Marstar's M14 review and insight

[45ACPKING]

well.... that depends. chances are your stock norinco rifle will be in the 7.62 or greater range. Lazerus2000 showed us a neat trick with a 308 go and a bunch of 1 thou auto feeler guage material, building up through the 7.62 range..... he could probably better explain this procedure as his experience with these rifles is VASTLY greater than mine.
If you are installing a GI bolt...... .308 guage is what i would use.

 

[Erik]

Opinions Please

If someone could help me out it would be appreciated. How crucial is barrel indexing. If it is off by a few degrees does that make it unsafe to fire or is it just an issue with accuracy. If it is accuracy which is affected is it due to the front sight being off with the barrel or the barrel to the receiver indexing. I have not received my M305 yet but I am just thinking ahead; I hope I get a good one because I do not have any special tools and I do not know of anybody who could do this in northern Ontario. I'm just hoping for something that can shoot decently out of the box without major tuning. So I have my fingers crossed.

 

[Mickey849]

+ 1 for the above.

 

[tiriaq]

Hmmm. If the barrel is out of index, the sights might look pretty odd when they are actually zeroed.
As the barrel rotates, so does the gas cylinder and operating rod guide. This is going to affect alignment, vibration pattern when cycling. In an extreme case, the engagement of the op. rod with the bolt is affected. None of this is going to help accuracy. If the barrel is slightly out of index, and you install a scope, you will likely never notice. If you are going to shoot with irons, you will notice it every time you bring the rifle up to aim.
Don't think it would be a safety issue.
Barrels being poorly indexed does not seem to be all that rare. Silly, because it is no harder to screw the barrel in to index than to screw it in out of index. Really suggests sloppy, indifferent assembly and inspection practices. Often all it takes is to bring the rifle to shoulder and aim it, and the accuracy of the indexing can be observed. There is no reason for rifles to be delivered at retail with obvious misalignment.

 

[45ACPKING]

There is no reason for rifles to be delivered at retail with obvious misalignment.

I wasn't gonna say it...... but since it's been said....... I agree 100% with the above statement. I'd pay 499.00 retail for the same 399.00 package, if i knew that the inspections actually were taking place as advertised/claimed by the leading retailer of this rifle. I can re index a barrel in mere minutes and i'm NOT a gunsmith by trade. But for 399.00 i don't mind.... cuz i have the tools..... i'm betting most do not.

 

[45ACPKING]

had the opportunity to inspect 2 more current marstar rifles today, here's what i found.
1) both rifles have what seems to be properly indexed barrels
2) one had a nice tight gas sytem but loose oprod guide, the other had a slightly loose gas sytem but op rod guide was nice and tight.
3) both passed all safety tests
4) both had rear sights that were..... well... crappy norc rear sights
5) both had bolts with acceptable engagement of both locking lugs.
other than the above mentioned..... these rifles were very nice as far a fit and finish

both were inspected, issues addressed and rectified all in under 4 hours.
both rifles now have excellent "ping" and are nice and tight all around.
the owners are quite happy and i have been promised a range report in the coming weeks.

 

[762shooter]

M-14s as shipped

Artie, don't be scared off. My is 1 1/2 yrs old. Absolute best $400 you can spend. Just cleaned it up and started shooting. It'll go under 2" for five with open sights at 100 yds. What more could you possibly ask. This is with Lake City ammo. As for the buy 2, I foolishly got rid a a Springfield Garand that I bought for $199 many years ago. My 305 is here for ever.

This is my experience as well, 5 shots under 2" at 100 m with open sights, surplus ammo and old eyes!

My rifle's barrel seems to be over tighted a bit since the front sight is at the right edge of the front sight base. The "8" shaped nut that locks the gas cylinder is .007" loose, the rear sight aperature piece is a bit rough.

But it shoots! So I'm not doing anything to it.

 

[762shooter]

Barrel indexing

If someone could help me out it would be appreciated. How crucial is barrel indexing. If it is off by a few degrees does that make it unsafe to fire or is it just an issue with accuracy. If it is accuracy which is affected is it due to the front sight being off with the barrel or the barrel to the receiver indexing. I have not received my M305 yet but I am just thinking ahead; I hope I get a good one because I do not have any special tools and I do not know of anybody who could do this in northern Ontario. I'm just hoping for something that can shoot decently out of the box without major tuning. So I have my fingers crossed.

