TACCOM24 Sterling arms R18 mk3 .223

45C said:
It’s more than just an opinion when the person acts as spokesperson for the company? Is it not?
I’ve had EE dealings and have followed Bartoks posts since 2013 and find his posts interesting and informative and I have tons of respect for the man.
But most people will buy this based on his opinion,which I find a bit to enthusiastic… lol
I mean if it was that easy to fix and at a $1000 less,3 years later, what do that say about the company involved?

Also everyone who bought the first gen for $3000 are now out 50% ,which should have been corrected the first go around.
But hey,at least we got another piston gun to choose from
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That's kind of why I don't put much stock in the reviews. He's very enthusiastic about this company's offerings and makes quite a few posts about them. He comes off to me like more of a PR guy than anything.

Edit: not to say I don't have respect for him. I would be enthusiastic about a potentially good product my friends made too.
 
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Wow!......:(

Tough crowd here on Gunnutz. No surprise. LOL

I happen to like your enthusiasm and excitement for this Mk 3 model. There are several versions of the AR180-B rifles, I think the ideas that Sterling Arms are trying are great. I think everyone should agree that once the bugs are worked out and the fine tuning kicks in, this Mk 3 model will be a hit. At $1800.00 it's at least affordable for most target or hunting folks.

The fellows talking about spending $4000.00 and up for a similar model is crazy, most people will not do this. A few will yes, but $4000.00 for any rifle is a lot of Jake........:(

To each his/her own I guess.

I enjoy your reviews, you have been completely upfront about your friendship with JR. Your 302 100% transactions on Gunnutz speaks volumes on who you are on this gun site. And this is good enough for me.

Will I wait for positive reviews on this rifle, absolutely! Already lost money on a BCL Siberian, beautiful looking rifle, but not at all reliable and very magazine picky indeed. The guys whining about the MK 2 model, oh well, I lost money on the Siberian, technology gets better over time, suck it up, I had to. No, I didn't like losing money and it didn't make me happy, but one moves forward. The MK 2 owners will have to do the same.

Please keep up the great reviews, I look forward to the firing, accuracy and reliability report.

Thanks!......:)

John

PS: No I do not know Bartok5 at all.
 
If I may add as a new member of CGN, I've been following this thread and R18 since TACCOM and while a lot of people's skepticism is entirely valid, I don't understand why they keep on pressing Bartok negatively. He has been upfront with his connections and his intentions. So I see no problem with that. I can see why someone might react a bit defensively when all someone wants to do is bring information out while others keep on questioning their motives and arguing with them. Sure let's keep in mind the fact that he does have connections, but let's leave it at that and enjoy the information adjusting our expectations as we go.

NO ONE here has the same access to the R18 Mk3 as Bartok did. So for all intents and purposes, he is the foremost expert on this rifle. Sure you may have speculations and opinions which is fine, but let's wait and see what the rest of the review entails. To add to that, wait until you have the rifle in your hands. Before then, our opinions and speculations on this particular rifle, are just that, opinions and speculations. Which will easily be trumped by someone who has actual physical access to the product.
 
45C said:
It’s more than just an opinion when the person acts as spokesperson for the company? Is it not?
I’ve had EE dealings and have followed Bartoks posts since 2013 and find his posts interesting and informative and I have tons of respect for the man.
But most people will buy this based on his opinion,which I find a bit to enthusiastic… lol
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True, some will make decision based on reviewer opinion, not necessarily on facts. However, we're all adults. I don't blame reviewers for their conclusions, I either agree or disagree.

45C said:
I mean if it was that easy to fix and at a $1000 less,3 years later, what do that say about the company involved?

Also everyone who bought the first gen for $3000 are now out 50% ,which should have been corrected the first go around.
But hey,at least we got another piston gun to choose from
Click to expand...

