NEA-15 12.5” Carbine
Disclaimer: I am the majority shareholder in a business which recently sold services to North Eastern Arms Group. This happened very recently; between the time they shipped it and the time it arrived, we ended up setting up a deal which leaves me not entirely independent of their organization.
Consequently I would like everybody reading this to be aware that I am no longer the disinterested third party I used to be.
NEAG is not the only organization my company deals with, however, the nature of NEAG’s involvement with past posters who wrote about their products is such that I think it is important for me to point out: they have recently agreed to pay my company money in exchange for services not related to this testing and evaluation.
As I said elsewhere, in some ways I’m a little disappointed that it worked out this way; I was really looking forward to running the gun hard, reporting the findings, and hopefully giving everyone a very detailed look at the gun and its advantages and disadvantages.
I am still going to do that, but I accept that my opinion on the gun will be worth less than it was two weeks ago. I anticipate that some people will probably accuse me of altering the review to favour the NEAG gun. I won’t do that, but I can understand people who would voice that concern. I think it’s fairly reasonable. If someone from the E. A. Morris Institute of Oncology advised me that cancer concerns regarding cigarettes had recently been shown to be greatly overblown, I would obviously be a little skeptical.
So please bear in mind as you read about the gun: I do have a financial interest in NEA remaining in business for at least as long as it takes for them to pay out my company. Not that I thought this review would significantly alter their outlook...but anyway, that’s how it is.
Arrival and Initial Inspection
The gun showed up on a Thursday, but I was tied up with work all weekend. I gave it a quick field strip and had a look at the bolt carrier group. Staking is good. Carrier finish is good. Internals overall...looks fine. I had gotten a pretty thorough list of questions from Westicle, actually - he’s quite knowledgeable about the platform - and started looking through the gun.
Without rehashing an entire list of specs, basically, we’re good to go. Extractor spring looks standard, with a black insert. No O-ring, but then whether that’s a good or a bad thing depends on the build. In NEA’s case, they’ve found that running O-rings on their carbine-length guns decreases the reliability as the extractor spring ends up overpowered. I’ve seen that a few times and don’t find it all that surprising.
The quality of the machining has definitely improved from the early guns. My lower is a bit rough but it’s early, and it would have been scrapped if I hadn’t insisted on that specific serial number months and months ago. The guys at NEA tried to talk me out of taking it, but I wouldn’t budge. I don’t care that it’s a bit ugly. I’ll just get another lower from them later on if it ever becomes an issue. In fact, I’ll probably do that just so I can take better pictures without everyone panicking about the tool marks on the lower. If you notice them in pictures, just remember: this would never make it out the door today and they tried to stop me from taking it.
Aside from the lower, it looks good. Surfaces look nice. I know they’re treating them differently now; frankly I don’t recall if they’re keeping their approach to surface treatment a secret or not, but it’s much better than it used to be for sure. All the critical dimensions are clearly done properly. Really it’s just the outer surfaces of the lower that would be of any concern to a buyer, and you won’t see another like this one.
Bottom line: looked through the gun, didn’t see anything that worried me particularly (although I am a shooter, not a gunsmith) so I slapped an Aimpoint micro and Daniel Defense mount on it, wrapped it in a VCAS Medic sling I had kicking around, snapped a couple of pictures on my deck, which should fairly obviously reveal my location as Vancouver, and set it aside for the next range trip.
Range Trip Number 1
Temperature 7 degrees. Light rain. Covered shooting area.
Loaded up 4 Fusil GI-type mags and 6 Magpul PMags. Not much to say from here on out other than give numbers.
Rounds: 370 (mags loaded + 3x100 boxes AE bulk, 1 box PMC)
Stoppages: 0
Malfunctions: 0
Breakages: 0
I was not really in an environment conducive to precision; consequently I can’t tell you any details about the accuracy. Certainly there were no obvious issues with the accuracy of the gun; at 100m the impacts were absolutely predictable, so it’s not shooting giant groups, but whether it’s a 1 MOA gun or a 2 MOA gun, I have no idea. It feels tight and smooth. The gas port is almost certainly quite a bit smaller than a TDP-spec gun. I don’t cycle through tons of ARs, but I would compare this gun to a 16” with a carbine-length system in terms of recoil impulse. It’s quite tame. I was very glad to see it run well for the day. Ejection was consistent; 1-2 o’clock and 2m ahead of me, no exceptions.
