Advice on my first AR

Stoner99 said:
Well obviously. You are shooting 5rd mags or 10 rd mags at most and for 100 rds at a time in 3 Gun competition. That means nothing. Lol. The conclusion to come to was buying crap ARs is a waste of time. Even for hobby guns. Colt Expanse is probably as low as I would go. $700 Canadian I would pay for it.

The problem with what you are doing is that people will see your posts and validate buying low end ARs, but then they will buy a bunch of them and before you know the wild claims start getting parroted as gosbel.

What people buy is there buisness but I will continue to point out the obsurdity of shooters purchase crap and stating it’s just as good BS.
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Who in their right mind would state that a $700 rifle can be compared equally to a $3000 in terms of quality. Certainly everyone knows which is the best pick if you have 3 Gs to blow. However if you shoot 500-1000 rounds per year and just want an AR to have some fun with at a 3 gun shoot a cheaper AR may be all that is required.
For example why would a guy buy a $500 hockey stick when a $100 stick suits his skill level and will last him as long as the more expensive stick? Why buy a $2000 suit to wear 3 times in 5 years unless you have those funds available. The analogies could go on and on.
Absolutely machining, tolerances, metallurgy etc. are what we pay for in an AR. Personally I just want one to blast a few rounds downrange every year. If I want a precise piece of equipment later I'll buy it but for now my cheap AR will do.
Everyone should be happy there are more affordable ARs on the market. It certainly has encouraged more shooters to plunge into the world of the Black Rifle.
You're right if anyone would call a piece of crap that shoots OK just as good as an expensive rifle. It's not but it just may be good enough.
 
Stoner99, no, the conclusion is that for the vast majority of casual AR shooters, an inexpensive American made AR is aptly sufficient.

Edited to add:
Merry Christmas!
 
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bluesclues said:
I am not arguing with anyone as to the definition of quality/ top shelf gear. And, I would also advise potential buyers to buy the best that they can afford after doing their research.

You are right about 3 gun as far as my experience goes as well. An average season sees 9 or 10 matches with ~ 100 rounds each. Add in a practice regimin and it equals ~ 2K rounds of fairly hard use per year, albeit though in a controlled environment. Most recreational AR users will not shoot 2K a year in the hot / cold / rain / snow / sand etc while throwing it into/ onto dump buckets / tables etc. slamming home mag changes etc.

Which brings me to my point; it has been my personal observations that many budget AR's are routinely keeping pase with significantly higher quality rifles during the competition season in both accuracy and reliability and have been doing so over many years now.

This not an endorsement but an observation only.
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As stated below, the answer is that a decent US made AR15 is likely good enough for most who want/use one. That in no way means they are equally as good as a quality milspec rifle.

rkm456 said:
So you're now taking what's true of an early version of a NEA rifle and just extrapolating it across all non-mil spec rifles?
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Where did I say that? In addition there have been more than a few problems with the latest "generation" of NEA rifles as well, so it's not just a gen 1 issue. More importantly, how do you f**k up the dimensions on a gun that has been around for over half a century?? I have CAD files for the AR15, is it really that hard to setup the CNC??

Stoner99 said:
Well obviously. You are shooting 5rd mags or 10 rd mags at most and for 100 rds at a time in 3 Gun competition. That means nothing. Lol. The conclusion to come to was buying crap ARs is a waste of time. Even for hobby guns. Colt Expanse is probably as low as I would go. $700 Canadian I would pay for it.

The problem with what you are doing is that people will see your posts and validate buying low end ARs, but then they will buy a bunch of them and before you know the wild claims start getting parroted as gosbel.

What people buy is there buisness but I will continue to point out the obsurdity of shooters purchase crap and stating it’s just as good BS.
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And this is the lesson of the thread folks. The low end stuff might be good enough, but it is NOT just as good as..

pilon said:
Who in their right mind would state that a $700 rifle can be compared equally to a $3000 in terms of quality. Certainly everyone knows which is the best pick if you have 3 Gs to blow. However if you shoot 500-1000 rounds per year and just want an AR to have some fun with at a 3 gun shoot a cheaper AR may be all that is required.
For example why would a guy buy a $500 hockey stick when a $100 stick suits his skill level and will last him as long as the more expensive stick? Why buy a $2000 suit to wear 3 times in 5 years unless you have those funds available. The analogies could go on and on.
Absolutely machining, tolerances, metallurgy etc. are what we pay for in an AR. Personally I just want one to blast a few rounds downrange every year. If I want a precise piece of equipment later I'll buy it but for now my cheap AR will do.
Everyone should be happy there are more affordable ARs on the market. It certainly has encouraged more shooters to plunge into the world of the Black Rifle.
You're right if anyone would call a piece of crap that shoots OK just as good as an expensive rifle. It's not but it just may be good enough.
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Well if you read this thread and others like it there are plenty on this forum that believe such BS. I will say that you don't have to spend $3000 to get a quality milspec rifle.

bluesclues said:
Stoner99, no, the conclusion is that for the vast majority of casual AR shooters, an inexpensive American made AR is aptly sufficient.