Understandable frustration. I have huge experience with historical firearm and researching firearms development is my interest. And I can tell from my understanding of the last 250 years of firearm history - no, you can't just come up with the rifle from the scratch and make it work reliably. You can't even combine together a number of proven design and expect it to work reliably. None of Canadian companies that currently cater to civilian market can pull this. It requires enormous resources (combination of funds and time and talents). Hell, in my opinion even CZ can't (or doesn't want to) pull it now - they are on 3rd gen with Bren and still there issues they haven't addressed! Obvious issues. Firearms design and manufacturing is not a simple thing. That's why I did not buy 1st Gen $3000 gun and will be very cautious even towards Mk3 gun.

Take a look a USA market. PSA with it's own JAKL (essentially a "combination of a number of proven designs") is making changes based on customers' testing. KelTec is the same. And they did their testing. And both companies arguably have more resources than any given Canadian company.

The less you deviate from proven platform the better (MS, Crypto for example. And then even small changes in Raven caused number of issues), but the problem is that proven platform are banned in Canada. Designers have two choices - stick close to origins and risk unfavourable classification or combine something that is not prohibited and get all pains from this new design growth. Don't expect miracle and then you will not be disappointed.
 
Hello everyone. I don't really pop on here much, but I think I better keep track of these threads a bit better...

Firstly, I don't think it is fair to insinuate that we screwed the MK2 purchasers. That rifle system has been pretty solid and we have had a less than 2% warranty service rate on it. We also learned a great deal in both engineering, manufacturing and QC from it. I get it that with the price drop, some people will feel that they got "stuck"; which is exactly why we stopped shipping almost 6 months ago. Owners got to enjoy their rifle and not feel slighted as we launched a MK3 while their purchase was still warm. If I was going to build a DMR, I still think the MK2 is a better platform with the rifle length gas system and a standard AR barrel. In 3 years, we have had ZERO gas system warranties from broken components.

To be clear; we are not simply buying an offshore rifle, rebranding and selling it. With what we get from Turkey, we cannot build a complete rifle. We also have a significant QC plan and system in place; key when getting parts from a variety of sources. But without offshore production and sourcing, there is ZERO way to get the pricing down. I also want to be transparent; when we were getting almost everything from Canadian sources, we had as much or even more QC issues. We also dealt with some terrible attitudes in regards to consistency and supply. Our ongoing frustration with our MK2 supply chain drove us to find solutions. Given my overseas business activities, I am happy with the partners I was able to find.

There is a reason why ALL of the serious Italian players now have parts production facilities in Turkey. With the right QC, it is the future.

The first 25 pre-production rifles we build were simply that: Pre-production so that we could use and abuse as well as confirm / adapt manufacturing processes. When you get a bunch of parts, even using the same drawings from a variety of places, tolerance stacking and unique shop particularities can come to light. We also could farm these out a bunch to knowledgeable people to get serious good/bad/ugly feedback.

These points could then get addressed as much as possible in the final product.

If anyone here thinks Bartok5 is a shill, you have never met the guy... You have no idea how nervous I always am sending him anything. He does not suffer fools lightly, not hold back on an opinion.

We've worked hard and spent a great deal of money to come up with the MK3 platform. The current AR180 system shortfalls are not easy fixes. For example... a semi rifle with a 12" CQB barrel operates completely different than a 18.6" Canada barrel. The bolt cam system loves to eat side plates, etc.

Is it going to be perfect; of course not, but given the parameters and Canadian RCMP limitations the entire community face, I think that we have come up with something that ticks a lot of boxes and at an affordable price point. Our goal was not to just make something to get around the OICs, but to be a viable platform if/when the OIC goes away with a change of government. The R18MK3 is that rifle.

We also needed to make a rifle (in our minds) that we could get a FRT for and couldn't launch it till we had it in hand. We all have seen first hand how subjective the lab can be, so we had to stick (good or bad) with a lot of the features in our MK2 rifles. If we had a free hand, we would have made other choices, but that simply was not possible. In our view, we know people would be pretty pissed with us if we sold them a $2000 rifle and then it was shortly individually prohibited. With a brand new sparkling NR FRT in hand, there is some level of protection both in a OIC ban and from being accused of having a prohib by an officer in the field. That's just us.

