stag just released a separate rail system like the VRS-T for gas impingement AR’s. This is a drop in two piece that can be installed in minutes. There is no need to remove the stock ring. MSRP is in the $180 to $210 range depending on length.

Stag Arms 8T Piston AR-15 originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on January 17, 2013.

One of the new rifles unveiled this week was the Smith & Wesson M&P-10. Their website currently only lists a camouflage version with a Magpul stock and five round magazine for an MSRP $1,729.00. My guess is the rifle shown here is going to be a bit less.

Note the handguard flare reads “Ambidextrous Features”; you can see the left-hand magazine release below.

If you look closely you can see the left handed safety and bolt-catch release on the right hand side of the rifle. The rep claimed it accepted Magpul Pmag type magazines.

It appears the upper and lower receiver are the DPMS style, as opposed to the Armalite and KAC straight angles, but no information is available on compatibility. Similarly there is no information on the barrel nut type. Like the magazines the DPMS and Knight’s Armament type has become the most common but I don’t want to assume.

The barrel is not free-floated and is an 18″ 1:10 twist R5 type. The rifle appears fairly standard but I doubt it will be long before the product line branches out to alternative accessories.

S&W Joins .308 AR Market originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on January 18, 2013.

New for 2013, the LaRue Tactical in 7.62 is notable for it’s QD (quick-detachable) handguard. LaRue claims that after the rifle is reassembled that it will shoot a grouping within .25 MOA of the prior one before disassembly. The QD handguard feature is useful if you need to swap a barrel out quickly when you’re out in the field with limited tools.

The QD handguard switch allows the user to simply use their fingers to unlock two latches, one on each side.

Once the latches are open the handguard quickly slides off. A barrel change then requires a special wrench.

The entire rifle can be broken down and put into a 17″ long case. Barrels come in 14.5″, 16″, and 18″ lengths. In addition to 7.62, the PredatOBR is available for pre-order in 5.56. There is currently about a 1-year waitlist.

www.LaRueTactical.com.

Chris Cheng is History Channel’s Top Shot Season 4 champion. A self-taught amateur turned pro through his Top Shot win, Cheng very much still considers himself an amateur who parachuted into this new career. He is a professional marksman for Bass Pro Shops who shares his thoughts and experiences from the perspective of a newbie to the shooting community. www.TopShotChris.com.

LaRue PredatOBR in 7.62 originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on January 20, 2013.

My main mission at SHOT has been interviewing AR-15 makers for a longer piece that I’m working on, and as part of that project I’ll be publishing edited transcripts and information from those interviews here on TFB. Specifically, I’ll be focused on updating all of you who are in the market for a new AR on what the pricing and availability picture looks like as of right now. So look for updates on Daniel Defense, Knight’s Armament, LWRC, and others.

All AR makers are backlogged right now, but some are worse off than others. And then there’s LMT, which is a special case in that the company doesn’t really seem to know how backlogged it actually is, or even basic availability facts about is newly launched, flagship .308 Sharpshooter rifle.

My initial conversations with some LMT reps revealed that the gunmaker has by far the longest order queue of anyone I spoke with: two years. You read that correctly — if you’re a civilian who puts an order in today with your local LMT dealer, you can expect to see your gun in about two years. (Military and LE orders get priority, so they can expect to see guns sooner.) At first I thought they must be joking — they can’t really expect users to order a gun now, and plan to get it two years from now. But this is in fact LMT’s “best estimate” based on their existing production and the production they expect to bring online over the next year.

Note that this goes for everything that LMT makes — if you want an upper, wait two years. If you want a complete gun, it’s two years. If you want just a barrel… well, you can’t buy just a barrel, because contrary to what’s advertised in the company’s 2013 catalog, I’ve been informed that LMT intends to make only uppers and complete guns this year, and won’t be selling parts and accessories at all. I’m sure if they were selling parts, though, they’d quote you a two-year wait time.

But there is a major complicating factor here, described in detail below, which means that LMT customers might actually see their guns a lot sooner. Or not. The end result is that LMT seems to have no idea what its real wait time is. But more on that in a moment.