When I got home, I popped it apart and snapped a few pictures. I tried to hit the thing with light from a couple of angles to give a bit of a look at the internals, but to be honest I am pretty tight for time today and can’t really afford the amount of work to set up a really good photo session. Fortunately I type very quickly, or this write up would not be happening just now.
The nitrided surfaces sure clean easily. I will probably give the internals a cleaning just because it’s new, and I might as well let it break in properly. At this point I’ve just given the bolt a quick wipe down. It was during the bolt cleaning process that I noticed the one unusual thing: the firing pin retaining pin was bent. The NEA-15 uses an M16-type firing pin, and the spool on the pin is clearly striking the retaining pin. Some contact is not a big concern but if the retaining pin is a little soft, well, over time that will generate an issue. It’s a two-cent part and they’re offered to send me a new one, so I’ll see if it does the same thing. Jeff tells me it’s the first time he’s seen that. It’s not really severe - if you’ve ever seen the combination of hooked M16 hammer and SA bolt carrier and what that does to the retaining pin, that’s much worse! Anyway the one they’re sending is from their current batch of parts, just in case I somehow ended up with an old stock pin from one of their previous suppliers. I’ll probably run this one for a thousand rounds and see what kind of shape it’s in, then switch and see what kind of beating the new one takes. I’ll let everyone know how that turns out. For the record bent retaining pins aren’t unheard of, so this isn’t an “NEA only” issue. The cause is usually sporter-style bolt carriers, but soft pins are pretty common also. The original design called for a slotted solid pin, which was eventually dropped because of manufacturing cost. Anyway, that’s the only thing I’ve seen so far that’s caused either of my eyebrows to raise.
And now, on with our pictures:
Disclaimer: I am the majority shareholder in a business which recently sold services to North Eastern Arms Group. This happened very recently; between the time they shipped it and the time it arrived, we ended up setting up a deal which leaves me not entirely independent of their organization.
Consequently I would like everybody reading this to be aware that I am no longer the disinterested third party I used to be.
NEAG is not the only organization my company deals with, however, the nature of NEAG’s involvement with past posters who wrote about their products is such that I think it is important for me to point out: they have recently agreed to pay my company money in exchange for services not related to this testing and evaluation.
As I said elsewhere, in some ways I’m a little disappointed that it worked out this way; I was really looking forward to running the gun hard, reporting the findings, and hopefully giving everyone a very detailed look at the gun and its advantages and disadvantages.
I am still going to do that, but I accept that my opinion on the gun will be worth less than it was two weeks ago. I anticipate that some people will probably accuse me of altering the review to favour the NEAG gun. I won’t do that, but I can understand people who would voice that concern. I think it’s fairly reasonable. If someone from the E. A. Morris Institute of Oncology advised me that cancer concerns regarding cigarettes had recently been shown to be greatly overblown, I would obviously be a little skeptical.
So please bear in mind as you read about the gun: I do have a financial interest in NEA remaining in business for at least as long as it takes for them to pay out my company. Not that I thought this review would significantly alter their outlook...but anyway, that’s how it is.
Arrival and Initial Inspection
The gun showed up on a Thursday, but I was tied up with work all weekend. I gave it a quick field strip and had a look at the bolt carrier group. Staking is good. Carrier finish is good. Internals overall...looks fine. I had gotten a pretty thorough list of questions from Westicle, actually - he’s quite knowledgeable about the platform - and started looking through the gun.
Without rehashing an entire list of specs, basically, we’re good to go. Extractor spring looks standard, with a black insert. No O-ring, but then whether that’s a good or a bad thing depends on the build. In NEA’s case, they’ve found that running O-rings on their carbine-length guns decreases the reliability as the extractor spring ends up overpowered. I’ve seen that a few times and don’t find it all that surprising.
The quality of the machining has definitely improved from the early guns. My lower is a bit rough but it’s early, and it would have been scrapped if I hadn’t insisted on that specific serial number months and months ago. The guys at NEA tried to talk me out of taking it, but I wouldn’t budge. I don’t care that it’s a bit ugly. I’ll just get another lower from them later on if it ever becomes an issue. In fact, I’ll probably do that just so I can take better pictures without everyone panicking about the tool marks on the lower. If you notice them in pictures, just remember: this would never make it out the door today and they tried to stop me from taking it.
Aside from the lower, it looks good. Surfaces look nice. I know they’re treating them differently now; frankly I don’t recall if they’re keeping their approach to surface treatment a secret or not, but it’s much better than it used to be for sure. All the critical dimensions are clearly done properly. Really it’s just the outer surfaces of the lower that would be of any concern to a buyer, and you won’t see another like this one.
Bottom line: looked through the gun, didn’t see anything that worried me particularly (although I am a shooter, not a gunsmith) so I slapped an Aimpoint micro and Daniel Defense mount on it, wrapped it in a VCAS Medic sling I had kicking around, snapped a couple of pictures on my deck, which should fairly obviously reveal my location as Vancouver, and set it aside for the next range trip.
Range Trip Number 1
Temperature 7 degrees. Light rain. Covered shooting area.
Loaded up 4 Fusil GI-type mags and 6 Magpul PMags. Not much to say from here on out other than give numbers.
Rounds: 370 (mags loaded + 3x100 boxes AE bulk, 1 box PMC)
Stoppages: 0
Malfunctions: 0
Breakages: 0
I was not really in an environment conducive to precision; consequently I can’t tell you any details about the accuracy. Certainly there were no obvious issues with the accuracy of the gun; at 100m the impacts were absolutely predictable, so it’s not shooting giant groups, but whether it’s a 1 MOA gun or a 2 MOA gun, I have no idea. It feels tight and smooth. The gas port is almost certainly quite a bit smaller than a TDP-spec gun. I don’t cycle through tons of ARs, but I would compare this gun to a 16” with a carbine-length system in terms of recoil impulse. It’s quite tame. I was very glad to see it run well for the day. Ejection was consistent; 1-2 o’clock and 2m ahead of me, no exceptions.
When I got home, I popped it apart and snapped a few pictures. I tried to hit the thing with light from a couple of angles to give a bit of a look at the internals, but to be honest I am pretty tight for time today and can’t really afford the amount of work to set up a really good photo session. Fortunately I type very quickly, or this write up would not be happening just now.
The nitrided surfaces sure clean easily. I will probably give the internals a cleaning just because it’s new, and I might as well let it break in properly. At this point I’ve just given the bolt a quick wipe down. It was during the bolt cleaning process that I noticed the one unusual thing: the firing pin retaining pin was bent. The NEA-15 uses an M16-type firing pin, and the spool on the pin is clearly striking the retaining pin. Some contact is not a big concern but if the retaining pin is a little soft, well, over time that will generate an issue. It’s a two-cent part and they’re offered to send me a new one, so I’ll see if it does the same thing. Jeff tells me it’s the first time he’s seen that. It’s not really severe - if you’ve ever seen the combination of hooked M16 hammer and SA bolt carrier and what that does to the retaining pin, that’s much worse! Anyway the one they’re sending is from their current batch of parts, just in case I somehow ended up with an old stock pin from one of their previous suppliers. I’ll probably run this one for a thousand rounds and see what kind of shape it’s in, then switch and see what kind of beating the new one takes. I’ll let everyone know how that turns out. For the record bent retaining pins aren’t unheard of, so this isn’t an “NEA only” issue. The cause is usually sporter-style bolt carriers, but soft pins are pretty common also. The original design called for a slotted solid pin, which was eventually dropped because of manufacturing cost. Anyway, that’s the only thing I’ve seen so far that’s caused either of my eyebrows to raise.
And now, on with our pictures:
Last edited:
