Sent here by Double Naught Spy, hello to LRRPF52

[PeterD]

Hi guys,

I recently moved to TX, turns out I'm just over an hour away from Double Naught Spy who I met on the Lone Star Boars forum, and LRRPF52 who I met on AR15 forum. Looks like the people I meet with 6.5 grendel in common all end up here.

I spent approximately 10 years living overseas in Australia where of course you'd be lucky if six people in the whole country had a special license to own a semi automatic rifle so I've always had Finnish bolt rifles, two barreled shotguns and that's about all I could get on their A & B license. I lived on a rural property mostly shooting foxes and the occasional kangaroo under license.

Now that I am here of course I bought right away the highly illegal and outlawed Ruger 10/22, but I've mostly been buying and shooting pistols, something that takes a lot of effort to get a license for in Oz and you are not allowed to bring them home, they remain locked up at the gun club.

So long story short. I am used to fabulous accuracy with bolt rifles at decent prices that I've been able to shoot down to a 1/3 MOA with handloads with my favorite caliber to date 243 Win {6mm}

I don't have the AR platform experience to know what is normal expected accuracy performance at each price point tier so the obvious first line of reasoning I would use is to fall back on my bolt rifle experiences and see if I could put together AR at the similar price point and get similar performance.

I chose the 6.5 Grendel first and to be honest was only looking at bolt rifles.st first. I have some anecdotal reports from CZ 527 American 6.5 Grendel owners that they got 0.7/0.8 MOA with their handloads.

Howa also makes a 6.5 Grendel but I had no personal ownership experience with the brand yet. I wish Tikka would put out a 6.5 Grendel but they only have 6.5 Creedmoor which is more recoil than I'm looking for and is not best suited to my intended use which is primarily hunting, deer / pigs / coyote etc.

Double Naught Spy has shown me through his videos some benefits to a semi auto in pig and coyote applications. LRRPF52 has given me some his personal barrel experience.

What I'm looking for is more wider experience from builders mostly building hunting rigs versus long distance paper punch rigs to see what the go is on purpose built Ara for that application.and any nuances involved in parts selection. I see plastic and wood stocks for instance nicer to hold in cold weather than metal hand guards but maybe it's not an issue for you guys who have then in practice.

Thats about it.

Cheers,
PeterD

[Bigs28]

Welcome. For hunting purposes the sbrs or ar pistols are becoming very popular. Using a lightweight 12inch barreled ar is easy to carry and move around and you can still achieve 1 moa accuracy from them with effective hunting ranges out to 400 yards plus depending on bullet selection.

[Klem]

Hi Peter, welcome.

If you've spoken to both DNS and 52' about building an AR then there's not a lot the rest of us can contribute. Perhaps a slight difference of opinion in techniques and preferences but the main principles I suspect you already know.

You will notice these guns are lighter than you are used to and so unforgiving with shooting technique. With tinkering you can approach the accuracy you are used to in match bolt guns but it will be fleeting and fickle. What you will enjoy however is the luxury and empowerment of a light-weight, high power, semi-automatic and for that you sacrifice a little precision. Depending on how deep your pockets are you will also end up shooting more ammunition and cleaning more often than you are used to. You get used to it and it's a labour of love. Scope aside, AR's are cheaper than the finest match bolt guns and if you limit the number of AR's you buy you can have a best-quality rifle and enjoy precision at least as good as the average bolt gun. These things are not hard to build and if you are thoughtful and careful you will have the satisfaction of having a bespoke gun with every single part exactly as you prefer.

You won't notice the aluminium hanguard in cold weather. If it gets cold enough that your tongue sticks to metal then you will be wearing gloves.

Where in Australia do they not let you store your handgun at home?

[PeterD]

That is an interesting idea Biggs. I do have a HD PCC to scratch that itch, not in an AR platform though. It has an arm brace to avoid the dreaded NFA tax stamp and nearly year wait.

Because of that I started by looking at the bolt rifles I am already familiar with that weigh 6 1/4 lbs without scope or ammo as a target weight parameter. Accuracy I know what I can achieve with hand loads. Budget for buying those minus a scope is around $800. So my only three parameters to start investigating the AR platform were those to compare and contrast with.

[Double Naught Spy]

Welcome!

[PeterD]

Thanks Klem. I was in NSW and Victoria and Canberra but the farm was in Victoria. I never went through the pistol process to know all the regs but I can say you can only use them at the range, if i used one on the farm no matter what use I would be charged. You cannot use them for self defense so no use being home, in a car etc., they can only be used at the range. I would have to join the range club and compete to prove I had a genuine interest in competitive shooting for at least six months as my justification for being issued a license. The only other justification I remember is collecting and security officers. So I gave up pursuing further.

[VASCAR2]

Welcome to the forum PeterD! If your budget is $800 for an AR-15 in 6.5 Grendel it is hard to beat the Faxon 18” 6.5 Grendel barrel or the 16” Faxon GB barrel. There are also high quality 6.5 Grendel bolts in the Group Buy section here on the 6.5 Grendel Forum.

