Home Forums Hunting & Shooting AR and Tactical Rifles 'splain me buffers

i've been told that a heavier buffer will help the ar extract/eject more reliably. ok... wonderful. my question is, how does slowing the rate of fire help? so, if a heavier buffer is indeed a good thing, how heavy is good? is heavier gooder? is really heavy goodest?

so, i think i should put in a heavy buffer, but don't know which is the way to go...

Heavier buffer IIRC, will slow the opening or unlocking of the bolt. Theory there is the case has a bit more time to shrink back to pre firing size and there for allow the case to pull out instead of the extractor trying to pull the case while its expanded and ending up ripping the rim off and leaving the case "stuck"

would an adjustable gas block do the same???

woofer

so what's the difference between a 'standard' carbine buffer, a 'heavy' carbine buffer, and a 'h2' carbine buffer?

Guys, I'm sorry. We need E4E here. I don't know much about different buffers. I'm a service rifle shooter and always use a standard buffer and have my gas ports drilled to my size specs for the ammo I'll be using to time it out correct.

An adjustable gas block can do the same thing.

AS to the heavy buffers, you can get a weighted carrier also or look at a weighted carrier. I know a few folks that made their own weights. I just don't need them for my purposes as its covered when my barrels are machined.

Jeff

Rost,

I gotta get back to this one a bit later.

Can open.....

WORMS everywhere, andI am flatwiped from the heat and a day oftraining with good friends!


I'llget back to this later.

It ain'tgonna be a short post, nor specific.

Hope all is well withyou!
E4E

just re-read my first post, and see that i failed to mention the ar is a carbine... i'm ready to get the new buffer in (because i don't know how to add weight to the carrier appropriately), but don't know which carbine buffer i need...

E4E will have some superb answers to your questions for the carbine. Just be patient. (tough to do I know)
Jeff

waiting w/ baited breath!!

To make a complex issue short.....

In the beginning their was a standard barrel, standard ammo, with a standard pressure curve.

Things have gone pretty much NUTS since then.

Heavy Buffers compensate for the loss of mass from the original rules, both in the aspect of legality (AR vs M16 bolt/carrier) and propellant pressure curves.

Frankly the whole matter is a mess.

"H" marked buffers slow the cyclic rate and allow for reliable operation with std. Magazines with std. ammo in Carbines that have a shorter distance from the Gas tap to the chamber.

The delay allows for brass that is expanded under pressure to expand and contract, and allow for extractor "Bounce" (Ugly secret that isn't talked about much) and allowfor the timing difference between the 20" and 14.5" Carbine.

It's all a balancing act.

Yet still ammo dependent.

The further we get from the original design, the more we compensate with the smaller details.

"H" buffers are a good thing when wego shorter than the 20" original.

Especially when civvie bolt carriers have lost the inertia at rest when compared to the M16 bolt carriers.

If a Black rifle is shorter than the 20" standard,ya gotta fuss with the details.


The "H" buffer is one of them.

Ammo becomes , more critical, Magazines become more critical, as does temperature and a host of other crap a Grunt has little time for.

The stupid thing is that the package works when ya find a "Std".

Good Mags, Good ammo, "H" buffer, and all conditions met.

Dunno what else to say.......
It's a balance.

E4E

ok, i been spending a lot of time trying to understand my carbine - so much time w/ it in fact, that my usual hunting and target shooting preps are taking a loss - i digress.

anyway, w/ most factory loads, my gun ran fine. would occasionally have troubles w/ winchester nickel plated cases, and federal classic, but it was occasional.

w/ my handloads, i never once had a failure of any sort using h-322 and aa2230. and that included a 2-day prairie dog shoot w/ no cleaning (h-322, 63 grain sierras).

then, i decided to try and run some varget thru the gun since everybody says that is so good in the ar and w/ heavy 223 bullets...

so, i work up a load w/ varget and get occasional failures. then, i find an absolute killer load between 25.9 - 26.2 grains of varget, and was about 350 f/s faster than the h-322.

