So I recently decided to give the whole "build it from parts" thing a try with an AR15, and so far I've picked up an Anderson stripped lower, PSA bolt carrier group, and a PSA A2 lower kit. This is going to be a budget build, acceptable accuracy being 2-3 MOA at 100 yards. I've never built an AR before, any recommendations on an upper on a budget?

Clay, I just finished putting one (actually 4, but you asked about an A2) together myself. Anderson receiver, a Heavy Bbl, 20", Del-Ton upper that the LGS made me a deal on, the rest of the hardware is PSA, it easily is a 2" rifle.

https://www.del-ton.com/ar-15-barrel-assemblies-s/4.htm

The top rifle from this pic:

The bottom 3, are PSA uppers, complete with BCG, and they were 'BLEMS'

Everything I buy from PSA is a 'blem'......... So far, I'm not sure that I can find the 'blemish'..............

You can't build cheap. You have to have the biggest names. ETc...

LMAO.

While I would part together a better gun if my life relied on it, most of the times the cheaper stuff is just fine for fun. And truth be told lots of what you pay for is profit. Lots of parts are made by some of the single big companies, bought in bulk and sold under various names...

2-3 moa with good ammo takes the cheapest barrel you can buy basically.
2-3 MOA with ball bulk ammo, the best barrel might not make it consistently.

bear creek uppers. Under 300 on Black Friday. Just shot mine. Looks like it will hold MOA basically pretty easily with the right ammo. PSA nothing wrong with either.

And from eons ago Model 1 sales IIRC, out of IL. Sold some cheap surplus stuff, even back then the accuracy was more than good enough... people laughed and bought COLT. I didn't. In fact the one colt we finally bought, the trigger/hammer pins wallowed out after 2 barrels and had to reswage the holes. Something I've only had to do with one other lower since the 80s.

Odds are there will be lots of cheap bulk run through this, like most of my guns. Bear creek I’m a little leery of, heard the machine work on their barrels isn’t all that. PSA and Aero are both on my radar, I’ll check out and see if I can find one of those Model 1 somewhere

CB right now PSA has some complete uppers with and without bcg and ch's at some hard to beat prices.
The stuff I've got from them works finr...mb

An Anderson upper will work just fine if you can locate one...............or this one will work too for $65.

I've used one before, snug fit on the lower with the pins but they go in & everything else aligns & fits & the finish is fine.

MM

Cheap Upper

I've had good results with AR-Stoner stripped uppers and uppers with the dust cover/forward assists already installed.

Also stripped uppers from PSA.

Budget barrels from AR-Stoner (Midway), PSA, DSA, and DPMS have all worked fine. One of my more accurate barrels is from Ballistic Advantage, a few bucks more, but still quite affordable.

The only place I got burned was a barrel from TNTE Sales, the barrel extension came loose while I was installing it on the upper receiver. It needs a proper torque/headspacing, and I'm not tooled up to do that properly.

Anyhoo, good luck and have fun with it. Be warned, it can get addictive after the first one......grin

I appreciate the feedback gentlemen, got a lot to look at between now and next payday. Definitely liking what I'm seeing about PSA's upper quality, and I don't see much priced better for a blem one.

Montana, I definitely understand that. Picked up firearms thinking it would be cheaper than cars, but definitely doesn't seem to be the case xD

One of my favorite "low cost" providers is DSA. They make Mils Spec parts for military contracts and have good prices.

Aero and BCM uppers are better in my experience, but for $40 stripped, and $55.00 Complete are good deals.

https://www.dsarms.com/c-784-upper-receiver.aspx?pagesize=100&sortby=priceasc

I have 2 Del ton uppers that are the 2-3 inch guns that are great shooters. If I found the right barrel I'd buy from Del ton again.

kwg

Surplus Ammo has good uppers.

I’ve had great luck with Faxon and Ballistic Advantage, more so with Faxon. For a while those were budget. Don’t know about now.

