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That's awesome. My 11.5 gets the most use.
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And finally, turn up the volume
he volume.. |
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Originally Posted By lazyengineer: It was nitride. I'm happy enough with getting 11k rounds through it. Technically, i can probably keep running it since the 55 FMJ's are not keyholing yet. Googling, 10.5's typically go from around 3000-10,000 rounds or so; maybe some longer. Depending of course on the ammo and abuse. I think 11,000 rounds of such heavy mag-dump use I gave it, is actually pretty good. (It was this upper that a learned REAL FAST why the USGI spec is plastic handguards with heat shields - takes you about 3 mags fired at the right cycle rate to figure that one out!) I probably should upgrade to an 11.5, which is the new hotness, but heck - I have a spare untouched 10.5 on the shelf from a prior project, so there we go. Haven't decided if I'm going to replace the bolt, or just check the springs and keep rolling... WAIT! It's a PSA! I just realized, their customer service is ridiculous enough, they might replace that! That's a totally unreasonable ask, since this is normal wear and no way should anyone expect for them to actually warrantee that. ... but it'll be an interesting "why-not?" Ok... let me look over my purchase history.... ok, scrolling to page 2... OK.. page 3.... Here it is. Found it!: https://palmettostatearmory.com/psa-10-5-5-56-nato-1-7-nitride-9-lightweight-m-lok-freedom-upper-with-bcg-ch-516446396.html https://palmettostatearmory.com/media/catalog/product/cache/0423dea8e9791990cba1722182d60508/5/1/516446396_2.jpg That's a lovely jet-black gas block in that photo. FWIW, dumping your water glass on the sucker to boil away and make it cool enough to avoid catching your car interior on fire, discolor/rusts the gas block a good bit. Still runs perfectly great. Gas tube is fine, barrel and handguard never discolored, even from the water dump abuse. Rest of the gun is great, bolt is fine, (well, after replacing the ejector springs). Reliability has been shockingly good. It's kind of a great little upper. Only thing I've done is replaced the muzzle device, and threw a Wolverine Red Dot on as the sight. As to accuracy: I've taken this little guy out to 600 yards, and accuracy kind of surprised me - especially with just a red dot. Did a temporary rezero (with a whole lot of clicks) and we were passing it around and nailing 10's and X's on a regulation 600 yard NRA bullseye with it, which kind of amazed everybody there. It stabilized 77gr bullets just fine. (Obviously a low wind day; as 600 yard wind calls would be tricky with at 10.5") @PalmettoStateArmory - nice job, this guy lasted easily as long as most "premium" boutique brand barrels and has been a total win; I'd recommend it to anybody. If you think the worn out barrel is still under warrantee, then let's talk! (ha!) View Quote I like threads like this. I did this to another manufacturer's barrel (>20k but it was a rifle barrel and gas system) once and they were on me stat with an offer so sweet that I am still shooting it today. I can't imagine PSA would let you gloat for long either (ETA: nope, of course not). The 600 yard thing? My PSA course beaters can do 600 with Wolf steel case if the wind isn't too bad, and yeah, the gas blocks have taken a distinct brownish orange tinge. I think there is some sort of sweet spot for every barrel length and gas system length that allows this - I am sure there are more variables, but it's cool when a $350 upper does this with no fanfare. But yes, those short ARs erode the gas ports, muzzles, and muzzle devices like crazy, no matter who makes them. They also beat the crap out of the BCG and recoil spring, as your logs show. You're right about the gas port, I expected worse. Sometimes it's the length of barrel between muzzle and gas port that determines erosion rate, since that's when gas is flowing through there. |
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Originally Posted By PalmettoStateArmory: We made his barrel in house at DC Machine. The only FN barrels that we use are the CHF/CL that are advertised as FN made. @lazyengineer We appreciate your detailed write up. If you PM me your address, I will send you a fresh barrel to start over again with! Thanks, Josiah View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By PalmettoStateArmory: Originally Posted By jmreagan: Of course PSA sells a great barrel. FN-USA is still making all PSA barrels for them aren't they? Still impressive though! I was expecting the gas port erosion to be 2-3X's what it actually is. Good job documenting. And run that barrel until its totally done and report back as long as it's still safe to shoot that is. We made his barrel in house at DC Machine. The only FN barrels that we use are the CHF/CL that are advertised as FN made. @lazyengineer We appreciate your detailed write up. If you PM me your address, I will send you a fresh barrel to start over again with! Thanks, Josiah Hells to the fuck yea! This is why I love this company. It ain’t hard people……take note! |
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Crap, I was hoping someone would bilaterally section it lengthwise with EDM.
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Preferred Pronoun: Space Lord Mutherfucker
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*Hold on to your AR-15s. Their magic must be very powerful, or they wouldn’t want them.*
JAFOM.... Just another fat old man. ________________________________ TOGC,IADC |
Very nice documentation and write-up!
Why would 77's keyhole and 55's not? What characteristic of the barrel would yield this result? Thanks! |
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N&MEM, SSDR, NRA Life Member
Gun control is literally Hitler. |
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I'm not sure exactly which upper he used, but it was a Nitrided barrel, so it probably wasn't their "premium" line. They have Premium uppers with CHF/CL barrels and they use PSA's Premium BCGs. Which BCG comes with the Classic and Freedom lines, I couldn't say. I'm not really sure on the Premium line, either. The nature of steel quality and modern manufacturing technology makes me think the most basic, low cost parts would probably work very well, as long as they're in spec. I guess the QC of the "spec" part is where the line between garbage and economy lies.
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I'm curious which of PSA's BCGs rode 11,000 hard rounds to victory so far.
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Originally Posted By Tiribulus: I'm curious which of PSA's BCGs rode 11,000 hard rounds to victory so far. View Quote SKU and link are on page 1 - I'm still running it. Ran 60 rounds yesterday on the replacement barrel. Looks like a standard PSA mil-spec BCG. Don't think it's malonited. I'll look again when I get a chance. Sometime next month I'm planning on running it wide open again on the binary, and it'll probably have a 500-1000+ round day. Maybe more. It will be a "wear gloves", day. My brother has a bunch of Russian steel he wants to dump. Blah- steel - never run that crap. But, eh, toying with pulling the replacement 11.5 off and going back to my spare new PSA 10.5 anyway - haven't committed. I like the handling characteristics of the 10.5 better. So if the steel smokes this one, kind of don't care in the meantime, it all runs great. Oh! And a friend is coming down from Wisconsin and is bringing her thin 18 year old French Exchange student who has been quaking in her Parisian heels about going shooting in Texas. We'll put her to work on burning up that steel ammo in it. Ha! We'll drag her Hog hunting in the mud with the thermal afterwards. 'MERICA! |
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I love this, very interesting
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That’s awesome. I’ve always liked PSA and bought a bunch of stuff from them. They’re a stand up company!
Keep us updated on how the new barrel does! |
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You took an awesome thread and made it awesomer! The info is great and this proves what most of us have said for years. ARs are plug and play. In spec parts + build QC = a fully functional rifle...er, pistol. love it!
PS. The French girl looks great, but could use a little Texas sun! |
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Originally Posted By jdk1: You took an awesome thread and made it awesomer! The info is great and this proves what most of us have said for years. ARs are plug and play. In spec parts + build QC = a fully functional rifle...er, pistol. love it! PS. The French girl looks great, but could use a little Texas sun! View Quote Glad you like it. Here's another mom that was with us - who is also very cool. She said it's fine to post, and had a ball shooting guns under the eclipse. It's at about 50% partial here. 200 yard gong, (some shots went under due to shorter zero) |
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