Crusader arms backland
- Thread starter Deathrawt
- Start date
True, that can be removed but regardless I don't believe it will work. 
One of the rifles developed a light strike problem. BANG BANG BANG -click- BANG BANG-click
So because the BCG tail pin is so hard to remove I tried other things than disassembling the BCG- cleaning, different magazines, new charging handle. Nothing worked. To add to the frustration sometimes it would shoot a whole magazine with no problem then the next mag I would get some CLICKS
Anyway, I soaked the tail pin part of the BCG and went on vacation to Maine and Boston for a week. Came back and finally I was able to drift out the pin nice and easy! A miracle as it hadn't been disassembled in 5500 rounds or more!
The culprit was the firing pin which was broken into 3 pieces. I cleaned up the BCG parts, grabbed a firing pin from the AR small parts bin, installed, went into back yard and BANG BANG BANG. I'll give it a better test tomorrow at the range but I'm pretty confident that was the problem
I'm actually impressed by how well the gun functioned with a 3 pc firing pin as it would usually only fail to fire 2-3 rounds per 10, so that's not bad.
So because the BCG tail pin is so hard to remove I tried other things than disassembling the BCG- cleaning, different magazines, new charging handle. Nothing worked. To add to the frustration sometimes it would shoot a whole magazine with no problem then the next mag I would get some CLICKS
Anyway, I soaked the tail pin part of the BCG and went on vacation to Maine and Boston for a week. Came back and finally I was able to drift out the pin nice and easy! A miracle as it hadn't been disassembled in 5500 rounds or more!
The culprit was the firing pin which was broken into 3 pieces. I cleaned up the BCG parts, grabbed a firing pin from the AR small parts bin, installed, went into back yard and BANG BANG BANG. I'll give it a better test tomorrow at the range but I'm pretty confident that was the problem
I'm actually impressed by how well the gun functioned with a 3 pc firing pin as it would usually only fail to fire 2-3 rounds per 10, so that's not bad.
Today the new firing pin rifle didn't get much of a workout- only about 60 rounds- but they all went bang. PMC and handloads.
Now that they are nearing 6000 rounds each Rugbydave is going to do another accuracy test soon.
Now that they are nearing 6000 rounds each Rugbydave is going to do another accuracy test soon.
Well folks, it's been about 10 days since last report and now both rifles are over 6000 rounds.
I've documented all the highs and lows on this thread and I am thinking I should probably compile all my posts into one thread. And actually when RugbyDave does some accuracy testing with these rifles I will, so there is a complete picture.
But I will do a quick recap:
I have zero experience with the Gen 1 or newest "comp" rifles. I bought one "Elite" (basically Gen 2) then bought another.
A) Rifle #1 was a jamomatic right out of the box. The fix was a break in, which I'm personally opposed to with all firearms (I remember when you could buy a brand new $75 SKS, take it out of the box and fire a crate of ammo through it without cleaning) but it seems that "break in" is almost a standard thing these days. Which seems crazy with CNC machining etc )
I learned that the return spring on the rifle was extremely potent and there was no point in shooting anything but full power loads (defined by me as factory ammo or handloads that had a maximum or near max powder charge) As mid level handloads that worked fine in AR, Tavor, 180 etc etc platforms were not powerful enough to really cycle that brand new spring. (Side note, mid level loads work about 99% of the time after extensive break in)
The rifle did break in and started performing reliably.
B) Magazines can be a bit finicky but that is to be expected if you don't use the supplied magazines and change things up for other mags. In short- magazines that are tight /wide or "new" with strong springs (for lack of a better word) can have trouble feeding. Well, that's not the rifles fault.
C) Rifle #2 showed up and was far less finicky. It still wasn't the best with mid range handloads but it wasn't bothered too much. Apart from the rifle being dry as a popcorn fart and feeling crunchy when the charging handle was operated it was fine. A little lube and things worked better.
