The AR-15 Thread - AR-15's and Magazines

[Schmoe1]

ARs are few and far between right now, Buds gun shop online has been out for months, as well as many other online gun stores.

I too decided to upgrade to an AR given the current climate.  I went with Palmetto State Armory, they make their own rifles and are constantly restocking and have great prices.

I got a basic PA-15(their brand name for the AR) carbine for $615.

I love this rifle, came with some magpul furniture, including the stock, handguard, and sights.  I plan on putting a red dot on it sometime soon.

As an added bonus, it comes with a screwed on flash suppressor and full auto bolt carrier group, ya know, just in case.

True, AR-15's are in demand at the moment what with all the unrest and all. Several first-time gun owners are snatching them up along side the usual suspects who just can't get enough of them. A couple weeks ago I went and picked up a new sidearm, and that gun shop had several AR's on hand, but prices were running a little high on them because folks had already bought out the lower priced AR's there. The folks running the shop said business had been pretty brisk lately, and the folks at the State Police office who run the background checks were getting slammed from everywhere across the state, and were very busy. The background check took roughly 3 times longer than usual because they were so busy.

The S&W AR I bought a couple years ago came with a Magpul rear sight, but a standard AR "F" front sight and sight base. I believe the stock was S&W - at least it has the S&W logo molded into it - and the handguards were probably S&W. They were round like the old CAR-15 handguards instead of the oval M4 handguards, and had no heat shields at all in them. I replaced them with mil-spec M4 handguards with double heat shields, and put a red dot sight on it so that I didn't have to trust entirely in the plastic Magpul rear sight. I keep that folded down but available for use in case the red dot sight goes wonky. I co-sighted the red dot and the iron sights, meaning that when I flip up the rear sight and peep through it, the red dot is centered in the aperture and perched on top of the front sight post. I had to get a 1/2 inch "riser" to mount on the Picatinny rail and which gives another Picatinny rail that is 1/2 inch higher to get the red dot sight to co-sight with the "iron" sights. I've made use of that arrangement once already, at the range, when the battery in the red dot gave out. I'd have been blind without the iron sights co-sighted in, and range day would have been over way too early.

I've also added a flashlight and a green laser to it now. Since I don't like the idea of rails festooned all over a gun, and especially not on the handguard, I rigged a setup with a short 3-slot rail on each side of the front sight base, and put the flashlight on one side and the laser on the other, with pigtails running from each one to the handguard so that the switches are convenient to my thumb when holding the rifle in fire position. The flashlight switch has two switches in the pad, one for "on" and the other for merely momentary on - that one turns it off just by lifting thumb pressure from it. The laser has only a momentary on, no full "on", since it's not really there for sighting, it's more for scare value. Nothing like watching a laser pop on on the chest to take the fight out of a man without having to actually shoot him. That's really the only use for the laser, and in dusk to dark conditions, when it's on it leaves a line straight back to ME, which is less than optimal for survival, so I don't ever want it to be "on" all the time.  Folks will tell you that you can't see the laser line, which is usually true with red lasers unless there are a lot of particulates in the air, but it's NOT true with a green laser - the wavelength of green lasers will reflect off of air particles along it's path and show a visible beam under low light conditions. Trust me on that, I know it well from fiddling with the one I have.

That is also why green lasers are preferable - you can see the dot farther in bright conditions than you can a red one. Mine is sighted in for 50 yards, just in case I want to use it as a sighting device, but that ain't it's primary purpose. Like I said, using it can also put your opponent's crosshairs directly on YOU if used for that purpose. Ideally, I'd get an infrared laser for sighting, but those are EXPENSIVE. I don't know why they are, but they are - orders of magnitude more expensive... and to use them you also then have to buy NVD goggles to see 'em with - another expense for limited usefulness of the laser.

This AR doesn't have the full auto bolt carrier. The last one I owned, built by Century Arms from military surplus parts, DID have one. Doesn't do you any good without the auto sear, auto sear spring, and full auto selector and trigger group, though. You CAN use a lightning link or a drop-in auto sear, but the lightning links are less than optimal and just create a slam-fire situation, and both are classified as machine guns just by themselves, so if you're going that route you probably just need to get the real parts and pay the federal tax and convert it legally as it was designed to be. The price is going to be about the same for all 3 options, as the federal tax is the bulk of the expense. I myself have no use for full auto. It just burns up ammo for no good reason. You use it mostly to keep you opponent's heads down while you maneuver on him, and I can pull a trigger fast enough to do that without the full auto option. Some folks just plain love full auto, though, so I have no gripes if they want it - to each his own!

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Do you like the Smith & Wesson AR?  It was on my short list of affordable AR15s.  I was eyeballing the Ruger AR as well, but ultimately went with Palmetto.

What turned me off to Smith & Wesson was when I bought a boot dagger with S&W's name on it...complete piece of shit, granted it was a $20 boot dagger, but still, why put your name on something like that?

I'm with you on the full auto, I'd much rather be accurate and conserve ammo, and you're right, it's more involved making a gun full auto than that rampant rumor about simply filing the auto sear.