Expensive AR's, Low round count failures

[fpgt72]

I

I don't know about anyone else, but for the Noveske I'm on the 9th case of ammo that I've bought for that rifle. So I know that it's at least that. I also use that rifle to hunt hogs, deer and coyotes. As a result other ammo has crept in as well, so that's more a round about number.

The RRA NM is more exact since I only shoot match in that rifle.

I find what my rifles like and just stick with that pretty much. I'm guessing others are employing similar methods to get rough rd counts.

With my pistols it's a different story. There's so many different brands and lots of ammo going every which way that it's impossible to tell now, but I used to keep better track of it.

Now I more keep track of what's coming in than going out.

Just depends on how autistic you are about such things.

I could see that if you only use one brand for one rifle, or have one rifle in one flavor.

I generally roll my own, and keep a log on what was tried for this and that, but never have documented the round count. I know I generally work up 10 of each receipe for testing, but that is a guideline, really.

I am real anal on my loading, wanting everything perfect, weigh bullets, cases, each round after, but counting how many in each gun, I just never saw a real end game to that.

 

[Browning]

I could see that if you only use one brand for one rifle, or have one rifle in one flavor.

I generally roll my own, and keep a log on what was tried for this and that, but never have documented the round count. I know I generally work up 10 of each receipe for testing, but that is a guideline, really.

I am real anal on my loading, wanting everything perfect, weigh bullets, cases, each round after, but counting how many in each gun, I just never saw a real end game to that.

That Noveske is the one I shoot the most and I just typically just buy one type of ammo (M193, 55gr) unless I'm hunting with it. That doesn't really consume much ammo though. Couple shots here, few shots there.

Same with that RRA NM except I've tried a few different kinds of match and I've only ever shot that one at a range.

If it wasn't for that I would have only been able to give a rough estimate.

For instance I know that I have more than 10,000 rds through my BCM upper/PSA lower mutt with a Geissele trigger. How much more I don't know. I've shot all kinds of stuff through that one.

I haven't reloaded in awhile. No time for it.

 

[tarosean]

I don't know about anyone else, but for the Noveske I'm on the 9th case of ammo that I've bought for that rifle. So I know that it's at least that. I also use that rifle to hunt hogs, deer and coyotes. As a result other ammo has crept in as well, so that's more a round about number.

Thats how I do it... when I reload its at 1k batches.

Im definitely not the person that will tell you an exact number like 5312 rounds.

Have a Larue and DD V11 = zero parts breakages or failures.

 

[coloradokevin]

I first shot an AR-platform rifle in the mid-1980's, as a kid. I got my first AR-15 in the mid-late 1990's, and I've been tinkering with and building my own AR rifles for the past decade or so. In that time I've developed a few opinions:

1) Anything mechanical can fail.
2) Most failures in these rifles can be fixed pretty easily, with readily available parts.
3) True failure (breakage) is pretty rare. The more likely scenario is that something comes loose, or doesn't function as intended.

The biggest issues I've ever had with factory built AR-15's were as follows:

1) My mid-1990's Bushmaster rifle had a gas key that became loose shortly after I bought the rifle, causing some cycling issues. This was remedied with an allen key, and insured with a little staking around the bolt.

2) My duty gun (a S&W M&P AR model) had the safety detent sheer after maybe 7,000 rounds of use. When we train we're also cycling the safety on and off constantly. Fortunately, when mine sheered we were in the "fire" position, which left the rifle operational. But, it wouldn't be good if you had something like that sheer in the "safe" position when you needed to "fire". This was the only actual mechanical breakage I've experienced with an AR-15, and it was the fault of a $2 brass pin the size of a small grain of rice... very easy to remedy, but a pain if it happens when you need it. Also, it wouldn't have mattered if this was the cheapest or most expensive AR-15 I'd owned, because I don't think I've ever seen designer/custom safety detents!

 

[coloradokevin]

I don't know if what I have would be a high end, low end or just an antique.....it is a Colt from the 80's.

I can't begin to tell you how many rounds have been down it....and really how do those people that say yea I have this or that and it has 9000 rounds in it....really you keep track, how do you know that.....sorry calling bs. Even if you only have one rifle that shoots that specific flavor of ammo, you really keep track of how many you buy or how many you reload....nope, never gonna buy it. You can guess....lets see I have this 1911, I shot a game every week that used 50 rounds, that went on for 8 weeks, practice was around 100 per week....ok I gots an basic idea....but I would never say this is what I shot in the gun.