Alexander Arms has some very affordable quality barrels. Bear Creek Arsenal is selling a lot of 6.5 Grendel components and have really decent hand guards which are affordable. I’m using a Hogue float tube that has a molded rubber hand guard on my 20” 6.5 Grendel and doesn’t weigh a lot.

http://www.65grendel.com/forum/showthread.php?12701-OPEN-Faxon-18-quot-65G-Group-Buy-185-S-amp-H-47-50

[ClutchAutomatic]

Welcome to Texas mate!

[PeterD]

I think I lucked out in timing for those group buys, bolts are all gone, might be a barrel left.

$800 isn't a hard limit if you can get something sub MOA I'd be willing to go up a couple hundred.

Anyone had any experience with Odin Works barrels? I forgot to say in pretty close to runner runner guns, they make their own uppers which may be an option to cut down on initial tools outlay although I know nothing of their build quality or what people get accuracy wise from their builds . They only seem to deal with 18" lengths which bring ups a weight question. I'm guessing the typical lower is 2lbs so some complete uppers may start climbing above the weight parameter I w hoping to stay at or under.

There is no weight listed for that Odin works upper at runner runner but this is what I'm reading here:

http://cdjhu.ypjqe.servertrust.com/product_p/6.5-odin-18-15-eos-8-i-0.htm

They have another which I can't make it out what brand barrel they use, it's an extra hundred over the Odin works one :

http://cdjhu.ypjqe.servertrust.com/product_p/6.5-grendel-dmd-13.htm

This one lists a weight estimate which is something but I would think down to oz would be what am AR upper buyer would want to know.

I was thinking 16" to keep the weight down and yet be out of any NFA requirements, I'd go shorter but if it's going to be light then I don't see how it would work well braced so would need to go SBR route which could pop the budget. Not done an NFA to know if a build is effectively off limits until you get the whatever paperwork back and I vaguely task people having to set up trusts which complicates this and adds more costs.

[PeterD]

Thanks clutch it's really like the 190 degree opposite of my experience in Oz as far as getting more of a freedom from nanny state feeling.

[bj139]

I think I lucked out in timing for those group buys, bolts are all gone, might be a barrel left.

Bolts are still available.

http://www.65grendel.com/forum/showthread.php?15820-OPEN-65G-Monster-Bolt-2018A-55-3-50S-amp-H

[Klem]

Peter,

You've mentioned sub-moa a couple of times now. I'm going to be up front and say your $800 upper limit, even with a couple of hundred on top is not going to guarantee sub-moa. If you are used to sub-moa you are not going to find anything less than that, interesting.

If you pare the task down to the basics I would focus on barrel, trigger and scope. The rest of the receiver and furniture holds it together and can be budget basic. But, if you compromise on any of those three you end up with an average AR. Average AR's don't shoot sub MOA and sit somewhere between 1-2MOA. Occasionally your group will be under a MOA and close to 1MOA if you hand-load but you will always feel like you are struggling. You might be lucky and get a cheap barrel that is a hummer but they are exceptions to the norm.

This is a slow but efficient calibre due to the small case volume so my thoughts would be not to go down the sub 16" route. A 16 or 18" barrel that is not a chunky profile on an AR is not heavy. carry this with 10-15 rds in a mag (a 20rd size 5.56mm mag) and this drops the weight further.

[41bear]

Welcome aboard. My experience in building ARs is "Johnny come lately" with lots of ups and downs due to a lot of misinformation posted on the world wide web but these guys here will only feed you the best/right info to help you move forward. Personally I'm chasing the lightest build possible given a budget close to yours. With that figure in mind I would suggest an AERO lower receiver mated to a Spikes slick side upper, both are in the 5 oz range and the quality/fit is outstanding. My 16" Faxon Gunner barrel upper weighs 3 lb. 2 oz, sans scope, with my lower coming in at 2 lb. 3 oz. Of course you can go lower with a pistol build and knock off another 1/2 - 3/4 lb. AERO also makes a light weight scope mount which will help control weight too. Given time you can get a great trigger when they are on sale, hard to beat the Group buy price point on a quality barrel which leaves you with needing quality glass. How much you spend there is up to you. I'm lucky there because most all of my hunting is Georgia woods inside 50 yds. thus I use a Vortex Spitfire red dot.
Hop this helps in your quest.

[just_john]

Welcome to the Clan, PeterD, from native born Texian! I, too, am a little over an hour from DNS ( east in Central Collin county, as are several others in this group ). We will all gladly help feed your new addictions and offer any help that we can.

[PeterD]

Thanks John,

I am west? Collin County I think, I still need to get my bearings and lay of the land sorted. I'm west of the 75 at least that I know.

I have a red dot on my PCC, 2 MOA but I've discovered that with eyes I get some star burst vision when looking at red dots, I turn the brightness low and it's still there just dim star burst. But I still use it as it's intended purpose was HD/CQ and plinking at the indoor ranges with short lanes.

I was looking at BDC reticles, not having used them before they are interesting, and from the ballistic curves I think the 6.5 Grendel was following close the 556 within 600 yards which most BDC seem to be now applicable with use in my mind with a 6.5 Grendel rifle. I'm not sold anything just looking at what's out there.