Will we guarantee that our new rifle will be issue free? No, but by making LARGE pre-production test batches, we really are able to identify the majority of issues before the consumer gets them. That's all we can do. Plus, make sure we have a fully supported after purchase team.

I'll watch these threads and try to answer specific questions as they pop up.

JR
 
Thanks for the supporting fires, JR. You always were a reliable Fire Team Partner back in our relish days....

Fvck the naysayers and doubters. They always fall by the wayside when their envy-based negativity runs headlong into positive reviews anyways. They're simply annoying in the meantime.
 
So now you’re telling everyone who disagrees with you to go fuc themselves?
Hey man, I didn’t see one nay sayer tell you to go fuc yourself.
And where do you see any envy coming from?
I guess what got my panties in a bunch is that you came off as saying every other semi is sub standard compared to the MK3 and you haven’t even fired it yet .

Just call it what it is, a cheap new alternative.

I apologize if I offended you in anyway and I’ll let that be my last comment.
 
45C said:
So now you’re telling everyone who disagrees with you to go fuc themselves?
Hey man, I didn’t see one nay sayer tell you to go fuc yourself.
And where do you see any envy coming from?
I guess what got my panties in a bunch is that you came off as saying every other semi is sub standard compared to the MK3 and you haven’t even fired it yet .

Just call it what it is, a cheap new alternative.

I apologize if I offended you in anyway and I’ll let that be my last comment.
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Nope, I am not telling everyone who merely disagrees with me to go fvck themselves. However, certain individuals in this thread have gone well beyond simple disagreement and at least one so far has resorted to name-calling. I have my tolerance limit for bullsh#t, and a couple of people here have exceeded it. I am not the least bit angry. I will simply ignore those particular individuals going forward.

Disagreement is all well and good, but when it devolves into name-calling and insinuations of shilling(or worse)? My "Fvck 'em" is well-deserved in such particluar circumstances. I don't have time for people who are inclined towards doubt and negativity anyways. Those are the ones my "Fvck 'em" was for, not the general audience who may disagree with some of my conclusions. Anyhow, "#### 'em" is simply my left-over "Army" way of saying "drive on, despite the naysayers...."

Don't be so sensitive. It wasn't about you

And I don't have to fire a rifle to recognize that it is a very clever amalgamation of current design trends. Unlike some here, I have zero doubt that the Mk3 will go "Bang". And when it does, all other AR180B-derivatives currently manufactured in Canada WILL instantly become inferior in terms of their design. That is fact, not idle opinion. When you finally get to handle the R18 Mk3 you will understand. It handles, disassembles/reassembles, and appears 100% to be a genuine "Defence Product", not a project cobbled together in some guy's garage. If I am wrong about the Mk3, and its accuracy is worse than 2.5 MOA with bulk ammo (as advertised) or if the reliability is less than perfect, then CGN readers will once again be the first to know about it in detail from my Part 2 Review. Stay tuned....
 
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TSE JR said:
Firstly, I don't think it is fair to insinuate that we screwed the MK2 purchasers. That rifle system has been pretty solid and we have had a less than 2% warranty service rate on it. We also learned a great deal in both engineering, manufacturing and QC from it. I get it that with the price drop, some people will feel that they got "stuck"; which is exactly why we stopped shipping almost 6 months ago. Owners got to enjoy their rifle and not feel slighted as we launched a MK3 while their purchase was still warm. If I was going to build a DMR, I still think the MK2 is a better platform with the rifle length gas system and a standard AR barrel. In 3 years, we have had ZERO gas system warranties from broken components.
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I was thinking exactly this.

Never build out a "DMR" style rifle before (and certainly never on an AR-180 platform), so if anyone here has any links to helpful articles or just wants to share some pointers with me (e.g. good buttstock options to help with the front-heaviness of the R18 Mk2? Ideal optic magnification? 55gr vs 62gr ammo? etc.), a PM would certainly be appreciated!

