BigNate

If this were a factory built gun it might be a bit easier to give you a specific comp value. For example - I could probably PM you what I paid for my Armalite AR-10(T) if that is what you had and were selling... For custom built guns it is a whole lot different in that there really is no 1:1 comparison. If it were me, I'd look for similar builds for sale in the various forums and price accordingly if you choose to sell. I'd start a bit above what you want to get - and drop the price if you don't get interest - or if you decide that you "NEED" to sell sooner. Sorry - it is not an answer to the "what is it worth" question - but anything I'd give you would be a guess that is probably not as good as your guess. I can tell you that when I'm buying a used gun - I'm not going to buy one for the price of the new parts, I'm only a buyer at a pretty good discount from retail prices - or at least that used to be my rule. How much less would depend on inspection and how well I know / trust the seller. That said - the market today is screwy - supply is very constrained for some things - and demand is up. so...

Pretty sure that the 6-24 power scope was somewhere in the vicinity of 1% responsible for my slow target acquisition in the accurized AR events... Figure this can't shouldn't hurt...

You beat me to it... I adjusted where I was standing a couple of times - watching folks catch their foot on that brace while transition with a loaded rifle. I honestly don't remember for sure - but I think that I caught a foot on it myself. This was one of those things where the exercise / competition (training) was very real - and in the moment my first thought was "man - that's stupid to have a transition that runs across that trip hazard... " Monday morning quarterbacking being what it is - I'd think it would be good to have that kind of stuff - but that it REALLY calls for some additional controls around where folks were standing / watching. Being 90 degrees to the side of that shooting position is cool when folks are shooting from it... but when they turn 90 degrees to their left to transition to the next position - moving with a loaded rifle - and trip - well, that is not a good situation. As to the habit of flipping to safe on transition - I need to get better in that space. As I said when we were at lunch - years of carrying DAO hand guns and decades of my only rifle shooting happening from fixed positions with no transitions has resulted in the loss of muscle memory and habit around moving rifles between safe and fire. I feel like I'm solid with trigger finger discipline, muzzle management, etc. - but "flip to safe immediately before transitioning and flip off safe immediately before firing" is a habit that I need to rebuild. I'll ask all the guys out there to be in my ear about this if you see me violating that rule.

LOL… I was all giddy because I sucked a tiny bit less than last month (4 more hits than last month). Had a blast… learned a couple of things… screwed some stuff up including distracting Matt by babbling about the timer while timing one of his rounds… ‘It was a good morning.

Very cool! This post needs some video! 🙂

As a new guy here - I'll give it a 3rd 👍

He lives in the Midwest these days... he gets back here from time to time - if he happens to be out on the weekend of the fall shoot, I'll invite him. He tends to have cool toys (tools).

Yes 😁 Although when I wrote it I did mean "safe" - in that when you run out of room in the current safe it could potentially stifle good gun purchasing habits... while you save up for a new safe...

Great advice... although I'd say "multiply by 2.25" then, buy the gun, buy a gun's worth of ammo, and bank 1/4 of a gun's worth of money towards the next gun safe... 😁

Some of the chatter in the recent 6.5 CM thread coincided with a buddy posting the video below in a different forum (actually a local car forum that is about 50 of us...). Anyway - I decided not to clutter that thread with this - but still thought it was cool enough to share... This is .300WM - Norma brass, RL26 powder, Hornady 225 ELD bullets and cci magnum primers.

and now paranoia sets in... If you can't tell by the laughing emoji... this was an attempt at humor. Fantastic group!

Well... he is low and right... 🤣

That is my reasoning behind choosing .308 / 7.62X51 as my "if you can only take one..." cartridge. 5.56X45, 7.62X51 are probably the most plentiful rifle cartridges in the western world... If you are scrounging / bartering for rounds - you'll be more likely to find these than others. Given that there are a lot more folks who will be competing for the 5.56... and that IMHO the 7.62 is a much more versatile cartridge - I choose 7.62... 🙂 I have to admit - when I see the odd-ball cartridge on the shelf at Walmart (they've had something - I think maybe .350 win - through the entire ammo crisis) I've thought about buying it, and buying a gun that chambers it. However, I already have a few of those sorts of things that I could probably find ammo for if I wanted... thinking .303 British for the Lee Enfield... Just my two cents.

LOL I have 2 calibers of AR (today) - unless we want to call .223 Wylde its own caliber... I'm working on what the next one will be. .260 Rem, 6.5 CM are the leading contenders...

Errr... cough cough.... https://greenacressporting.com/product/federal-gm300wmbh1-premium-gold-medal-300-win-mag-215-gr-berger-hybrid-open-tip-match-20-round-box/ Maybe not! LOL

It's just an old Ruger 77MK2 - long skinny barrel in a synthetic stock (first rifle that I ever bought myself). It weighs nothing, kicks like a mule. I put a Timny trigger in it - and that helps it - but it's no target rifle. I guess I could get some long heavy .300 WM match rounds and see what it will do... Looks just like this (other than the optic)...

I’ll go total them up this weekend. I think I’ve got 8-10 rounds from 4-8 inches, and three silhouettes from small to a full size…

I forgot .300WM in my longer list above.