Don’t rule out Red-X Arms. I won an upper from them in 2020. My only complaint is the barre is a 1:9 twist 5.56. While I would prefer a 1:7 or 1:8 twist, the barrel is a shooter. Putting my Teslong bore scope though it, I have no complaints. I have also bought just an upper receiver from them for another build and I have no complaints about it.

Any of you guys hear of KM Tactical? They sell a lot of inexpensive parts. I bought some inexpensive handguards from them. A local shop had some for $59, so I figured what the heck. Look exactly like my $270 Noveske NSR's, but a lot less money, and they work very well. Seem to be very rigid and accuracy stays the same:



Can you figure out which one is not a NSR?


They have some very light M-lok rails on sale right now. The op may want to check them out:
KM Tactical M-Lok skinny rail on sale: $39.95

BSA,

I met an older gentleman a couple years ago shooting a 6.5 Grendel with a KM Tactical barrel. I had never heard of them before. He told me he paid $64.99 for the Grendel barrel. It was hit first time out with it and he was shooting darn near sub-MOA groups with it at a 100 yards He thought his shots were all over the place, so he asked me to spot for him. When I told him they were all grouping together in one right group he got a smile on his face. Needless to say, I was pretty impressed I know he had a scope on it, but I want to say it was just a 3-9x40 Leupold.

Thanks Hudge. That is pretty dang good at any price. I know my LGS carries their barrels and they are exceptionally priced. I've never tried one. But the shop owner says everyone seems to be happy with them. "No one has ever brought one back", he says. I figured I'd give a couple of their handguards a try. I've been very pleased with them. They seem to be very rigid and lightweight. Feel good in the hands too. Here's another one I bought from them:






They fit up great and color match some of my receivers. Not all, but some.



I even did some accuracy testing, because I have seen some differences in accuracy when switching parts. Here's how my Northtech Defense shot with that handguard:


You can see where the picatinny rail on the handguard doesn't line up perfectly to the receiver picatinny. But it's not all too noticeable.

Then with the NSR look alike that was $59...:


Just relaying my "cheap" parts experience to others. I generally buy good bolts to go in my BCG's and use good triggers. All of my rifles use Armaspec lower parts kits. I don't know how those fare in price compared to others, but I like the look of the Armaspec stuff and it hasn't failed me yet...

Might as well stick with PSA.

Ended up being offered a complete BCA upper for a price I felt was reasonable, so going that route. Should have this together in the next few weeks hopefully

Let us know how the gamble worked out.
Some people get lucky. At my club around 20-40% go back to BCA.

Figure at 180 shipped across the country for a used one that’s complete with a BCG, it’s either going to be a crapshoot I use as trade materiel or else it’ll result in a $350 AR build

I built a .300 BLACKOUT on the cheap with I think a Korean made barrel can't remember currently and it shoots Green/White box Remington ammo into 3/4" at 100 yards.

And has been 100% reliable after I got the correct spring in it.


Goes to show you never can tell.

So far a sample of 5 folks with bear creek all show with reloads around MOA. I don't think they are any worse than the other lower end places personally so far.
Faxon sold us a skinny barrel years ago that was pretty much MOA with reloads too.

Accuracy with ball ammo says usually not much more than what the ammo is.

I guess he will keep us posted. He says he paid $180.00 for a used upper with BCG. One of my buddies offered me a complete flat top upper with old Bushmaster 20" HBAR with A2 fsp for $350.00. Says it shoots great too. Another buddy bought an old/but like new complete A2 national match Bushy upper for $200.00 a few years ago. So my question: does a person buy a used el cheapo, or go with a more proven upper for just a little more money? Also, my buddies national match loves 62gr green tip ammo, but doesn't like 55gr ball. I don't know of too many rifles that do like ball ammo. Expectations shouldn't be too high there.

You get finer sight adjustments with the NM. Other than that, it's your judgment call.

62 is ball also, but sometimes shoots a bit better. Especially if you weight sort the 62s if loading em. Big PITA. before we did that we just bought thousands of 60 flat base HP instead.