Thanks,
-Variable
 
With all the different reviews, on various firearms that Bartok5 does, I view him as an asset to CGN. No, I'm not thinking of buying an R18 right now. No, I don't know him, but enjoy how he does a firearms write up, step by step. Are they just the observations and opinions of one, sure, but isn't it best to have the more the merrier before you lay down hard earned dollars? Is he happy to review the R18 and hope it does well for J.R. and company? He should be.

We all would love to get back to whichever firearms we can't use due to the OIC, in the meantime we all benefit from write ups even if you aren't buying right now. I never buy the newest, latest, greatest first model and prefer waiting for development and changes in models. My gen.3 Raven just arrived. Bartok5 reviewed the earlier one with suggestions on updates. I am happy I waited.

Would I buy solely on Bartok5's word? No. I look at all comments and information, good and bad. Then as a consumer, I decide. Agree or disagree, at least you have someone on here that takes the time to do the work, and let the rest of us know.

P.
 
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OCanada said:
With all the different reviews, on various firearms that Bartok5 does, I view him as an asset to CGN. No, I'm not thinking of buying an R18 right now. No, I don't know him, but enjoy how he does a firearms write up, step by step. Are they just the observations and opinions of one, sure, but isn't it best to have the more the merrier before you lay down hard earned dollars? Is he happy to review the R18 and hope it does well for J.R. and company? He should be.

We all would love to get back to whichever firearms we can't use due to the OIC, in the meantime we all benefit from write ups even if you aren't buying right now. I never buy the newest, latest, greatest first model and prefer waiting for development and changes in models My gen.3 Raven just arrived. Bartok5 reviewed the earlier one with suggestions on updates. I am happy I waited.

Would I buy solely on Bartok5's word? No. I look at all comments and information, good and bad. Then as a consumer, I decide. Agree or disagree, at least you have someone on here that takes the time to do the work, and let the rest of us know.

P.
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Thank-you!
 
OCanada said:
With all the different reviews, on various firearms that Bartok5 does, I view him as an asset to CGN. No, I'm not thinking of buying an R18 right now. No, I don't know him, but enjoy how he does a firearms write up, step by step. Are they just the observations and opinions of one, sure, but isn't it best to have the more the merrier before you lay down hard earned dollars? Is he happy to review the R18 and hope it does well for J.R. and company? He should be.

We all would love to get back to whichever firearms we can't use due to the OIC, in the meantime we all benefit from write ups even if you aren't buying right now. I never buy the newest, latest, greatest first model and prefer waiting for development and changes in models My gen.3 Raven just arrived. Bartok5 reviewed the earlier one with suggestions on updates. I am happy I waited.

Would I buy solely on Bartok5's word? No. I look at all comments and information, good and bad. Then as a consumer, I decide. Agree or disagree, at least you have someone on here that takes the time to do the work, and let the rest of us know.

P.
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Very well said 🤝
 
even as a poster of a negative comment. i still will probably get one! lol in the market for a 223/556 sporting rifle after getting rid of the siberian and this is the best priced and most interesting of all released at taccom.
 
I hope to be near the head of the line, there are great design elements that make the MK3 UNQIUE. It's pretty much what I (and others I assume) want of a black rifle, even if some of the recent prohibits weren't affected by oic. I'm not concerned with the Turkish manufacturing, I'm sure the QC will be there and I've seen some really good work come from Turkey. (not speaking of the dime a dozen shot guns).

I'm really looking forward to the MK3, it's the only black gun on or planned for the market I want since the oic's. Regardless of the oic, they've design something good here. I just wish they split the difference between carbine and rifle on the gas system ;)
 
Lot of weiners and whiners on here. Go buy something else. This guy is just giving us information to make a decision if they're interested in the product. These look half decent. I'm genuinely interested and most of my semi autos cost well above the 1800 price tag. Rock on Bartok half these guys cant understand your vocabulary anyways. Keep doing your thing.
 