LM308 Sharpshooter: known unknowns that would make Rumsfeld proud

LMT’s new LM308SS Sharpshooter

In addition to the confusion around the general product line, there’s also the mysterious case of the LMT’s new LM308SS Sharpshooter, the civilian version of the .308 that the UK’s military has been using since 2010. The company’s printed catalog warns would-be buyers that the rifle “manufactured by LMT in limited quantities,” and “will only be available for a limited time. Now is the time to add the Sharpshooter to your collection.”

You’re probably wondering what it means that a product with a wait time of two years is “available for a limited time”. Does that mean you have a “limited time” in which to place an order into the two-year queue? Or is the time limited merely because the quantity is limited, and if you don’t get in the queue now then you’ll miss availability. Or has the “limited time” and “limited quantity” language now joined the parts and accessories pages in the company’s catalog in becoming inoperative due to recent events. I asked some reps at the booth for clarification, and they initially didn’t believe that the “limited time” language was in the catalog until I showed it to them. They then referred me to the head of LMT’s sales operation for clarification, and the exchange went something like this:

Me: “So what does it mean that you’re selling this for a limited time, when the order backlog is two years?”

LMT: “It’s because of recent events that the time is limited.”

Me: “Does that mean that I have a limited time in which to order one of a limited quantity of these, but then I wait in an essentially unlimited backlog queue until I get it?”

LMT: “You have to order now, because it’s for a limited time.”

Me: “Ok, so what is the exact time limit here? Or is it a quantity limitation?”

LMT: “You have to order now, because it’s limited due to recent events.”

Me: “Yes, but what is the cutoff date after which I am no longer able to place an order for this gun.”

LMT: “I can’t tell you that. We haven’t yet decided what that is. You just have to order now.”

So there you have it: if you want LMT’s new Sharpshooter package, then you should run out and order it right now, and hope to get it in about two years, because if you wait then you may or may not miss the “limited time” cutoff, which may or may not really exist, depending on what the company decides.

Dealers, distributors, and the waiting list

Speaking of things that may or may not exist, LMT may be quoting customers a two-year waiting period, but even they admit that they don’t really know what’s going on with their order queue. But first, you’ll need some background to understand why there’s confusion:

Unlike many AR makers, LMT doesn’t sell through distributors — it’s all direct-to-dealer. So a dealer takes an order from a customer (presumably without a deposit), sends it to LMT, and LMT puts that order in their queue. Eventually, when LMT arrives at your spot in the queue, you get your gun. Now, with other manufacturers who use distributors, there may be guns out there still in the distribution channel that haven’t been sold yet for whatever reason, so there’s a tiny chance that you might be able to score one if you’re in the right place at the right time; but this is not the case with LMT. LMT just works its say through its order queue on a first-come, first-serve basis. But the problem is, not all of those orders have real buyers behind them.

An LMT rep informed me that many of their queued orders may actually be the result of guys hitting multiple LMT dealers and placing an order with each, with plans to take the first gun that arrives and then cancel the rest of their orders. It’s also the case that dealers are putting in extra orders in hopes of getting just a few of them filled. So some unknown percentage of LMT’s two-year order backlog comes from this kind of over-ordering; depending how much of this “false demand” there is out there, the real wait time for an LMT could be shorter than the stated two years. Nobody really knows, which is kind of astounding to me.

At any rate, if you don’t want to wait “two years”, then you can hit a site like Gunbroker or Armslist and expect to pay double MSRP to get a gun today. Even dealers are going to charge you a hefty markup for anything they may have on-hand, and LMT has no price caps so expect to pay insane prices for anything you see on a rack.

No relief in sight from increased production

Before the Newtown tragedy and the ensuing buying panic, LMT had already invested heavily in new production capacity. The company bought new space and new machines, and hired 25 new machinists. But it will take them a year to be able to increase their output, because that’s how long it will take these 25 new machinists to get through an apprenticeship program so that they can start working on production guns.

So while LMT is planning a major production increase, that new capacity won’t be online for another year.