D) Whoops, #2 stopped working well and upon examination the gas key was loose. Whomever had the job of staking it must have subcontracted to his 5 year old daughter and given her a toy hammer. I didn't have the gear to stake at the range but I had high temp loctite and screwed it down, intending to stake in the future but never got around to it and it's fine. Ultimately I had to do the same with Rifle #1 Also the screws on the handguard worked loose. Blue loctite and an Alen key fixed this.
E) Both rifles were supplied with a standard A2 ? charging handle. Which worked fine when you wanted to charge a round in. But when you wanted to remove a live round from the chamber instead of pulling back on the handle with your fingers I often had to use a solid object to "break" the round free. I think it was due to the really strong return spring slamming the round into the chamber hard- which is a good thing if you are going to pull the trigger, not so good if you want to remove a live round. I could also be at fault for this because when I encountered this th chambers weren't exactly clean. Anyway eventually both charging handles got replaced with bigger handles I can actually grab onto with my sausage fingers.
F) Now we are getting into the higher round count with both rifles over 3000 rounds. And I kinda lost track of which one was #1 and which was #2. I suppose I could have gone and searched up serial numbers but they both showed up close enough in time both are going to have similar round counts so it's not that important to me.
The Crusaders have 2 locater pins on the upper, so when the upper is being attached to the lower, the pins slide in and then the main pin on the front can be pushed into place.
I took one of the rifles apart because a primer that wasn't seated properly fell out and was jammed in the bolt face. Clearing the primer was easy but the locater pins fell out. I used permanent strength Loc Tite and slid the pins back into where they belonged. 24 hours the Loc Tite had dried and everything was AOK in rifle function . I don't know if they are just pressed in or whatever but they should at least come loc tited from the factory. It's not a big deal but it's one of thoise things that could be better addressed at manufacture level.
G) At one point on both rifles I had random bolt lock backs. I couldn't figure it out until I started thinking of AR15's >>>
The random bolt lock backs and realized that there was minimal spring tension on the bolt release. Knocked the pin out and sure enough the detent was stuck too deep in the spring hole. I have been down this road with at least one AR15 and it appeared to be the same problem- The opening around the detent got peened over and was preventing it from extending properly.
I took out the awl on my multi-tool, poked the detent in with the point and reamed out the offending material with the blade part. I think last time I did this I used a tiny file and a small drill bit (used by hand) would also accomplish the same thing. It's really just a thin bit of material that needs to be removed. Since it's not uncommon on AR15's I'm sure someone has a Youtube video about it
H) At about 5000 rounds I was getting light strikes with on of the rifles. Like every third or fourth round wouldn't ignite. Turned out the firing pin was broken into 3 pieces. I was impressed that it only had a 25=35% failure rate with a completely broken firing pin.
Once Dave does the accuracy test I'll start another thread as I am sure that the title of "Accuracy over 6000 rounds will draw attention and be informative. And I'll include all my experiences that I have outlined too.
Before I summarize this I want to stress once again I have zero Gen 1 experience and I know people documented problems there. So I can only speak to my own experience.
Is this a "cope" gun? Well, sure. While it has bits and pieces that resemble an AR, it sure isn't one in ergonomics or function
Does it suck? Hell no. it's true that one rifle needed to break in but the other didn't. Do they need specific ammo? Well, not really. Use factory Federal, PMC, CCI whatever. Or use max or close to max charges of handloads
Did I mention trigger? Apparently the new COMP models come with a better trigger and/or you can replace it. The Elite trigger is nothing to get excited about but it's sure not the worse AR/PCC etc trigger I've encountered. It seems kinda "standard" for lack of a better word.
Were there QC issues? Yup, mostly relating to loose screws/ gas key staking, ,that sort of thing. It absolutely shouldn't happen but I would be lying if I said I have not encountered stuff like this on other firearms that came from well established gun manufacturers. And none of them were insurmountable.
So yeah. 2 rifles. 6000 rounds each. Good and bad clearly explained. None of the problems were catastrophic, honestly the thing that irked me the most was having to break in one rifle. I mean, I was going to shoot those rounds anyway but it would have been nice to not have to muck around with it every few rounds until I got to 100 or 150 or whatever.