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Bartok5 said:
And I don't have to fire a rifle to recognize that it is a very clever amalgamation of current design trends. Unlike some here, I have zero doubt that the Mk3 will go "Bang". And when it does, all other AR180B-derivatives currently manufactured in Canada WILL instantly become inferior in terms of their design. That is fact, not idle opinion. When you finally get to handle the R18 Mk3 you will understand. It handles, disassembles/reassembles, and appears 100% to be a genuine "Defence Product", not a project cobbled together in some guy's garage. If I am wrong about the Mk3, and its accuracy is worse than 2.5 MOA with bulk ammo (as advertised) or if the reliability is less than perfect, then CGN readers will once again be the first to know about it in detail from my Part 2 Review. Stay tuned....
Click to expand...


I will vouch for that much of it. I handled it. It impressed me. There's a reason I keep creeping through these threads... Great info so far.
 
Scotty454 said:
Bartok is like a weird combination of a guy with lots of experience that knows what he's talking about, aaand a ridiculous product shill that will fully endorse something that sucks because he has some sort of vested interest in it. It's weird, lol. There's good parts you can pick and choose out of his reviews, but best to take them as a whole with a grain of salt.
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LOL, reading through this thread and I was going to post to Bartok saying that he was getting perilously close to someone calling him a "shill" ... and here we are. :)

Is there a "shill law" like Godwin's Law that we are seeing in action here?
 
TSE JR said:
Firstly, I don't think it is fair to insinuate that we screwed the MK2 purchasers. That rifle system has been pretty solid and we have had a less than 2% warranty service rate on it. We also learned a great deal in both engineering, manufacturing and QC from it. I get it that with the price drop, some people will feel that they got "stuck"; which is exactly why we stopped shipping almost 6 months ago. Owners got to enjoy their rifle and not feel slighted as we launched a MK3 while their purchase was still warm. If I was going to build a DMR, I still think the MK2 is a better platform with the rifle length gas system and a standard AR barrel. In 3 years, we have had ZERO gas system warranties from broken components.

The first 25 pre-production rifles we build were simply that: Pre-production so that we could use and abuse as well as confirm / adapt manufacturing processes. When you get a bunch of parts, even using the same drawings from a variety of places, tolerance stacking and unique shop particularities can come to light. We also could farm these out a bunch to knowledgeable people to get serious good/bad/ugly feedback.

If anyone here thinks Bartok5 is a shill, you have never met the guy... You have no idea how nervous I always am sending him anything. He does not suffer fools lightly, not hold back on an opinion.

Is it going to be perfect; of course not, but given the parameters and Canadian RCMP limitations the entire community face, I think that we have come up with something that ticks a lot of boxes and at an affordable price point. Our goal was not to just make something to get around the OICs, but to be a viable platform if/when the OIC goes away with a change of government. The R18MK3 is that rifle.

Will we guarantee that our new rifle will be issue free? No, but by making LARGE pre-production test batches, we really are able to identify the majority of issues before the consumer gets them. That's all we can do. Plus, make sure we have a fully supported after purchase team.
Click to expand...
Every consumer product undergoes continual improvement. That is the nature of consumer products. People who buy in at Gen-A in the lifespan on a product are not getting "screwed" because of an improved Gen-B or Gen-C product. If consumer products didn't improve, we'd all be driving Model T cars.

QC is a specialty thing that requires experts in that field. Most people don't understand it and don't know how it is done properly. The first part of my career involved a lot of QC and QC adjacent involvement. While I wouldn't call myself an expert, at least I have a clue about the subject matter.

The best friends are the ones who will tell you the truth. The sunshine blowers are not useful friends. Given what I know of Bartok and his previous life, I have no doubt he will give you the unvarnished truth. Given what I know about you, JR, I know you will want to hear the raw truth anyway. We veterans are not sensitive violets who bruise easily.

There is no consumer product on earth that is "perfect." Production works on a range of tolerances and quality and sometimes those go a little cattywampus. It happens.

We had a WK180 and while I liked it well enough, the QC on the rifle we got was non-existent. Our WK didn't see a huge amount of use so we never had any troubles with it. We graduated to X95's because those fit our needs better. However, based upon what you've shown me with your MK3 and Bartok's descriptions, I am kinda interested in seeing and maybe trying the MK3 to see how it feels.
 
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