Actually the LMT MRP is a pretty nice firearm. Old news or not, it's made a substantial impact on current battle rifles. Colt Canada's IUR/MRR for instance uses the LMT monolithic system and straight gas tube. New Zealand has just adopted the LMT mrp as it's battle rifle. ISO 9000 manufacturer, Mike rock CL/SS barrels, straight gas tube with angled port to avoid corrosion, Enhanced BCG available, and a very close working relationship with KAC. When compared side by side many of their products clearly use the same parts. These rifles come well equipped right out of the box. The Sopmod stock and ergo grips for instance and the buis is pretty good if you shoot with irons up (Which is how many police/military types are trained to shoot) in a 1/3rd cowitness.
We aren't talking about MIL/LE use here, we are talking about the OP plinking away and possibly competing. There is no performance advantage to a KAC over a Colt, DD, BCM, LMT rifle. Sopmod bits are fine but they are a personal touch that does nothing for performance or reliability.
As for price, are they grossly over priced? Most of these rifles had a hay day when they were brought in at exceptional prices. LMT with Quester, DD with Wolverines supplies. But those prices are long gone. A DD today will run you a tiny bit under $2000 to $2400 depending on the model you buy. A colt MRR is $2350 without IOP pricing. LMT MRP is $2350 to $3100 (MARS ambi lower/slick sided MRP) without the $100 mil/police rebate. KAC SR15 will run you at the high end of $3100. But it also comes with a lot of those extras that you would need to buy (as mentioned by Farmboy). Unlike Farmboy, I am going to include the Sopmod stock. This is actually my favourite carbine stock. My LMT rifles came with it, my SR15 came with it and I've used it for a number of high end builds. The current RCMP C8IUR rifles are also LMT SOPMOD/ergo grip equipped.
The MRR is over priced and the weak dollar makes an average AR cost a mint. The MIL/Le discount doesn't apply to everyone so there's no sense in mentioning it. The add ons that come with the KAC are great, if those are what you want. Same story for the stock.
QUoting the above to continue with my point regarding the prices of these various products.
When you add up the parts/features I've found that the value with LMT/KAC is much better than first presented. I am the first to state that the pricing on KAC is exceptionally high. But if you like those parts/features (which I do) then trying to mimic this is going to cost pretty close to the same, only a bit of afterthought look rather than that made from the factory options look.
Mimicking the KAC is not going to cost an additional $1500.
I want to add something about this, that you can't tell from the spec sheets. For example the first time I took apart a Colt Canada BCG I noticed the machining tolerances and quality. Removing the Bolt from the carrier it was as if there was a vacuum seal. The same thing with my LMT mrp and KAC SR15. Not so with my Colt USA. The Colt 6920 is considered by many as the standard. Yet, having compared these higher end carbines, there are differences that aren't on the spec sheets. I don't know with DD as I haven't taken one apart. I just thought I would bring this up as some of the differences require an actual hands on and full use to appreciate.
Does the bolt need to be that tight in the carrier? The answer is no it does not. Does such a tight bolt improve performance or reliability? The answer is no it does not. Tight tolerances are great but if they're in spec then it doesn't matter. DD bolts are also very tight in the BCG
Keep in mind the "proprietary" parts are designed to have a significant reliability improvement as well as life cycle of the product. Thereby requiring far less need to replace. Really by the time you are likely to need to replace these parts, your barrel will be close to shot out and you will have already spent not far from 10K in ammo. I recall reading that KAC warranties their bolts for 20,000 rounds. So is this really an issue to you? Only the purchaser/user can answer that for their use.
If you've read the story about filthy 14 you'd see that the bolt ran for 16,400 rounds under hard use and near nil maintenance before needing to be replaced. That's almost $8500 worth of ammo at todays prices. And 20,000 rounds is nowhere near the life of a barrel under normal use. The late Pat Rogers did a video just before he passed discussing the many rifles in their(EAG) inventory that have achieved over 20,000 rounds without cleaning and without parts. The benefit the E3 offers is something I have never seen and never heard anyone rave about or even acknowledge.