There are lots of guys on here that have expressed disdain for these (Backcountry Elite) rifles but I will say that if they don't have real experience with them (IMHO real experience comes well after 1000 rounds in a rifle like this) their opinion should be disregarded completely. I have always felt that way with most things...Low experience people will talk about the 'known issues" but when asked to describe their personal experience it turns out they have none. Even if that item had 5 star reviews they probably weren't going to buy it anyway, they just like to whine and moan.
Frankly most people take a year or more to get 1000 rounds experience through a rifle, if they even ever get there. I have 6000 rounds x2 rifles experience in about 6 months. I have mostly ignored the people chirping from the sidelines about how these rifles suck because it's usually apparent they have zero experience but more importantly I had to see for myself. Once I get a satisfactory amount of experience with a product/business etc I am more than happy to be very up front and honest about them- good or bad- and I've done that on many topics for many years on CGN.
Would I rather have an AR or even one of the good 180's? Yeah, for sure. This rifle would have never been developed if the gun bans hadn't occurred so I have to give kudos to Crusader Arms for coming out with this and doing their best to supply Canadians with something that they can at least work with.
I've documented all the highs and lows on this thread and I am thinking I should probably compile all my posts into one thread. And actually when RugbyDave does some accuracy testing with these rifles I will, so there is a complete picture.
But I will do a quick recap:
I have zero experience with the Gen 1 or newest "comp" rifles. I bought one "Elite" (basically Gen 2) then bought another.
A) Rifle #1 was a jamomatic right out of the box. The fix was a break in, which I'm personally opposed to with all firearms (I remember when you could buy a brand new $75 SKS, take it out of the box and fire a crate of ammo through it without cleaning) but it seems that "break in" is almost a standard thing these days. Which seems crazy with CNC machining etc )
I learned that the return spring on the rifle was extremely potent and there was no point in shooting anything but full power loads (defined by me as factory ammo or handloads that had a maximum or near max powder charge) As mid level handloads that worked fine in AR, Tavor, 180 etc etc platforms were not powerful enough to really cycle that brand new spring. (Side note, mid level loads work about 99% of the time after extensive break in)
The rifle did break in and started performing reliably.
B) Magazines can be a bit finicky but that is to be expected if you don't use the supplied magazines and change things up for other mags. In short- magazines that are tight /wide or "new" with strong springs (for lack of a better word) can have trouble feeding. Well, that's not the rifles fault.
C) Rifle #2 showed up and was far less finicky. It still wasn't the best with mid range handloads but it wasn't bothered too much. Apart from the rifle being dry as a popcorn fart and feeling crunchy when the charging handle was operated it was fine. A little lube and things worked better.
D) Whoops, #2 stopped working well and upon examination the gas key was loose. Whomever had the job of staking it must have subcontracted to his 5 year old daughter and given her a toy hammer. I didn't have the gear to stake at the range but I had high temp loctite and screwed it down, intending to stake in the future but never got around to it and it's fine. Ultimately I had to do the same with Rifle #1 Also the screws on the handguard worked loose. Blue loctite and an Alen key fixed this.
E) Both rifles were supplied with a standard A2 ? charging handle. Which worked fine when you wanted to charge a round in. But when you wanted to remove a live round from the chamber instead of pulling back on the handle with your fingers I often had to use a solid object to "break" the round free. I think it was due to the really strong return spring slamming the round into the chamber hard- which is a good thing if you are going to pull the trigger, not so good if you want to remove a live round. I could also be at fault for this because when I encountered this th chambers weren't exactly clean. Anyway eventually both charging handles got replaced with bigger handles I can actually grab onto with my sausage fingers.
F) Now we are getting into the higher round count with both rifles over 3000 rounds. And I kinda lost track of which one was #1 and which was #2. I suppose I could have gone and searched up serial numbers but they both showed up close enough in time both are going to have similar round counts so it's not that important to me.
The Crusaders have 2 locater pins on the upper, so when the upper is being attached to the lower, the pins slide in and then the main pin on the front can be pushed into place.