On that subject, with some of my guns (the precision rifles in particular) I can tell you precisely how many rounds I've fired to the exact round on each gun (I log the shots from these rifles, mostly to track performance). On some of my well-used AR-15's it's more of a guesstimate, but I'll bet you I'm correct within +/- 1,000 rounds on most of them. On the other hand, I also feel like I log a lot of things that most people don't. For example, I've been tracking my hiking vertical for the year this year, mostly to figure out what I do in a normal year here in our mountains. I can tell you that as of right now I've completed hikes with a total of 113,664 vertical feet of climb in 2018

 

[fpgt72]

On that subject, with some of my guns (the precision rifles in particular) I can tell you precisely how many rounds I've fired to the exact round on each gun (I log the shots from these rifles, mostly to track performance). On some of my well-used AR-15's it's more of a guesstimate, but I'll bet you I'm correct within +/- 1,000 rounds on most of them. On the other hand, I also feel like I log a lot of things that most people don't. For example, I've been tracking my hiking vertical for the year this year, mostly to figure out what I do in a normal year here in our mountains. I can tell you that as of right now I've completed hikes with a total of 113,664 vertical feet of climb in 2018

On a tool like a precision rifle I can sorta get that, just like I have a ball park idea on my "game" guns I have a real good idea, but not a exact number. I really want to get into the long range game, no place to do it, but don't really know what round count would tell me....if things start to go south start looking for solutions.

And this from a guy that will weigh each and every round I hand load, will sort bullets, even sort cases....but round count, perhaps it just has not hit me yet.

 

[JONWILL]

How to reliably jam a 6920:

Don't seat the mag. Drop mag in dirt. Scoop up dirt/rocks in mag getting it back into rifle. Feed dirt/rocks into action.

Reminds me of a guy at the local club that showed up when I was shooting. This was 20 or so years ago. I had my AR and he showed up with his AK. I think it was a Romanian WUM.

Started talking about how tough the AK was a the AR was crap and all that. To show me he took off the dust cover and put dirt in the back of the action.

I stepped way back. First shot, the Bolt Carrier came back and literally stopped. The back of the receiver was bulged out in either side about 1/2 inch.

He didn't say anything after that. The good thing was he could probably go home and pound it back with a hammer.

 

[coloradokevin]

On a tool like a precision rifle I can sorta get that, just like I have a ball park idea on my "game" guns I have a real good idea, but not a exact number. I really want to get into the long range game, no place to do it, but don't really know what round count would tell me....if things start to go south start looking for solutions.

And this from a guy that will weigh each and every round I hand load, will sort bullets, even sort cases....but round count, perhaps it just has not hit me yet.

Well, not to drag this off topic, but I keep track of exact round count for a few reasons:

1) Mostly I like to collect a bit of data on each of my shooting sessions. How I performed: hits misses, what dope I used for different shots under different atmospheric conditions, etc. If I'm already tracking this, it's easy to track the round count. Sometimes this means that I have detailed data on each and every shot (chronograph data during load development, etc.) and in other cases I just make a notation at the end of the day: "Shot match at Whittington Center; 60 rounds, 50 hits; 80F degrees, 20%RH."

2) Having a total round count lets me know when I should be watching for accuracy degradation that would necessitate a barrel swap.

3) Keeping this data gives me a better idea of how I like to space my cleaning intervals on the bore (I don't clean every time I throw a bullet downrange).

 

[2011ERIC]

Larue Tactical OBR 308. I have about 2000 rounds through it. I’ve never had a malfunction. I’m not saying it won’t ever and I haven’t subjected it to any harsh tests. But this is one accurate gas gun. Sub half inch with Federal GMM’s

 

[cfullgraf]

I prematurely wore out a 204 Ruger AR-15 barrel due to an over enthusiastic trigger finger on the prairie dog fields. Round count was fewer than 2000 rounds.

That's the only low round count premature failure that I have had.

Like some others, I keep track of rounds fired in my higher end, more precision rifles including AR-15s. Plinking AR-15s not so much.