Home Forums Hunting & Shooting AR and Tactical Rifles making a Daniel Defense AR15 into a shooter

i have a stock DD M4V7 16" standard weight barrel. assuming optics AND trigger are up to the task, what can i expect the rifle to shoot:

1, with quality factory ammo?
2, what ammo would that be?
3, with quality reloads?


not looking to make a benchrest gun, i'd just like for ME to be the weak link, NOT the gun. i guess a true 1 MOA shooter would be my goal

ked

You tell us. Get some Fed Gold Medal Match. 77's or 69's. I favor the latter. Don't waste it with irons or a red dot. Install a proper scope. I've relegated a 4-14x MKIV on an AR mount for such duties.

I have an older V7 LW barreled gun that is about MOA with factory hornady 55 grain VMax. I have a newer one that is just not as good.

A few years ago DD's were getting raves for accuracy. I recall one guy at the local range showing off his targets, which were bugholes. He was delighted with his.

Somewhere along the way their accuracy seemed to degrade, like jimmyp says. I have a DDM4V5 in .300 BO that is about 1.5-2 MOA, and I have a Mk12 that has the super-duper CHF, stainless, nitrided SPR barrel, and it was running about 1.25-1.5 MOA. Recently I tuned it some more, with a different flash hider and it seems to be doing closer to 1 MOA, now. Maybe the super-hard nitrided barrel is just now getting broken in.

Both of mine are ultra-reliable, and made of quality components. But I have seen cheaper guns out-shoot them. YMMV

You gotta shoot the gun with various ammo first. Thats a key with ANY gun...

Then if not good enough go from there forward.

Assuming GOOD ammo, good guns/barrels aren't finicky.

Finicky, or one load guns go down the road real quick like. Life's too short to deal with 'em, be they bolts or AR's.

Lot's of junk 223/5.56 ammo around though.

MM

Try some good factory ammo in it first.

Examples:
Federal Match 69gr/77gr
Hornady Match (not superformance) 75gr
Hornady 55gr VMAX
Black Hills 69gr/77gr

Add Blackhills 60 grain Vmax to the list

you know I was looking at their Mark 12 but for close money I would buy a knight with a chromed barrel, some say the Knights with a chromed barrel are sub MOA for 5 shots, and then some do not .

I built my wife a ar-15 around a 16" lightweight DAniel Defense barrel, it loves the hornady 75 grain bthp match factory load. I dont believe that rifle has ever shot a group over 1". Its the best shooting rifle i have, so dam consistent with that ammo.

Chrome and sub moa GENERALLY are not compatible FWIW.

I hunt some nasty weather.... with CM and SS barrels. If I feel the need to further protect, nitride it or bore coat it.

When I say nasty, days on end of rain in Alaska and some of it in the salt... I have no issues that would make me want chrome lined.

I have a Noveske 18" SPR barrel that I need to finish building. I'm curious to see how it works versus the DD. from checking pilots for muzzle cutters I did discover that the Noveske barrel is tighter than the DD - I needed a pilot .001 smaller to fit it.

Black Hills Mk262!

55gr Hornady Vmax

another thing to think about is that the chrome lining is going to get the kinks ironed out about 1000 rounds are down the tube. It may get better with age...