Postscript: the uncertainty factor

Incidentally, in talking to different AR makers, I found a range of positions on the “production capacity vs. legislative uncertainty” question. The makers are in various stages of investment in new capacity, and depending on where they are, they’re either doing like LMT and going full steam ahead with a production ramp-up, or they’re holding back to see if an assault weapons ban passes.

In many cases, those that are holding back probably will probably still increase production if a ban passes, but they need to wait to see kinds of guns will be legal and what kinds won’t before they decide what to produce. In this respect, Feinstein and co. will essentially be in the firearm design business, because these makers will be tailoring their upcoming offerings to fit legislation.

Lewis Machine and Tool: orders are backed up for 2 years… or not originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on January 21, 2013.

For those of you who can no longer find standard 30-round rifle magazines on store shelves, X Products may be able to fill that need. X Products has a 50 round drum that can fit a variety of rifles from the AR-10/15, M1A, M14, M249 SAW, FN SCAR 16, M-4/16, and many other models. Calibers include .223, .308, and 300 AAC Blackout.

A 50-round .223 drum behind a 50-round .308 drum.

The same drums from a different perspective.

When I asked them why they stuck with 50 rounds and not higher like their competitors, their opinion is any more than 50 rounds should be on a belt. The X-15 .223 drum is 1.5″ shorter than a 30 round Magpul mag, and 4″ shorter than Surefire’s 60 round mag. It can fire 1100 rounds per minute.

The loading procedure takes some getting used to, where you have to charge the spring by turning the wheel on side as your simultaneously load your ammo. The company reps said that with practice, users will get used to the loading procedure.

There is currently a 2-3 month wait, and is available at Brownell’s, Cheaper Than Dirt and many other stores which you can find out

www.XS-Products.com.

Chris Cheng is History Channel’s Top Shot Season 4 champion. A self-taught amateur turned pro through his Top Shot win, Cheng very much still considers himself an amateur who parachuted into this new career. He is a professional marksman for Bass Pro Shops who shares his thoughts and experiences from the perspective of a newbie to the shooting community. www.TopShotChris.com.

X Products high-capacity magazines originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on January 22, 2013.

POF-USA’s new “Enhanced Finger Placement” trigger is a single-stage, 4.5lb pull, non-adjustable, drop-in trigger. It “naturally guides the tip of your finger to the same resting place for a precise, smooth, consistant trigger squeeze every single time.”

The EFP trigger in an AR-15 lower.

www.POF-USA.com.

Chris Cheng is History Channel’s Top Shot Season 4 champion. A self-taught amateur turned pro through his Top Shot win, Cheng very much still considers himself an amateur who parachuted into this new career. He is a professional marksman for Bass Pro Shops who shares his thoughts and experiences from the perspective of a newbie to the shooting community. www.TopShotChris.com.

POF-USA’s new EFP Trigger originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on January 22, 2013.

KNS Precision manufacture a number of AR-15 accessories including a rifle machine gun-like spade grip, a tripod mount and a GoPro video camera mount. At SHOT Show they had all three hooked up to a short barreled AR-15. The end result looked awesome and must be a lot of fun to play with. The GoPro camera could be used to capture plinking sessions at the range or be used by law enforcement or private military contractors to document live engagements or training sessions.

KNS AR-15 Spade Grip, Tripod Mount and GoPro Picatinny Adapter originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on January 27, 2013.

Bushmaster is now offering an upper for the .300 BLACKOUT (aka 300 BLK or 300 AAC BLACKOUT) cartridge.  The uppers use a light contour barrel with a black Melonite coating.  Barrel length is 16″.

The AAC Blackout 51T ratchet mount flash hider is used on these uppers.  The upper receiver has a flat top with Picatinny rails for mounting a wide range of optics and iron sights.  The gas block is low profile and does not have a built in front sight post.

The handguard is a quad-rail allowing for the addition of many different accessories such as a white light or laser.  MSRP is $869.  In current market conditions, prices could be higher than the MSRP, assuming Bushmaster ships these in any quantity.

