Home Forums Hunting & Shooting AR and Tactical Rifles Thoughts on buying a complete upper to rebarrel

Yeah Jeff.
I'm going to call bca today, and see if I can get the upper unassembled.
It's a stainless, fluted, 1/8 twist, hb.

I don't need it but if you didn't want it... like I said I'm AR stupid at times...

I have an awesome shooting Grendel.
Just wanted to get into the 6mm ARC game.

The only BCA upper I have had any trouble with is a 350 Legend. Little tinkering at it works perfectly now. Accurate also.

I'd this exactly... almost. I bought a side charging 6.5 G upper (16" heavy barrel from BCA). I pulled the barrel and replaced it with a 16" faxon gunner, replaced the bolt with a toolcraft 6.5, and replaced the handguard. I think I paid like $200 for the complete upper on sale. Plan to sell the barrel and handguard to recoup a few bucks, but so far they are just sitting in the parts bin.

First thing I'll say is BCA torques the sh** out their barrel nuts. I was worried I'd break something using a 36" breaker bar and a torch but it finally came loose. It was a PITA. The upper receiver is wide at the base of the pic rail and so standard handguards with anti rotation tabs will NOT fit. You'll have to trim or get a handguard with no tabs. Now that it is all done I like the upper. The side charger is cool and different. If I was doing it again, I'd but a stripped upper and avoid the hassle of removing the barrel nut and possibly breaking something.

once upon a time there was literature out , maybe in the 80s, that the barrel nut needed like 90 foot pounds or something stupid.

I had heck once I put one together following that...

Lets see,, gas tube in place, barrel nut can't go anywhere really. Lube the threads, set them a couple of times. And snug it up and call it good. Maybe 30 foot pounds, dunno, its been 2003 or so since I ran the numbers and assembled one. Used to know them all by memory.

I guess you get one now and then thats stupid tight. I know one came out of a famous Florida smith once with the barrel wobbly loose in the upper. It happens.

Most grendels now days are type II , will that affect using same bolt on 6arc ??

It's the same .136 bolt.
When you can't find 6arc marked brass, make them out of 6.5 grendel.

Your the 2nd person to say about the tight barrel nut.

Just looked at tracking. Upper is supposed to be here Sunday.
BA barrel to be here Saturday.

When's the range report going to be?

Dunno ?
I have dies, some brass, and an oal gauge in bound also.
I been looking, but I think I need a rifle length gas tube ??
Power choice isn't that great either.
Thinking of starting with 90 or 95 grain ballistic tips I have a bunch of 90 grain bt's with a cannular.
My 243 liked lighter stuff, so I have 70 gr bt's, 90 gr Speer hot cors, 3 boxes of 90gr Barnes originals, and a box of 95gr bt's.
Got a box of 105gr Hornady match coming in.
So basically, a hunting ARC !

The specs on barrel nuts was 30’lb-90’lb, 40 was kinda the sweet spot but when you don’t want to shim or trim the nut to get things lined up, 90 was tolerable.

I broke a Colt once that was well over 90… as in broke the upper.

Geez, 90 seems extreme. I don't like going over 80. But like you say, sometimes you have to go a hair more. Had to do that with my Noveske with the NSR. Sometimes those are a pita...

Maybe it was 30-80, it’s been a long time since I looked at my old book.

Not surprising. An upper is pretty thin around the barrel nut. I'd be afraid that if it didn't break, that it would be warped and stressed. AL doesn't act like steel when stressed. It holds on to the stress and can break later.

Midway just shipped my dies !
Says April 8th for delivery.
Be awhile......

Found some leverevolution powder.
2 lbs shipped is over 120 bucks.
60 + bucks a pound !!!
Wtf !!
I was/am a hoarder to a point, and haven't had to buy supplies in awhile.
What's powder going for on the store shelves ?

Stores are about the last place I buy powder from.

was around 40ish on the shelf in AK last time I looked last fall. N555 was more like 55 a pound IIRC.

Oof!

I have lots of powders for all my other loadings.
This, and the Grendel, use different ones than I have for top velocities.
I'd like to try leverevolution.