If I can truly only have one... 7.62X51 / .308... Capable of taking almost any game in North America Provides range and knockdown superiority over the other two ubiquitous battle rifle cartridges (5.56X45 and 7.62X39) - yes - I know it is heavier too. Readily available in any NATO country. Functions in a wide variety of relatively available rifles ranging from battle rifles, to hunting rifles, to tactical tack-driver bolt guns. That said - you can bet that I can keep more than 1 - and when the SHTF there will be .22LR, 5.56, 7.62X39, 7.62X51, 45-70, 12ga, 9mm, and .45ACP stuff in the bug-out box. 🙂

@98Z5V is too kind. I stunk it up... and had a great time... and learned a ton - fixing a couple of the hundreds of mistakes I made between the 1st stage to the 5th. I'll be out next month - and I expect will be a tiny bit less terrible each month. To anyone else local to this event who is thinking about joining the crew - DO IT! It is a great time with good people and if you put any effort into it at all I have no doubt it will make you a better shooter. 98Z was kind and did not put my suckage on blast - but I will - because I'm looking forward to tracking progress... and I hope that maybe some of you who are considering coming out will do so - knowing that I never once felt anything but encouraged by the group. I finished 59th of 65 shooters with 17 total points out of 47. Stage 1 - 2 hits Stage 2 - 5 hits Stage 3 - 6 hits Stage 4 - 3 hits Stage 5 - 1 hits (I think I ""hit" steel 3-4 times - but I got out of sequence and the last 2-3 hits did not count because I was on a target beyond the one that I was to have been shooting) There were a few major lessons for me in this shoot. 1) - Learn your equipment / know your gear. This was the first time shooting competitively through a tactical optic and candidly - the second time that I've shot through a tactical / real-time adjustable optic. This led to a few lessons... * Bigger isn't better - I bought a 6-24 X 50 optic - it is too much for this sort of event. I found myself having a hard time finding targets - and messing with my level of magnification. * Remember to set parallax * Don't dial in windage... Twice I had windage dialed in and forgot to zero this out before the next stage - and this cost me a number of hits (or at least a bunch of time) on stages 4 and 2 if memory serves. 2) Learn to use a rear bag when shooting prone. 3) Pick up the pace... I went in to this thinking I should just slow down, breathe, take my time. I'm fairly certain that I had rounds at every stage - and other than stage 1 where the miss resets - I suspects that I'd have done better had I moved a bit faster. 4) Don't "Ambush the target" / find stability - I have a TON of work to do in getting myself into a stable / braced shooting position. There are probably 100 more lessons to learn - but those are the biggies. Again - had a fantastic time and I'm looking forward to the next one!

On this part we agree... I guess I had focused on working within the parameters of a gas system that was intended for the heavier BCG / Spring / etc... I presume that the challenge is going to be found in tuning the system so as to reduce gas to the BCG to the level necessary to cycle the weapon consistently and with sufficient energy to both extract the case and then feed the next round - and to do that in a way that does not hammer the buffer into the back of the tube. I presume that the lighter you get, the more precise the tuning requirements will be as the reduced mass (and I presume spring rate) will give a narrower window in which the gun will cycle properly without being over-gassed (again - speculating - and waiting for 98Z to yell at me... 🙂 ). Appreciate the opportunity to exercise some old and rusty brain cells. Oh - and my experience with (and as) an enlisted person many moons ago was different than what you described. Folks who evidenced those tendencies got whupped into shape pretty quickly.

First - This thread is full of "win" - I look forward to reading it in the future when I'm working on a build... That said - this rookie (me) is going to chime in with a statement / question about your last post. I have always been under the impression that with a common input force more accelerated mass will result in a longer accel / decel process and thus a lower impulse event - resulting in the need to exert less peak force on the system to control the muzzle. In my understanding, minimizing mass makes sense for a race gun but only makes sense if you are going to minimize input energy as well. I have a buddy that is a regionally competitive steel plate pistol shooter - and some of his 9mm loads are so soft that I joke that my fat ass could race them to the plate and win. His gun is tuned to function with these silly light rounds - huge mass in the frame, little mass in the slide, springs to match. I doubt seriously that his rounds would cycle my stock Shadow 2... and my guess is that if I put a standard 124gr NATO load (that my shadow 2 LOVES) in his gun it might try to tear the slide off of the frame due to the lack of mass in the slide and lack of buffer spring... So - if you were building a pistol caliber carbine for some sort of short range speed shooting competition I'd think that the "lighter is better" rule would apply for BCG etc. But you are building a 6.5 CM laser gun to shoot long heavy (relatively) bullets at at long ranges - I'd expect that this means that you want to find the fastest / flattest shooting load that the gun shoots accurately - and fast means more energy... I would think that running high energy rounds in front of a super light BCG is going to result in higher impulse operations resulting in MORE muzzle movement and possibly dip as opposed to less? I may be totally wrong - just the mental ramblings of a relative rookie... looking forward to you, or 98Z, or some one else, setting me straight... 🙂

Likewise!

I can't tell from the pictures that you sent - but is there any chance that your M-11 is installed 180 degrees out of spec (with the "top" installed down)? If the closed face is up - and the holes that should face up are facing down - I'd expect it would contribute a ton to your muzzle jumping when fired... Additionally - this thread made me do some reading on the topic and would suggest that it might be worth reading up on the difference between a muzzle break and a "compensator." I found this one interesting (although littered with ads). https://www.primaryarms.com/blog/muzzle-brake-v-flash-hider-v-compensator I had honestly never considered the difference. If you M-11 is installed / clocked correctly - you might look at a compensator...

Pretty sure that no one is calling you an idiot. I know that I'm not. If the question is around how to manage recoil and muzzle rise on your rifle I'd suggest laying out some details as to how you are shooting, what you are shooting, and the specifics of the problem that you are trying to solve. Shooting from a bench or off-hand? Factory 147 grain NATO stuff or super hot / heavy hand loads? Lots of folks here will help you - but they'll want details...