Bushmaster Offering .300 BLACKOUT Uppers originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on January 28, 2013.

Blue Force Gear collaborated with Chris Costa to design a tactical satchel for carrying submachine guns or PDW-style short barreled rifles that looked as little tactical as possible. The result was the Hive Satchel with its very “un-tactical” semi-circular shape and without any obvious tactical features or colors.

Knights PDW in the Hive Satchel

The satchel is currently being manufactured and will be available for order soon. The MSRP is $195.00.

Hive Satchel: Blue Force Gear’s Non-Tactical Tactical Satchel originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on January 28, 2013.

Joost, a reader of TFB, emailed us a sketch of an idea he had. He wrote …

The entire idea is basically deviding the pressure that goes trough a single gas-tube trough a dual-gas tube system, splitting the amount of gas 50/50 in the (low profile) gas block, and into the chamber.

The perk of this system is that the heat of the gas isn’t forced upon a singe gas-tube, and thus allowing for a faster fire rate for longer amounts of time.

Readers, how useful would such a system be? If fired continuously  the gas tube of an M4 will heat up and eventually burst, as seen this torture test …

originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on January 31, 2013.

At the 2013 SHOT Show in Las Vegas, DPMS announced the addition of two new .22 LR AR-style rifles to their line of guns.  The new “DPMS Mil-Std 22LR” rifles use mil-spec receivers, which means they are not limited to rimfire should you decide to bolt on an upper in .300 BLK, 5.56 or another caliber.

The new DPMS rifles will come from the factory in one of two configurations.  The first is the 6.45 pound AP4 carbine with an A2 front sight and rear detachable carry handle.  It has a 16″ barrel with a 1:16 twist.

The second new rifle is also a 16″ carbine, but has a heavy bull barrel and is completely devoid of all sights.  This rifle is a little heavier at 7.3 pounds.

Both of the new DPMS guns will ship with one 26-round magazine and one ten-round magazine.  $935 is the suggested retail price on each gun.

DPMS 22 LR Rifles from the 2013 SHOT Show originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on January 31, 2013.

Remington will now include Magpul MOE accessories on their R-15 line of rifles.  According to Remington, the company will have a line of four R-15 MOE rifles that will include Magpul pistol grips, trigger guards, stocks and handguards.

The four rifles will include a 16″ carbine, two 18″ carbines and a 22″ rifle.  The 16″ carbine and one of the 18″ carbines will have a MOE adjustable stock, while the other two will have a MOE fixed stock.  All of the stocks and furniture will be finished in Mossy Oak Brush camo.

The MOE R-15 rifles will all be equipped with the AAC 51 Tooth Breakout compensator and competitions two-stage triggers.

All of the new R-15 rifles will be chambered in .223 Remington.  All of the barrels will have a 1 in 9 twist.  MSRP will be $1326.90 on each of the rifles.

Remington R-15 with Magpul MOE originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on February 3, 2013.

There have been many advances in polymer technology in recent years. These advances have been primarily in the area of accessories as far as AR15′s are concerned. ATI is moving ahead with a new major component for the AR15 constructed of polymer.The lower is called the “Omni” and is 100% made in the USA.

Two types are available and they are a stripped lower and a complete lower that only needs to be attached to an upper of the shooters choice. When referring to a multi-caliber lower in the case of the “Omni” that would include .22 LR, .223/5.56 and .410 uppers.

When recently introduced the price of the stripped lower was $43.95 with the complete lower for $134.95. The complete unit includes a GI type six position adjustable stock, buffer tube, buffer with spring, the polymer lower itself, trigger group as well as the fire selector, bolt release, magazine release and both takedown pins.

As most of you know the lower is the gun as far as federal regulations are concerned and must be purchased through an FFL dealer. In the photos of the Omni you’ll note the serial number is a metal plate permanently mounted within the polymer just above the grip. This is a position different from most AR’s which have the serial number stamped into the metal on the left side of the magwell. Since the securely mounted serial number sits so far into the polymer it won’t fit within the magwell without interfering with magazine insertion and ejection.