unfortunately, the varget loads run the gun miserably. failures to extract all the time - maybe 3 or 4 out of 5 will be stuck in the chamber. remember, w/ h-322, aa2230, and most factory ammo (most notably bha) i never had a failure.

so, i'm thinking the slower powder isn't releasing from the chamber fast enough (like the faster powders)... and while waiting for e4e to get back to us, my gun was really pissing me off. so, i yanked the buffer that was in it, and it weighed 2.9 ounces. i figured h-buffers weigh 3.3 ounces. i have yet to find out what an h-2, h-3, or 9mm buffer weigh (but i will, someday).

next, i drifted out the pin, slid the steel weights out, broke a few dove loads open, and filled the buffer plum full w/ lead 8-shot. i had a hard time getting the rubber thing back on (tube was so full of lead), but i finally got it on and pinned in place. weighs 3.5 ounces now, or a little more than an h-buffer.

then, i took it out for a test, i made it thru 5 of my varget handloads without a failure, and went thru 10 bha factory loads w/o troubles, so maybe the thing is fixed now.

i would run a more complete test, except this range session (yesterday) destroyed my scope, so i have to wait for the new scope to arrive...

Ars can be hard on scopes for sure. And add weight to the carrier it slams home even harder. Just something to live with..

I think you are on the way to solving the problem. I'm not sure how reliable a heavy buffer is, you might snoop around and find pics of weighted carriers. They are easy to fabricate and seem to also help.

One thing I always say is that don't rely on the function or lack thereof of federal ammo. Some just won't be working things right in the AR in 223 caliber. Just a fact of life one would think they'd correct. Of course black hills had the problem a few years back with a huge lot sold to the marine team also. But federal has a long history of trouble in 223.
The adjustable gas block would probably also help a bit too. But if you can get it to run as is, stick with it.


Good luck, Jeff

well, i don't know if the ar killed the scope, or just finished what was already started... the scope has been used on a couple dozen rifles for developing loads and such. its had a tough life, especially given my penchant for cartridges that prefer 70-100 grains of powder at a time... but, i didn't know the ar was hard on scopes, so that is very useful info.

i spent the better part of the day trying to to understand weighted carriers, and the principle seems solid. seems that many folks just make their own, and epoxy it into place. not sure i'm up for that, but if this buffer thing doesn't work out, i'll give it a go. tubb also has a system out that can be bought, and seems to be a non-permanent, drop-in solution. might have to go that route.

as for the ammo... well, i much prefer handloads if at all possible...

thanks for the help! one way or another, i'm gonna re-scope the gun tomorrow morning (have a spare 4.5-14x leupold that might fill in for a bit), and get out and shoot for awhile. more to come on this, i'm sure!

thanks for the help.

I've seen a couple of leupys bite the dust on ARs. I use a tasco so I've not lost anything and its been on my test mount for ARs since 96 with a number of rounds. But it could go next time out.

FWIW Leupy always fixes their scopes, but warned one of our shooters that it looked like it was on an air rifle and they would not fix again. Thats when it came to our attention about the AR and the 2 recoil pulses. Evidently that bolt slamming shut is the wrong direction and enough force. Leupy said same thing when the AR was mentioned.

Tubb does make weights. Lots of weights were only a top and bottom piece and screwed together with a countersunk head and loctite.

Jeff

well, i got the scope replaced today... we're sitting at 100 degrees, though, so not sure that i'll do much more than mount and boresight today. if i can get out by 6:00 am tomorrow, i'll run the gun thru a few paces and see how she fares. tomorrow's s'posed to be around 105, so i want to shoot as early as possible.

been wondering... the weights in my buffer were free to move in the tube a little. if you held the buffer to end, then the other, you could feel the weights slide 1/4" or so. now that it is packed full of shot, the weight no longer moves. i wonder if this may create a new problem?? probably shoulda just sprung for the new tube while i was ordering parts for another ar... wanted an instant fix, though, and nobody locally had any tubes, so my fix was instant. don't know if it is good or not, but...