Albroswift

Dies showed up Monday, the new upper today, got the brass, case gauge, most of the Aero lower together (waiting on a real adapter plate!) Case gauge actually has rifling in it, should take the guesswork/ slugging / marking paint out of the reloading process! Most fun you can have in a AR-15 magazine

Friend built another AR-40 pistol last night pretty much copy of my .40 out of the lower he milled last week with the 5D Tactical Pro Jig. Start to finish starting with the stripped lower a little over an hour and a half Probably could have cut that time if he hadn't put the FCG in every way possible before coming up with the winning combo. I've never done one start to finish before, usually get a few parts, put together, get a few more.... two setbacks that cost some time, the set screws that hold the ejector would not screw in to the point of contact. threads were not clear through and didn't have a bottom tap that matched the thread pitch so spun up a couple spacer buttons on the lathe, easy fix. Bigger issue when we tested function bolt would only retract about 1/4", spent the next hour and a half like monkeys and a football, buffer tube on, buffer tube off, upper opened, closed, smoothed out every possible internal part before we figured out the charging handle was contacting the buffer tube alignment adapter (I believe it's called) Adapter was out of the parts bin, never used before, probably a cheap POS. Filed about a billion of an inch off the top and bingo. Check the simple stuff first, Duhhh!

Sawzall saw blade: $3.00 Gas Block: $15.00 Posting photos of your handiwork: Priceless

Tromix 458 SOCOM upper, 14"-16" pinned & welded, 12" round free float tube. 458 cutaway case gauge

What do you use for barrel grease? I've done low torque and loctite blue or medium torque and anti seize or grease. Never anywhere near 80 lbs though.

These are the reliable 31 round Glock type .40 S&W mags, Korea RWB 12.99 at Ben's https://www.classicfirearms.com/catalogsearch/result/?q=acc-gl40-31MAG ACC-GL40-31MAG Ben's also has another one that is not good, SGM brand, needs a lot of tweaking, stay away from alert: https://www.classicfirearms.com/sgmt-40-31rd-glock-mag/ ACC-SGM-40G31R If you look closely the SGM has a slightly longer body and a smaller base. Also has a SGM logo. Feed lips are crappy. Follower doesn't fit well, sloppy. I have 2 of the SGM and 4 of the Korea RWB's, just ordered more of the RWB's today. (I have only ran them about 75% full as of yet, but dug out my maglula UpLula loader yesterday so will give them the "Stuffed Full" test next time at the range. Also rebuild several old stock mags last night, see what the results are.

Good looking build. There are some shim kits to help with that alignment, I prefer the clamp on type or round handguards over the type that screw directly to the nut. Seems like lala land to expect proper torque and true alignment to be one in the same. What brand of mags? I have been checking the angle of the bullet/ follower and find they are all over the place. I made a gauge matching the most reliable angle and have been tweaking the ones that don't conform, got a bunch of glock type 10 followers on order, they seem to match the cheapo mags that are reliable.

This was the one I did first, trigger hole looks good.

Everything set up yesterday, today we turned out one ar-15 lower and one pistol caliber. Setup was easy, instructions good. Less then 1 hr per lower, I did mine, the AR-15, and then friend did his pistol lower. Definitely not quite as smooth looking as a factory milling, a little chatter marking, but the jig and tooling functioned efficiently and as advertised. Trigger hole a challenge, First one came out almost perfect, second one (pictured) a little off. nothing that couldn't be tuned up with a file or dremel. Other then that everything worked well. Used the recommended DeWalt DWP611 router and some Boeshield T-9 spray that had been laying around in the shop for 20 years or so for cutting fluid, Put a new filter in the shop vac and attached to the buffer tube end of the jig, pretty good chip extraction but still some chips in the beard and on the floor.

Maybe up your buffer weight and/or spring? Both of mine run pretty clean. If you have a case gauge it would be interesting to see if the spent casing still fits. I've now had the chance to reload and shoot brass that has made a pass through the blowbacks and find I am not needing to use a push through sizer as some suggest, just standard resizing die. (I'd probably just throw the brass away and order more off gunbroker if I had to go through the effort of push through sizing, not very progressive press friendly...)

Big Rick and his new Facebook page

BadAss

Got it out to the range today, more fun then a barrel of monkeys! Drills the 50 yard target. Finger sized holes. Fiocchi 1 oz slugs.

got to give a shout out to @98Z5V ! put a Armalite length buffer tube and an EA1095 spring on the AR-40 Carbine, if it works for the 308 why not the 40. 10oz buffer and a little spacer hot off the lathe, Full blow loads, 1500 fps no case bulge and SMOOOOOTH....

5D Pro Jig should be showing up today, along with a pistol cal 80% lower. Have a $39.00 223 80% to practice on just showed up yesterday. Might not really be the least expensive route for a build but dang it I like making things!

Upped the ante had 180 Cabelas bucks and a 25$$ gift card left over from Christmas, pretty much covered a VMX3-T without raiding the tax fund. Nice optic as you would expect from Vortex.

Yes on the glock mags, 9MM and .40 are identical outside dims. Happy to take the heat, Sketch!

All you need is to build is the upper, use your 9mm lower and save a few bucks to start. Joe Bobs still has the KVP barrels for $79.00, (I have 3 so far) The Stern Defense BCG has been solid for me, $143.00 (2 so far). Mill spec uppers are dirt cheap, even the dedicated ones with LRBHO are only a little over $100. Ebay for a handguard and nut, $20-$30, There you go! $350 or so plus optics and lead!

We have one up north of here we call the "Sultan Dump and Shoot" but gets pretty crowded with all the dumping and shooting and 2 or 3 trail heads in the same area.

I have to drive 2 hrs to get to a good pit, but we're the only ones there. We make a day of it, coolers, lawn chairs and folding tables. Range is 10 minutes from the house, 50 yard pistol and 200 yard rifle, but yea, rules...

gravel pits and ARs go together like peas and carrots!

Note: The Winchester Ranger off the Winchester Website shows 1210 FPS out of a 4" Barrel. Gained almost 300 FPS out of the 16" barrel. 10MM Mag velocities. Like to know what powder they use!

Another Range Report Rifle and trigger behaved, 10 oz buffer worked well, had some mag issues. The $12.00 cheapos work flawlessly, older stock glock mags were tempramental. It appears the followers in the cheapos are a faithful copy of the Glock #10, I have what appear to be "Old Style" in the rest of my mags. (Go figure, bought them all prior to Clinton's ban) Anyway, everything rocking so had a chance to get some chrono-radar data. IPSC loads, 180 RNFP that run just under 1000 fps in the limited gun My "Hot" 180 RNFP, all over the place. Maybe just pushing too hard, but my theory is the chamber has a little to much freebore for the slower powder. 10mm mag velocities. Law Dog 155 gr hollow points. Yowza!

"Pistol or rifle?" Carbine. Tromix 14.5 barrel with birdcage pinned and welded.