As mentioned in my note above, they can be accurate with barrel indexing apparently off a bit. Someone said that the front sight will look odd every time you sight the rifle if the front sight has been moved to one side to compensate for an over tightened barrel. Not really, because the protective wings move with the front sight blade so what you see is symmetrical.

Are barrels like mine really over indexed or is the bore of the flash hider/sight base mis-manufactured? A CNG told me that he switched out his flash hider for a GI flash hider/sight base and all of a sudden the front sight was centered on the base when zeroed, so his barrel had been indexed fine but the bore of the original flash hider was off. Any comments from you experienced M-14s mechanics about this?

 

[eyeguy]

Tiriaq has it right it is not so much that the sight has to be shifted because of poor indexing, it is the whole lining up of the gas chamber , op rod, and receiver. If out of line the op rod can bind a bit causing poor feed issues. As well as the harmony of the moving parts being off results in inconstancy's in firing. I had the barrel indexed install the marstar ss rod guide and locked the guide ring in place, have not shot it since doing that but the ping goes on forever

 

[Brentn]

What tools do you have to have in order to re-index the barrel?

My GF's M14 came out of the box with a crooked barrel, front sight, gas tube etc are all out of alignment with the rear reciever. the gas tube assembly is defenitly loose and after the range there was fouling/oil all over that area.

I will say however, that even with the gas tube/barrel not properly indexed it did fire perfectly, there were no failures in our 140 rounds of fire. Accuracy was of course off, but we're not marksman shooters either...

 

[tiriaq]

To adjust the barrel's index, you need a barrel vise, a receiver wrench, a heavy bench and vise, and a pair of parallels or a machinist's level.
You will also need a screwdriver and whatever other tools are needed to get the friggin' setscrew out.

 

[rdelliott]

To adjust the barrel's index, you need a barrel vise, a receiver wrench, a heavy bench and vise, and a pair of parallels or a machinist's level.
You will also need a screwdriver and whatever other tools are needed to get the friggin' setscrew out.

Actually, according to the parts diagrams those are the "Setscrew, Frigging".

Gotta say that I used to be pretty intimidated by the thought of indexing a barrel, but after reading Duff's M-14 books, and watching Hungry's video, I'm almost hoping that one of mine comes with the barrel indexed 45 degrees off just so I can fix it myself .

 

[Hitzy]

Hmmm. If the barrel is out of index, the sights might look pretty odd when they are actually zeroed.
As the barrel rotates, so does the gas cylinder and operating rod guide. This is going to affect alignment, vibration pattern when cycling. In an extreme case, the engagement of the op. rod with the bolt is affected. None of this is going to help accuracy. If the barrel is slightly out of index, and you install a scope, you will likely never notice. If you are going to shoot with irons, you will notice it every time you bring the rifle up to aim.
Don't think it would be a safety issue.
Barrels being poorly indexed does not seem to be all that rare. Silly, because it is no harder to screw the barrel in to index than to screw it in out of index. Really suggests sloppy, indifferent assembly and inspection practices. Often all it takes is to bring the rifle to shoulder and aim it, and the accuracy of the indexing can be observed. There is no reason for rifles to be delivered at retail with obvious misalignment.

There use to be a post on the old board by a fellow that did alot of dealing in Chinese product manufacture. He basically said there is no QC on the Chinese end, they just make "X" amount of product at "X" amount of dollars. He had to QC all the stuff once it was received. He also said that 10% of the product was generally better then expected, 80% was what was expected, and 10% was below expectations or scrap......
He wasn't dealing in guns though, but I don't doubt similar QC is practiced with Nork products.

 

[45ACPKING]

at the wet coast m14 support group today, we removed two of those "friggen" barrel screws. I used a slot screw driver that was dremelled to fit the little screw slot as tight and as deeply as possible. The barrelled action was clamped in my barrel vice and as I very slowly, and with as much downforce as possible, turned the screw driver, I had a fellow CGN'er tap the top of the screw driver rapidly and firmly with a hammer. After the screw started to turn, it just backed out with normal screwdriver work. Worked like a charm (thanx to Lazerus2000 for this trick)

 

[atr]

Just to put it into perspective , go to the M14 forum and see the guys who are having fits with thier Springfield Armory M1A's that cost 4 times as much. They are parts guns assembled by unskilled Mexicans with no sign of quality control . Quality control starts at $2,000.00 for a National Match and guys are still running into trouble. The Norc M-14 is the best deal on the planet for that type of rifle . If Marstar could supply Americans these guns would be at least $1,200.00 and they couldn't make them fast enough.