I took one of the rifles apart because a primer that wasn't seated properly fell out and was jammed in the bolt face. Clearing the primer was easy but the locater pins fell out. I used permanent strength Loc Tite and slid the pins back into where they belonged. 24 hours the Loc Tite had dried and everything was AOK in rifle function . I don't know if they are just pressed in or whatever but they should at least come loc tited from the factory. It's not a big deal but it's one of thoise things that could be better addressed at manufacture level.
G) At one point on both rifles I had random bolt lock backs. I couldn't figure it out until I started thinking of AR15's >>>
The random bolt lock backs and realized that there was minimal spring tension on the bolt release. Knocked the pin out and sure enough the detent was stuck too deep in the spring hole. I have been down this road with at least one AR15 and it appeared to be the same problem- The opening around the detent got peened over and was preventing it from extending properly.
I took out the awl on my multi-tool, poked the detent in with the point and reamed out the offending material with the blade part. I think last time I did this I used a tiny file and a small drill bit (used by hand) would also accomplish the same thing. It's really just a thin bit of material that needs to be removed. Since it's not uncommon on AR15's I'm sure someone has a Youtube video about it
H) At about 5000 rounds I was getting light strikes with on of the rifles. Like every third or fourth round wouldn't ignite. Turned out the firing pin was broken into 3 pieces. I was impressed that it only had a 25=35% failure rate with a completely broken firing pin.
Once Dave does the accuracy test I'll start another thread as I am sure that the title of "Accuracy over 6000 rounds will draw attention and be informative. And I'll include all my experiences that I have outlined too.
Before I summarize this I want to stress once again I have zero Gen 1 experience and I know people documented problems there. So I can only speak to my own experience.
Is this a "cope" gun? Well, sure. While it has bits and pieces that resemble an AR, it sure isn't one in ergonomics or function
Does it suck? Hell no. it's true that one rifle needed to break in but the other didn't. Do they need specific ammo? Well, not really. Use factory Federal, PMC, CCI whatever. Or use max or close to max charges of handloads
Did I mention trigger? Apparently the new COMP models come with a better trigger and/or you can replace it. The Elite trigger is nothing to get excited about but it's sure not the worse AR/PCC etc trigger I've encountered. It seems kinda "standard" for lack of a better word.
Were there QC issues? Yup, mostly relating to loose screws/ gas key staking, ,that sort of thing. It absolutely shouldn't happen but I would be lying if I said I have not encountered stuff like this on other firearms that came from well established gun manufacturers. And none of them were insurmountable.
So yeah. 2 rifles. 6000 rounds each. Good and bad clearly explained. None of the problems were catastrophic, honestly the thing that irked me the most was having to break in one rifle. I mean, I was going to shoot those rounds anyway but it would have been nice to not have to muck around with it every few rounds until I got to 100 or 150 or whatever.
There are lots of guys on here that have expressed disdain for these (Backcountry Elite) rifles but I will say that if they don't have real experience with them (IMHO real experience comes well after 1000 rounds in a rifle like this) their opinion should be disregarded completely. I have always felt that way with most things...Low experience people will talk about the 'known issues" but when asked to describe their personal experience it turns out they have none. Even if that item had 5 star reviews they probably weren't going to buy it anyway, they just like to whine and moan.
Frankly most people take a year or more to get 1000 rounds experience through a rifle, if they even ever get there. I have 6000 rounds x2 rifles experience in about 6 months. I have mostly ignored the people chirping from the sidelines about how these rifles suck because it's usually apparent they have zero experience but more importantly I had to see for myself. Once I get a satisfactory amount of experience with a product/business etc I am more than happy to be very up front and honest about them- good or bad- and I've done that on many topics for many years on CGN.
Would I rather have an AR or even one of the good 180's? Yeah, for sure. This rifle would have never been developed if the gun bans hadn't occurred so I have to give kudos to Crusader Arms for coming out with this and doing their best to supply Canadians with something that they can at least work with.
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Currently have shot 530 rounds of 223/556 rounds through my backland hunter comp gun runs pretty good only issues i had was the ####ty factory charging handle break due to the little pin in the charging handle break. I replaced the charging handle with:
