Way back in 1996, the mouse gun was just beginning to kick butt at Camp Perry by :
* 80 gr. VLD Sierra Match king bullets
* Free floated NM handguards
* Wylde Chambered (Wylde reamers, I should say) Douglas, Hart , Obermyer, Compass Lake , yada yada yada barrels
* 2 lb weights in the buttstock (Ray-Vin, I believe)
* Tuned 2 stage match triggers
All of this is documented in John Feamster's book (do a google search) "Black Magic, The Mouse that Roared" or something like that. My copy is downstairs and I don't feel like tripping over 20 18-19 year olds celebrating the new year.
At this time the USMC was still shooting their tried and true M14's all the while the US ARMY's reign at the National Matches was just beginning.... the rest is history.
So what type of prep work went into the USMC's M14s ? Well let me try this list (at the top of my head and not near my downstairs library, where my son's party is going on)....
* Hart, Obermyer , Mike Rock 5R, Douglas, yada, yada, yada custom barrels
* 1.630" chambers (even smaller in very few cases, I'm told)
* Unitized by welding, gas cylinders
* Some titanium nitrided gas pistons
* NM cylindrical op rod spring guides (Brookfield Precision and others)
* Glued handguards (glued upwards to the metal retaining handguard clip)
* Glued handguard (epoxy of some sort, likely Devcon or Marine Tex) to the front band that's bent upwards to accomodate fat barrel and shoulders at gas cylinder interface
* Relieved handguard by about 1/16" to avoid contact with forestock... cooling of barrel is helped also. No handguard rattle whatsoever (one piece vibration pattern.
* Hogged out flash suppressor with # 7 tapered pin reamer to 0.406 ID
* Rear and front lugs welded to USGI M14 reciever, increases bedding surface area
* Devcon'ed or Marine Text'd to the McMillan NM M14, super fat profile barrel
* USGI National Match contract rear and front sights
* Rear sight was 0.052" aperture (cannot recall off top of my head) and front was 0.062" to align with black bull at 600 yds
* Front band COULD have tight, loose and NO contact. Experiments showed no differences in accuracy according the the US AMTU builders.
This is a list of commonly carried out practices that I would try to emulate in my efforts to tweak my USGI M14's back in the 80's and 90's, well except the titanium nitride gas piston. I found them to be too expensive to buy from Fulton Armory. Back in the 80's, Clint sold me all kinds of NM tuned goodies for my rifle builds. Okay, I did not touch the 'lugging' issue since I know nothing about welding or heat treating. My rifles could shoot into an inch with boring regularity, just ask Skullboy. I sold him one of my greatest builds back in 93.
Not bad for being able to build my M14's in my humble basement in Collingwood. Many of you CGNutters who have attended my 2002 and 2003 clinics will attest to that!
