wsimpso1 Posted September 21, 2004 Share Posted September 21, 2004 A little report on an AR15 modification I made back when I was shooting High Power. In 2001 I installed a weight in the rear end of my bolt carrier to slow down the cycling a little to allow longer lived brass. I was getting a lot of stretching and was losing my pampered High Power brass (pocket uniformed, flash hole reamed, weighed and sorted, trimmed, chamfered, etc). This modification pre-dated the Carrier Weight System available from David Tubb's Superior Shooting Systems. I had also housebroken my rifle by tuning the ejector spring and slightly shortening the ejector face. Brass falls close and forward, even with 55's, and has never ever had any ejection issues. This helps with recovering pampered brass. I do not use pampered brass is IPSC Rifle... The weight was made by brazing a stack of stainless washers together, chucking it in my drill press and smoothing the outside. Don't ever do this... My buddy with the lathe was away that week. I attached the weight to the carrier by degreasing the phosphate coating with abrasive cloth and then bonding it in with thickened epoxy. The hole through the middle allowed assembly/disassembly of the bolt and carrier group. It looked pretty solid, so I figured that it would stay put until I found out if it worked... It worked fine for about 1500 rounds with NRA High Power loads (69's and 77's loaded softly, and 80's pushed pretty hard), when it became my number two rifle. It also survived my first season of IPSC, and another 500 rounds, for about 2000 rounds since the carrier weight was added. It has been completely reliable, has a nice soft operating feel, and is easier on brass than it was before. It works just as I had hoped that it would. It became my number two because I built a rifle around a Krieger barrel, including a carrier weight made from a solid slug of stainless steel, also epoxied in. That rifle has about 2000 rounds on it as well, and has been completely reliable since the break-in period. Again. the rifle had a soft feel, was easy on brass and worked very nicely. In fact it is a hammer, but that is what a High Power rifle has to be. Then yesterday in an IPSC three gun shoot, disappointment. The rifle would fire when hand cycled, but when cycled by firing, the hammer would not release, with the trigger not feeling the way it is supposed to... Most strange. We cleaned the chamber, but that did not change things... When I got to looking very carefully at the parts, I found that the braze was inadequate at one place AND the epoxy had failed forward of the bad braze joint. There was a slug of weight that could move forward and interfere with the hammer. Now, it was not loose per se, in fact, it took a mallet and punch to move it, but cycling loads could apparently move it (they did). The rifle had problems that fed upon each other, and either a well brazed weight or a solid weight might have survived forever, but we can not say that now. My next action? Well, it worked fine the other day with no weight, but my brass is back to stretching... I will install a solid slug of stainless and epoxy it in, and continue shooting IPSC Rifle with it. I will report back over time... Of course, you may ask why bother. Well, I do more than just shoot IPSC matches with it, and want my brass back from those sessions for reloading... I also like the fact that it does not shower my companions with hot brass, that it has a nice easy feel that makes it easy to read the sights in recoil... If that is not of interest, shoot your rifle standard... Experiment at your own risk, but by all means, Experiment. Billski Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zak Smith Posted September 21, 2004 Share Posted September 21, 2004 A lot of us go the other direction and use lighter BCG's. -z Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EricW Posted September 21, 2004 Share Posted September 21, 2004 Call me ignorant, call me old-fashioned, but I plan to stick with the stock carrier, buffer, spring setup until somebody shows me something that's more reliable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PacMan Posted September 21, 2004 Share Posted September 21, 2004 Don't know about others here, but that seemed to be a lot of trouble just to save brass. With most 3 gun matches, we don't have time to collect brass anyway, this process tends to hold up the rest of the squad. Thanks for sharing the info anyway Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dan Burwell Posted September 21, 2004 Share Posted September 21, 2004 Why not just use the JP adjustable gas block or an adjustable gas tube? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 Get the lead (brass) out of the carrier, put a muzzle brake on it, get some 1x 100% processed brass from Scharch Mfg, then “shoot and leave“ the brass for someone who doesn’t have a life to pick up 3 gun does require accurate ammo, but there is no reason to re-process the brass after the bullet is gone. I put a bit of prep into my brass, but I kiss it goodbye as soon as I box it. Treasure today, trash tomorrow -- Regards, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Freeman Posted September 22, 2004 Share Posted September 22, 2004 High Power is a different animal than IPSC. Much different. I lightly turned all the necks of my 600 yard Laupa brass. Every 600 yard powder charge was weighed. All the 600 yard bullets were sorted by weight. Every case from 200-600 had the flash holes deburred and the primer pocket squared. If I dropped any points, I want to know that it was me. Not the gun or the ammo. Weighted carriers slow the unlocking of the gun just long enough to allow the extraction to be a bit easier on the brass. With all that time spent on brass prep and using high dollar brass, you can be sure I wanted it back. Now that 90 gn bullets are getting more popular, it seems like slowing up the unlocking is a little more important than it was with the 80's. Then I shot an IPSC match in 1995. Shoot a Palma match now and again and silhouette monthly, but no high power. I found myself getting bored and taking little mirco naps between shots. I still have a brand new DCM Armalite AR that Frank White built for me. I guess I should at least break in the barrel. High Power match set-up is a lot easier though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wsimpso1 Posted September 23, 2004 Author Share Posted September 23, 2004 Hey guys, I do understand that there is a difference between games. Perhaps I do not understand enough of the differences yet... I did change the gun for shooting IPSC. I removed the weights and flash hider, flipped over the sling, installed a larger rear aperture and muzzle brake: IPSC rifle! Being as I did not know if I would love IPSC Rifle, I spent no money and left the internals alone, including the M-K trigger and heavy barrel (gun still weighs 9 1/2 pounds). As I had said, it has been completely reliable up until the weight came apart. I do not think that I negatively impacted reliability, atleast until the "temporary" brazed weight came apart... Yeah, I already know that in a big match, your brass is lost, but for local matches, practice and other shooting, I do reuse my brass, so the weight does have value to me. Even with the weight in the carrier, the gun splits much faster than I can see the sights on the target for the next shot. What do lighter carriers do for you? I can come up with two possibles: Quicker return to battery; Less sight picture disturbance. True? Trouble is that I have not played with them. I shall have to search the forum on the topic. Do you also use a smaller port size with light carriers? I had run the numbers before, and with the weight in one piece, the epoxy should last just about forever. For now and in the spirit of continuing the experiment, I am putting a solid weight back into the rifle and we shall see how long it stays put. Probably way beyond the useful life of the barrel... Yeah, I already know that in a match, your brass is lost, but for practice and other shooting, I do reuse my brass, so recovery and reloading of my brass has value to me. I am thinking about going to Derrick Martin's single stage trigger for the short reset and a more standard weight barrel to make it quicker handling. I figure that I would go for a smaller barrel port size too - I can go back up as far as 0.093" easily enough if I need to... Billski Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zak Smith Posted September 23, 2004 Share Posted September 23, 2004 Even with the weight in the carrier, the gun splits much faster than I can see the sights on the target for the next shot. Let's try a thought experiment. Clear the gun, and obtain a safe sight picture. Dry fire the gun. Now press the trigger. Press it again, and "double-tap" the trigger. Notice the gun doesn't move when you press the trigger. As long as you hold the same sight picture, the theoretical best shot-to-shot time for you is as fast as you can press the trigger in this setup. All the physics that happens when you're actually firing rounds downrange adds time. A lighter BCG helps to reduce the magnitude of the forces. A good muzzle comp is another part of the picture. What do lighter carriers do for you? I can come up with two possibles: Quicker return to battery; Less sight picture disturbance. True? Yup. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Posted September 23, 2004 Share Posted September 23, 2004 Zak is right on the money here. My JP CTR-02 AR with the low mass operating system and a muzzle brake allows me to snap the trigger twice as fast as my finger can twitch and I get pairs of “snakeyes” on target faces at targets in the 10 yard range and still get 2 A’s out to about 20 yards. This allows for some truly fast work on the close stuff. You really can not do that with any other setup. -- Regards, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
uscbigdawg Posted September 23, 2004 Share Posted September 23, 2004 ...get some 1x 100% processed brass from Scharch Mfg, then “shoot and leave“ the brass for someone who doesn’t have a life to pick up And at $45/1000, I'm not shagging brass any more! Rich Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wsimpso1 Posted September 24, 2004 Author Share Posted September 24, 2004 Thanks for the feedback on light carriers. I shall have to think about that. I do understand about throwaway brass, and some day I may get there, particularly if I end up really loving IPSC rifle. Right now, other shooting is still part of my picture, so I still pick up and re-use brass. Billski Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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