Edited to add:
Merry Christmas!
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Right! Good enough, but NOT just as good as..
 
My advice, look on the ee for decent deals, be patient, do some research, every once in a while you'll find a stag, or dd, colt 6920 etc pop up at a decent price barely a hundred or so more than a "hobby grade" gun, just swallow the pain pill and grab the higher end piece to start with. Or look around to see what goes on sale around this time of the year.

1) You will be happier with a higher quality product.
2) If you have or want to sell it back you will lose less money and usually have an easier time moving it. And depending on economic conditions you might even make money on it.
3) If you get sucked into the black rifle community, odds are that would be a better base for future projects or if you get more serious, it will perform better under the harder conditions.
4) This whole if you want a nicer ar in the future you will just buy it logic basically means you will be spending the money for the nicer ar anyways. So why spend the 700 bucks on a hobby gun that you don't want in the future and can't really sell?

Obviously this doesn't mean hunt down a Hk416 for however many thousands of dollars they go for now or dump huge money on a knights, but you can get a nice used milspec gun for not a hell of a lot more than a budget gun. Just get that. You'll be happier for it.

OntarioTim said:
Normally I steer very clear of online bullying and some of the misinformation bantered around on these threads. I happen to be one of the mindless gnomes tasked with writing specifications for military procurement. I am sitting on a military base as I write this, so, I might actually know a bit about the term milspec.

The term milspec is a short form for military specifications and only pertains to a particular tender or supply contract. If there was a need for C7 (AR) trigger parts made out of rubber for, say, training of weapons techs, the specifications would call for just that. The supplied components would then have to meet that 'milspec'! Therefore rubber triggers would actually comply with a specific military specification. Another department may have a need for a trigger group made from unobtainable hybred materials that needs to perform under the most harsh of conditions in real world applications. Those too would be supplied to a different milspec. So, basically a rubber trigger AND a indestructible trigger could both be milspec. Just calling it milspec is meaningless!

Now back to reality and the original topic; if you are happy spending big dollars for parts for your toy guns so you can have the best of the best semi automatic 5 round civilian AR go for it! Our boys and girls in uniform are still getting shot at by cheap, unmaintained Chinese junk and apparently that is still pretty scary!
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Wait, you write our procurement stuff? Why don't we have replacement fighter jets to our cf188 yet? Get on that man.

Also for the love of god replace the hi powers with something... anything...
 
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r34skyline said:
My advice, look on the ee for decent deals, be patient, do some research, every once in a while you'll find a stag, or dd, colt 6920 etc pop up at a decent price barely a hundred or so more than a "hobby grade" gun, just swallow the pain pill and grab the higher end piece to start with. Or look around to see what goes on sale around this time of the year.

1) You will be happier with a higher quality product.
2) If you have or want to sell it back you will lose less money and usually have an easier time moving it. And depending on economic conditions you might even make money on it.
3) If you get sucked into the black rifle community, odds are that would be a better base for future projects or if you get more serious, it will perform better under the harder conditions.
4) This whole if you want a nicer ar in the future you will just buy it logic basically means you will be spending the money for the nicer ar anyways. So why spend the 700 bucks on a hobby gun that you don't want in the future and can't really sell?

Obviously this doesn't mean hunt down a Hk416 for however many thousands of dollars they go for now or dump huge money on a knights, but you can get a nice used milspec gun for not a hell of a lot more than a budget gun. Just get that. You'll be happier for it.



Wait, you write our procurement stuff? Why don't we have replacement fighter jets to our cf188 yet? Get on that man.

Also for the love of god replace the hi powers with something... anything...
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Your 4 points are very much subjective. There is merit in everyone's opinion on what one should or should not buy. Everyone has there own set of circumstances. Some may even give their "cheapo" AR to a young shooter when the time comes. I have a friend who did just that with a nice shotgun.
Would You be happier if You had a Billion dollars? You might think so. What gun would you buy then?
 
pilon said:
Your 4 points are very much subjective. There is merit in everyone's opinion on what one should or should not buy. Everyone has there own set of circumstances. Some may even give their "cheapo" AR to a young shooter when the time comes. I have a friend who did just that with a nice shotgun.
Would You be happier if You had a Billion dollars? You might think so. What gun would you buy then?
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If I was a billionare I would buy the accuracy international axmc 338 lapua, maybe other random guns to play with before dumping them on the ee. As for ars. Mine is pretty much exactly what I want, more money would just mean more ammo, anything else will be going to my slr build... which is also currently being built to exactly what I want. It's gonna be a stinger, but it's a one time and done deal.