That said ball is often 3 moa and thats what he was sort of after. Thats out of just rack military guns. So its not going to be hard to get where he wants to go typically.

I bought a DB upper for $230 shipped for complete 16 inch barrel model with rail and it shoots great. I found Anderson LPK's for $35 also so I have less than $400 in my build. Watch cdnnsports also for close out parts.

I wanted to build one.
Then looked at parts, and the few tools needed.
Then the few more to do it right.

Then looked at PSA complete uppers/lowers.

It became obvious real quick that building cheap AR's was the
same game as reloading cheap blasting ammo. (Remember then)

And also that,
with careful shopping,


a high quality gun could be built
relatively cheaply.

Just like loading high quality ammo.

I agree rost. One of the reasons I brought up the 62gr green tips as well. It is ball, but seems to be just a bit better in some rifles than the 55's.

Upper and magazines showed up today, had the unexpected surprise of the upper still having a BCG in it. Sans sights I’m in for ~$350 at this point since the BCG I bought shouldn’t be needed. Still trying to decide which iron sights to buy, but I think that it’s close to finished for less than expected. Hopefully will hit the range next week.

"unexpected surprise" huh? AS was expecting a good range report. Is it going to be factual? Some things in this thread, make you go hmmm...

I doubt mine will be a good metric to judge BCA off of since this is a used upper.

Joe bobs is a good little site for ar parts. I couldn't find a 300bo upper anywhere and decided to build one. I went with aero upper from them, ar stoner barrel, matrix arms handguard. Of course the proper gas tube, etc and a toolcraft bcg. Had fun doing it and it shoots well.

But you gotta recall that BSA has his own personal demand of good accuracy.

And recall that good accuracy is what YOU desire.

As long as you report what you shot and how it shot its all perfect IMHO.

I only give a chidt about good honest groups. Honest being the operative word. I'll also add that 3 shot groups should not apply when dealing with high capacity firearms, such as an AR15. They should also not apply to a varmint rifle or heavy barreled tactical rifle in any chambering.. Others may disagree, but those are my standards.. YMMV

Well, it looks like we will not find out. Pawn shop next to my work had a gew 88 that I traded them for, straight swap and it should compliment my vz98/22 well.

Its not all about you..........

Good logic.

kwg

Well I will be the Guinea pig lol I ordered everything from them minus barrel and Lower. Grand total was $292 which included shipping.

I believe all their stuff is Chinese made.

Cool like 90% of the stuff sold in this country…. Their BCG advertised made in America, along with their uppers. Now there float tubes different story probably.

I don't buy Chinese made goods when there are viable alternatives made in the US or made in countries that share our values and respect intellectual property rights. There are scathing reviews of KM Tactical's BCGs on ARF. Whether these reviews apply to their current crop, I don't know. With the shortages of the last two years, I've frequently contacted suppliers to ensure that I'm not buying Chinese made parts. With the exception of a very small window around the time of the Biden Bucks Covid stimulus, at no time has the parts supply compelled me to reevaluate my stance—I've not needed to accept Chinese made parts due to lack of alternatives or the wildly escalated pricing of alternatives. Granted all this hinges on my own personal values and my individual choice to prioritize not supporting the economies of my enemies.

I don't presume that these must necessarily also be your priorities, but would certainly understand if they were.

I have other AR’s nothing high end most bought from PSA and Anderson parts. Barrels from small barrel makers. Majority here will probably never put 1k rds through their AR’s. Most probably just sit in the gun safe. I have plenty of components I might just do a 1k rd test on these chepo parts. Will have to recruit some buds to help do it all in one day.

So rational, kingston.

Why are you here?

If you really want to test these parts, put a Rare Breed trigger in the build and you won't need any help putting 1k rounds through the gun.

Nope just build a regular ol AR 15 run mil spec trigger like majority would run. Don’t forget many here on this site are the exception to the rule. If this thang breaks so be it…