The “Omni” is mil-spec so any brand of AR 15 upper will fit. I used my CMMG AR upper in 5.56 for all range work. The upper and lower fit perfectly. In fact the two fit better than many all aluminum units. The only other AR upper and lower I’ve seen fit as well was on a S&W M&P AR. The front and rear takedown pins lined up with the upper without a problem. The fit is snug so taking a small punch or other non-marring tool would be handy on the range should you need to swap out uppers.

Range Time:

After taking the “Omni” out of the box I looked it over and then lubed it since it was bone dry. I used a fairly liberal amount of Slip EWL that got all the parts operating smoothly.

I mated the CMMG upper and the “Omni” together and headed for the range. Most of you are aware that I normally shoot several hundred rounds when testing a new gun. I apologize for only firing 100 rounds of 5.56 and 100 rounds of .22 LR. Ammo is just that hard to find right now and I will have other guns for review in the near future.

In any event this is not one of those cases where accuracy is of any consideration. Function of the rifle as a whole is the main consideration. I can say the function was perfect with 5.56 and the Federal .22 LR using a CMMG conversion.

Essentially the only part of an AR lower that has any stress placed on it is the area where the buffer tube attaches to the Lower and just below that area. After shooting I checked that area with a USB scope at 40X and found no stress fractures or damage. I also checked the rest of the lower and found nothing unusual. I can honestly say that only extended testing over many hundreds of rounds would qualify as a complete test of the design in polymer. I can’t foresee any problems and expect it to last as long as most aluminum lowers. Only time and extended use will tell.

The trigger in this lower example was good and proved to be a bit better than a GI trigger. The safety lever worked smoothly as did the mag release and bolt release. As I mentioned I did lube it and work the controls to get them broken in which didn’t take long at all.

One thing about this combination I noticed right off the bat and that’s the weight. This lower weighs right at two pounds. The first time you shoulder your AR you notice the front of the AR just got heavier or rather it feels that way. This makes sense though since you just lost weight at the rear of the rifle with the lightweight polymer lower. I’m sure the user would become accustomed to this after a bit of shooting.

After I noticed this difference I called a friend and asked him to bring out a CMMG dedicated .22 upper that is clean with no flashlights or any accessories at all. This felt much more natural in balance than the full 5.56 with accessories mounted.

I also wanted to check several different types of magazines for ease of loading/ejecting and reliability. I had mags on hand from Magpul (PMag), several GI mags, CMMG .22 mags, Israeli steel mags and some old twenty round Colt mags. The only magazines I had difficulty with were the new Israeli steel mags. I can say that after seating them and ejecting a good number of times they also functioned fine. I can only figure that the new mags/lower needed a bit of breaking in. The PMags fit snuggly, which is nothing unusual. There were no problems with function.

A combination of the ATI lower and a dedicated .22 upper would make a great combination. That will also give a .22 AR shooter a new rifle at a very low price. In my neck of the woods that would be a price of $470 for a complete AR. Now that’s a price that’s hard to beat!

Conclusion:

Over all I was pleased with the Omni. It functioned well with the upper receiver I had on hand as well as my friends .22 upper. The price is certainly right!

I would encourage anyone buying the Omni to spend a small amount of time breaking it in with your magazines as well as working the controls after lubrication.

As far as longevity that is something that only long-term use will answer. I still believe, with the low cost, this is a good alternative especially now with prices of standard AR parts and ammunition running at an all time high.

ATI Omni AR 15 Polymer Lower originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on February 7, 2013.

If the pink rifle phenomenon taught us anything, its that there is a large market for guns that are not black in color. Colt Defense, the original maker of the Black Rifle itself, is now offer the AR-15 in a range of colorful patterns. From the press release …

The hydro patterned rifles are quite a change from the traditional black rifle that the gun market is used to seeing from Colt,” said David Ridley, Vice President of Domestic Sales for Colt Defense LLC.  “We are happy to be offering more options to customers looking to add their own personality to their rifles.”

The new patterns are available on many of Colt’s most popular rifle models. The patterns available include: Muddy Girl® camouflage
Tiger Stripe Vietnam™ camouflage
Carbon Fiber pattern
Silver Flame pattern
Brushed Stainless Steel pattern
Wildfire™ camouflage
A-TACS FG™ (foliage green camouflage)
Gray finish
Bounty Hunter camouflage
A-TACS AU™

Colt Defense Offering Rifle With Hydro Dipped Patterns originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on February 12, 2013.

SIG Sauer introduced the new M400 Predator at the recent SHOT Show in Las Vegas.  The M400 Predator is a AR-style rifle chambered in 5.56 NATO and set up for hunters.

The rifle has a match-grade heavy barrel with fluting to reduce the overall weight.  The barrel has a 1:8″ twist, which helps stabilize heavier bullets that many predator hunters prefer to use.  The rifle comes with standard 1/2×28 threading for the easy addition of virtually any common flash hider or sound suppressor.  The stock photo from SIG shows the M400 fitted with a flash hider.

This M400 has a two-stage match trigger from Geissele.  Trigger weight is set at 4.5 pounds.

Total weight of the gun (unloaded) is 7.6 pounds.  It ships with a single five-round magazine.

A Picatinny rail is standard on the upper receiver for the easy addition of an optic of the shooter’s choosing.  The fore end is free floated.  MSRP is $1384, though in the current market, the street price could be higher.

SIG M400 Predator originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on February 18, 2013.

For those unfamiliar with the concept of Back-Up Iron Sights (BUIS), they are just that, irons that fold out of the way when not in use, but can be quickly flipped up if for some reason an optic fails, and the shooter needs to be able to aim without the optic. Such a back up could save a range trip, save a hunt that would have otherwise been scrubbed, or even save a life.

Troy Industries’ line of BUIS is no exception to the quality they exhibit in their other products. Built from high quality aluminum and steel, they are very solidly built.

There are 3 different openings on the rear sight. The primary aperture, a large ring marked 0-200m, has a tritium vial on either side of the ring. The sights flip to a 300-600m setting which has a small aperture, with a small notch above it for extreme ranges. The tritium vials installed on these sights glow enough to be noticed in low and no-light situations, but not brightly enough to be distracting.

The sights are held in the folded position with a spring loaded detent in the sight body. This keeps them folded down when not in use, but allows them to be folded up quickly with a flick of a finger. There aren’t any buttons or other actions to make deploying these sights difficult. When the sights are folded the whole way up, the hinge pin locks very solidly in place by dropping around 2 small posts in the base of the sight. This ensures that the sight cannot be bumped down once locked into place.

Folding the sights is achieved by pushing the hinge pin in against spring pressure, and then pushing the sight back down to the folded position, where it clicks into place.

Troy BUIS mount like most any Picatinny compatible accessories to any Picatinny rail surface, via a screw-and-claw style clamp. Threads should have a low  strength threadlocker like blue Loctite to ensure that they don’t back out under repeated recoil, like any sight mount should. The front sight is adjusted like any AR front sight post, by screwing it in or out with a front sight tool, or in a pinch, the tip of a bullet. A special note about the tritium model, the front sight post is set up in 2 segments, the bottom containing the threads for adjustment, and the top containing the front sight post itself. The two segments are free to rotate, so the tritium vial can be properly oriented to face the shooter once adjusted the proper zero. The rear sight is adjusted similarly to an A1 rear sight, by rotating a disc on the side of the sight assembly with a coin in the provided slot, a bullet tip in the small holes ringing the wheel, or with a thumb (and some effort) on the stippled edge of the adjustment wheel.

Pros

These sights are very impressive from a build quality standpoint. They are built from Type III anodized aluminum with stainless steel locking mechanisms, and very tightly constructed, to the point of having the most solid lockup when up I’ve seen from any folding iron sights. I wouldn’t hesitate to use these on a rifle where they would be the only sighting system, not only in a back-up role. They held up to the recoil of the Kel-Tec KSG, one of the hardest recoiling guns I’ve ever shot, a testament to how positively they lock in place and hold zero.

They have a very clever adjustment mechanism. I can’t count the number of times I’ve had to jury rig up a sight adjustment tool when sighting a rifle. By allowing for 3 different methods of adjustment on the rear sight, they’ve definitely thought of the end user frantically shuffling through their range bag for something to move their sights with.

Cons

The first thing about these iron sights, sitting like the 800 pound gorilla in the room, is the price. At MSRP, the tritium models come in at $144 for the front, and $164 for the rear, which can make any buyer cringe. However, the the non-tritium models are more affordable at $99 and $119 respectively, which I think is a very reasonable price for sights of their caliber.

I have two more small gripes, which aren’t of much consequence in the long run. First, with the HK-style globe front sight, I found myself aligning the globe with the round rear aperture instead of centering the post, which was quite distracting. This can be solved by buying the more classic M4 style front sight, which has the classic AR-shaped ears instead of the HK-style globe. Also, the mechanism to fold the sights down can be somewhat difficult to operate, given the relatively heavy spring in the hinge pin necessary to ensure such a solid lockup, which I find as a reasonable tradeoff but slightly irksome.

The Bottom Line

If you are looking for high-quality iron sights, either for an irons-only gun, or as back-up irons for a gun with an optic, personally, I would look no further if you have room in your budget for them. I’d personally skip the tritium unless you plan on shooting the gun at night, or using it as a defensive gun, as well as electing for the M4-style front sight over the HK-style. All-in-all, this is an excellent set of irons that definitely deserve consideration.

Troy Tritium BUIS Review originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on February 21, 2013.

762PR Defence PR borrowed a Heckler & Koch G28, the Bundeswehr’s new Designated Marksman Rifle, from a local dealer for a photo shoot they were doing for one of their clients. The photos of are beautiful, as is the rifle …

I had the opportunity to handle the G28 earlier this year at SHOT Show. It looks just as good in person as it does in photos, but it is heavy, very heavy. The upper receiver is made from steel unlike the standard HK417 upper which is made from not aluminum. It is built to last.

H&K G28 DMR Photos originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on February 24, 2013.

Wired Magazine has published an excellent long form article explaining what the AR-15 is and what it is not to Wired’s geek/tech audience.

From the morning that ArmaLite opened its doors in 1954 to the present, most of the innovation that has gone into the AR-15 has been aimed at making the gun as accurate and pleasurable to shoot as possible. The result is a gun that really is an order of magnitude easier to use effectively than many of the traditional wood-stocked rifles that black-rifle-hating hunters grew up with. For someone who enjoys shooting a $2,500 AR-15 from a company like Lewis Machine and Tool, Black Rain Ordnance, Daniel Defense, or KAC, is like a driving enthusiast sitting behind the wheel of an Italian or German supercar. It’s a revelation, and the experience doesn’t wear off quickly.

Once you have SHOT a very high-end AR-15. It is hard to go back.

The AR-15 Is A Gadget originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on February 25, 2013.

Bushmaster Firearms is starting to use Magpul MOE stocks on a lot of their rifles.  Among the rifles now sporting MOE gear are the company’s Varminter, Predator and 308 Hunter lines.

Four different Bushmaster Varminter rifles are now using the Magpul stocks:

• Varminter (standard model)
• Varminter SS
• Varminter BFC-15 (bullet button version)
• Varminter A-TACS

Three Predator rifles are now using the MOE stocks:

• Predator (base model)
• Predator BFC-15 (bullet button model)
• Predator A-TACS

The Varminter and Predator rifles range in price from $1,358.83 to $1,534.51.

The larger-framed 308 Hunter is also now using the MOE gear.  The 308 Hunter carries an MSRP of $1,685.32.

It appears the standard A1/A2-type fixed-stock will no longer be available, and that these guns will only be available with the MOE stock.  As of the writing of this article, the Bushmaster website had not yet been updated to show the new models.

Bushmaster Using Magpul MOE Stocks originally appeared on The Firearm Blog on February 27, 2013.