I have yet to hear anybody buy a high quality product then go "oh shucks i shouldn't have bought this I should have bought the one that's not quite as good..." not once.

And actually if you monitor the trend on the ee, it's pretty easy to see norcs and low end s&ws sit on there for a very long time(hence like you said they become hand me downs), when a decently priced high quality gun barely goes on before it's gone. Keep in mind I'm talking about a good quality ar like a dd or 6920, the uber high end stuff like the swiss and knights etc tend to stay on there for a while as well.

And no it's not subjective, you can back that up quite easily. Running them lightly there is no difference, run them hard on a course I assure you the quality difference between a hobby gun and a top notch fighting rifle becomes apparent.

The last point yes this one I admit is subjective, but either way you are kissing away 700 bucks or so that you didn't really need to. But this one is definitely up to you. On a sidenote if a handful of hundreds of dollars is the difference in your financial ability, not to be a #### you need to get your finances squared away because you shouldn't be cutting it that close to the red line to buy guns. On an unrelated note it probably illustrates why canadians in general are as debt ridden as we are.
 
r34skyline said:
If I was a billionare I would buy the accuracy international axmc 338 lapua, maybe other random guns to play with before dumping them on the ee. As for ars. Mine is pretty much exactly what I want, more money would just mean more ammo, anything else will be going to my slr build... which is also currently being built to exactly what I want. It's gonna be a stinger, but it's a one time and done deal.

I have yet to hear anybody buy a high quality product then go "oh shucks i shouldn't have bought this I should have bought the one that's not quite as good..." not once.

And actually if you monitor the trend on the ee, it's pretty easy to see norcs and low end s&ws sit on there for a very long time(hence like you said they become hand me downs), when a decently priced high quality gun barely goes on before it's gone. Keep in mind I'm talking about a good quality ar like a dd or 6920, the uber high end stuff like the swiss and knights etc tend to stay on there for a while as well.

And no it's not subjective, you can back that up quite easily. Running them lightly there is no difference, run them hard on a course I assure you the quality difference between a hobby gun and a top notch fighting rifle becomes apparent.

The last point yes this one I admit is subjective, but either way you are kissing away 700 bucks or so that you didn't really need to. But this one is definitely up to you. On a sidenote if a handful of hundreds of dollars is the difference in your financial ability, not to be a #### you need to get your finances squared away because you shouldn't be cutting it that close to the red line to buy guns. On an unrelated note it probably illustrates why canadians in general are as debt ridden as we are.
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Agree on all points!! I've far too many guns. lol I'm really trying to get my finances squared but in the meantime I'll just head to work in the morning. Cheers.
 
rkm456 said:
I'm just an unfrozen caveman lawyer, but I'm pretty sure that gas block location is a specified tolerance.
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Found this today, thought you might like to know about it. Watch the video from the 12:40 mark and pay close attention to what Bill says..... Oh f**k I'll spoil it for those who don't want to watch it. Bill is showcasing the newest SOPMOD block 3 upper for US special forces.... And it's a MIDLENGTH GAS SYSTEM!!! Oh and it's a cold hammer forged and chrome lined barrel, it also sports a low profile gas block and the hand guard is..... MLOK!!! So the carbine gas system guys can eat crow, the Keymod crowd can eat crow, and the "I hate chrome/CHF barrels" crowd can eat crow.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyjMVbfemcU
 
Kidd X said:
Found this today, thought you might like to know about it. Watch the video from the 12:40 mark and pay close attention to what Bill says..... Oh f**k I'll spoil it for those who don't want to watch it. Bill is showcasing the newest SOPMOD block 3 upper for US special forces.... And it's a MIDLENGTH GAS SYSTEM!!! Oh and it's a cold hammer forged and chrome lined barrel, it also sports a low profile gas block and the hand guard is..... MLOK!!! So the carbine gas system guys can eat crow, the Keymod crowd can eat crow, and the "I hate chrome/CHF barrels" crowd can eat crow.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyjMVbfemcU
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Jesus Christ. You've been carrying this thread around with you for a month?
 
rkm456 said:
Jesus Christ. You've been carrying this thread around with you for a month?
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He never surrenders
He will not quit ever.
He will not stop. Ever
He is KiddX. Lol.

Wish he put his tenacity against the anti’s. We would have won the election and have FA by now. Lol.

Hey what did the OP buy again.
 
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