Does anyone have any thoughts on this Carbine? Looks to have the following:

A2 Upper
Pencil barrel maybe?
A2 Fixed Buttstock
Carry Handle mounted Scope

Any ideas on what the period correct scopes for the teams were?

Any ideas on that buttstock pad?

SEAL sniper team I think. Cheek pad is probably isomat and riggers tape.

Cheek pad is lace on. I have s brown one from Cabelas that is a match or very similar. Personal add?

Yeah,  you're right. I looked at the pic zoomed in on my computer and you can make out the laced on the bottom.

They still make versions of them, but Eagle Industries, Blackhawk (when they actually made stuff in the US), and London Bridge Trading (a favorite of NSW) have all made those type of cheekpads.

It might be in the A2 forum, I saw a photo of a Ranger from Gothic Serpent with almost identical carbine set up.

They're R0727 carbines with M16A2 stocks and laced on cheek pads.

Handguards are carbine length FF tubes (possibly Bushmaster/Quality Parts V-Match, but simple aluminum FF tubes were not uncommon at the time, and it could also be a cut down rifle length tube, etc.).

Scopes are most likely either Leupold Vari X 1-4s or Microdot 1.25-4x, but could also be a couple of other commercial offerings that were also used around that time, and most likely with SIMRAD mounts.

At least one is equipped with an Israeli AIM-1 IR laser as well.

Another photograph of a similar Navy rifle from Somalia that helps to fill in some additional details, though this one has been a little bit more highly modified with a shaved front sight base and carry handle removed with a section of Weaver rail to allow lower mounting of the scope:




Note the A2 stock, heavier R0727 barrel, and Leupold "gold ring" on the objective end of the scope, as well as the AIM-1, FF tube, and SIMRAD mount.

The Ranger "DMR" was significantly more simple than these weapons, it was a stock R0727 with a Harris BRM 9-13 mounted to the plastic handguards, a [mostly likely] 100MPH tape and sleeping mat cheekrest, and a Leupold M3A Ultra [mostly likely] robbed from an M24.




~Augee

Bushmaster / Quality parts sold uppers just like that in the mid 90s.. They were shaved A2 uppers with a weaver rail attached, and the shaved FSB. It was the original "V-Match"...... Which ironically, "V-Match" was the only rifle I could find in Fedlog for Bushmaster, when I looked about 2004..

I know they did, but knowing the type and level of armorer support and their capabilities, I'm inclined to believe that the above upper is an "in house" creation, rather than an off-the-shelf V-Match, though it's very likely the FF tube was.

This is also the same organization that was building these just a few years later (could even have been built closer together, but the photograph is 1996):




Some additional photographs of these rifles:






Source:

https://m.theepochtimes.com/former-seal-team-six-sniper-tells-of-finding-peace-after-black-hawk-down-incident_2351322.html


~Augee

Try here or here

Heeeey 733s. Nice!

Is it me or does that very first one posted in the OP look like it's got knobs for a detachable carry handle?

Looks like it doesn't it... when were the first prototype flat top uppers made? Maybe they were testing flat top for the xm4?

I'm not 100% sure what that shadow is, but I would say it's unlikely.

Prototype flattops of various types did in fact exist at the time, and I can't tell you for absolutely certain that it's not, however, the same rifle appears to be visible in the other photographs I posted, with no indication of a detachable carry handle.

Also, if they were using prototype flattops, it seems unlikely that they would bother with the lace-on cheek rests and carry handle mounted sights--as indicated by the modified upper that I posted, if they were flattops, they would likely all be in similar configuration to that one.

~Augee

We did not start seeing flattops until after Somalia.

I tried blowing the pic up but it gets real fuzzy.  It seems like there is something there, but maybe it's just a shadow.  And all I can say about the mounting is that if for some reason they had an experimental flat top and they only had carry handle mounts on hand.....   I'm not sure how prevalent really high rings were back then.  But there is that other pic of the guy with the weaver rail on there....  So...  I get ya.   But that seems like it didn't need as high of rings as a normal flat top.  

But yeah, doesn't seem possible and maybe it was just a shadow or something.  But there definitely are some blobs in the vicinity of where the knobs would be on a detachable.

Now that I looked a second time I'm thinking its a shadow from scope rings or maybe larger knobs for attaching the rings to the rail. That seems more logical.

Couple of palmetto bugs landed on there at the right time....  LOL