I really disagree with the above statement. First off, these rifles aren't just designed for the "action shooting crowd". They are in many cases military/police carbines. Which have to be able to do double duty as both CQB and accurate infantry/Police DM use. The 77 grain round is becoming more and more common place in it's use. Up close, sure cheap crap is fine. But once you start getting further out there, accuracy makes or breaks it. I have never done 3gun or other game/competition shooting. But it wouldn't surprise me to see competitors using cheap crud up close and higher quality/longer rounds for further out. With Police carbines for instance, you have to account for every round and in many cases the carbine will be used for scene containment which can vary in distances. Accuracy is very important for those applications. The Colt Canada also for instance has won contracts due to it's accuracy and ability to stay accurate during decent rates of fire.
I never said they were just for action shooting. The AR15 is a service rifle and was designed for service by the military and by default LE. Both the mil and LE are buying guns with our tax dollars which means the price isn't a concern. The accuracy of even bulk ammo and a quality AR are more than adequate for both mil and LE uses. I would also say that the LE side is using quality ammo with a little better performance than the bulk stuff most of us shoot. I still don't hear or know of any LE department that are issuing KAC guns. In fact I don't know of any mil units that are using them either. Everyone who shoots is responsible for every round they fire and LE miss around 86% of shots fired so I don't think they're too concerned about where they shoot let alone what they shoot with numbers like that. I think all bets are off when you're fighting for your life. No matter, the primary use by non mil and LE folks is for competition or plain old plinking. There is no gain in performance with a KAC over any other quality brand of AR.
Also the AR10 version has been used as a designated marksman rifle/Semi automatic Sniper System for a long time. These rifles were designed to shoot sub 1/2" groups. It may not have been designed to be one, but it surely morphed into one a long time ago. I would argue that this modularity and ability to disprove the old belief that semi autos can't be accurate, has made the AR rifle a huge success both with military/police and shooting enthusiasts. This adaptability for almost every role is really the strength of the AR platform and how else would you account for a carbine of this age, remaining relevant for so long?
Highly modified in every way shape and form. You can make a brick fly if you try hard enough. I'm not knocking the precision side of the AR family, I think they're great.
Ambi controls can be added (except the bolt catch) but it isn't as well executed as the KAC design. Even the LMT MARS I don't think is as nice. KAC stuff looks designed for ambi from the start rather than a retrofit. While most aftermarket ambi stuff does still look like an afterthought.
The BAD lever is an ambi bolt catch. I agree it's more an afterthought when compared to the KAC offering but KAC is far from the only company offering ambi lowers. The "need" for ambi controls is entirely fabricated by the competitive market. I haven't heard of either in person or in literature of mass casualties due to slow reloads or impossible to use guns for lefties. To each their own.
Back up sights. Many professionally trained carbine shooters, shoot with the 1/3rd cowitness and the iron sights are up. Anyone who has shot precision rifles with an aperture sight can tell you that a good set of sights can give very accurate results. When going for accuracy at 100 or greater, I actually go to the iron sights over the red dot.
Are we talking about an AR for precision matches? If we are then optics are the name of the game and an aftermarket precision barrel is a huge plus. I also wasn't aware of the professionally trained shooters that make up the ranks of CGN. Using a reddot with the irons up is a personal choice a well. Frank Proctor doesn't use iron sights on his rifles with optics and other well known instructors do the same. Irons are referred to as BACK UP IRON SIGHTS because they are inferior to optics in nearly every way. I still shoot my irons and have them on all my AR's but I won't try to convince myself they are somehow a better choice over an optic. If you shoot from abnormal positions or low light you won't be happy with irons.
, bolt carriers, buffers and springs can be changed...interesting thoughts, and good discussion.
