Home Forums Hunting & Shooting AR and Tactical Rifles Rock River .308

My AR10A4 has eaten somewhere around 1500 rounds without a single real malfunction, even with ammo that was "iffy." The only exception was that the 10-round mags, when brand new and filled to capacity, had springs that were so tight that stripping off the first or second round of ammo was sometimes too much for the recoil spring. That's not a gun or design issue as much as a legal issue, as during the ban, 10-round designs of all types often had very tight springs to prevent the possibility of the mag holding 11 rounds. I never had a problem with a 20-round mag.

Back then, there were some issues with magazines, as Armalite went through a few different sources for conversion kit mag bodies, plus some people didn't do the conversion correctly. I corrected a couple of poorly-done mag conversions for someone and "fixed" their AR10 problems.

Anyway, you will probably be fine with either a DPMS/KAC-type rifle that uses original 1960's AR10-type mags or the current AR10s that use modified M14 mags. I would avoid any .308 AR that uses FAL mags, though, as the narrow FAL mag was designed to feed ammo to the center and not from the sides, as is necessary in a rotating-bolt design like the AR. FAL-mag rifles required the 6-o'clock lug to be deleted or at least cut way back, reducing strength, and the ammo still has to be guided around it, which affects feeding reliablilty.

FAL-mag .308 ARs were tried by ASA, Hesse, Bushmaster, and now RRA. None of them have sold well. Coincidence? You decide.

The FAL is a tilting-bolt design that locks at the rear of the bolt, and the ammo feeds towards the center of the chamber. This design does not lend itself to being compatible with a rotating-bolt design, which has a locking lug at 6-o'clock that the ammo has to feed around. In rotating-bolt designs, magazines are wider and ammo feeds from each side of the ammo stack.

From an engineering prospective, you'll never get a FAL-mag-based .308 AR to feed as reliably as the other designs. Forcing ammo to start from a center position, move to the outside to angle around the center lug, and then back towards the center to feed into the chamber itself, just isn't optimal engineering.

I understood the DESIRE for such a rifle during the ban, but given that you can buy new, factory 20-round .308 AR mags for reasonable prices, there is no reason to use a compromised design strictly to save money on mags. The weakest link in any semi- or full-auto is ammo feeding, so you want that to be as optimal as possible
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Thank you for the reply. I may have to rethink my desire for this rifle then. But the AR10 is out of my budget. Does anybody else make a flattop .308 with 20 inch barrel?

bamaguy,

Listen to Lewis Perkins. He knows of what he speaks.

eh76

I am contemplating buying this rifle some time next month and have some questions concerning ammo and magazines.The cheapest ammo I can find online that is of relatively recent manufacture is wolf sttel case. I have heard that this ammo is hard on extractors. Is this a concern? Also i would like to have an extra 5 or 10 round magazine due to hunting restrictions in my state. Does this rifle use the FN/FAL magazines? I would call rock river but today is sunday. Thank you.

accuracy is overrated.

I can hit a man sized target out to 500 yards with open sights on my FAL, every time...How much more accuracy do you need? What's more, my FAL works, every time and I can get parts and magazines cheap and easy.