I’m Practically a Tarantino Character

To my perhaps everlasting disgrace, I took until today to finish assembling my new AR-15.

I started ordering parts in January. White Oak Armament said they could have an upper in my hands in something like two months. I no longer recall the exact figure. Over the ensuing weeks, the date kept falling backward, suggesting the White Oak people were putting people in front of me. Either that, or they were having problems getting parts and materials. The upper finally arrived in late June!

I can’t recall whether I’ve blogged about the upper, so here I go. I went with .204 Ruger. I know, I can hear readers shaking their heads. “Too small for burglars! Too small for deer! Too big for squirrels!”

I got it for things like coyotes and coons, okay? I admit, I’ve only shot one coon here, and I shot it in the head with a .22 pistol while it was trapped in a cage. But I figured I would shoot more stuff. Also, I thought .204 Ruger would be nice for target practice at ranges up to maybe 400 yards. It’s a nice, accurate round, and ammunition is…was…relatively cheap.

Maybe it was a stupid idea. I just like .204 Ruger.

I got a 22″ stainless fluted barrel with a threaded muzzle and a very nice M-Lok handguard. They put a flash hider on it, too. I don’t think I paid for that. The fluting cost me $110, and it probably saved me half an ounce of weight, but it looks cool.

Of course, I bought a pricey Gucci lower, right? No. Lowers were hard to come by, and a good price on a fairly ordinary one popped up, so I pounced. I got a plain old Anderson Industries lower. I am no expert, but I think the people who spring for expensive lowers are probably the same people who get American Express black cards just so other people will see them when they use them to pay for overpriced pants at Duluth Trading Company. The lower I bought appears to be very, very well made, and Anderson makes the same lowers for status brands. I don’t know how an expensive lower can make a gun run better. If you want your gun to run better, buy something other than an AR-15. Isn’t that the cheapest, most effective step?

I wanted a lower with no forward assist, or as I would call it, no “shell jammer.” When a shell doesn’t want to go into your chamber, in what conceivable world is forcing it a good move?

The trigger was pretty pooptastic, but that’s milspec for you. It’s to be expected.

I decided to put a LaRue MBT-2S straight bow trigger in it. This is a sister to the triggers I put in my other AR’s. The pull is a bit heavy, but it’s a top-quality trigger. It seemed to me that putting a 1-pound trigger in a gun I wanted to use for hunting was not smart, even if a hair trigger produced better accuracy.

I also got an “Adaptive Tactical EX Performance Adjustable MILSPEC Stock w/ Buttpad,” as the confirmation email reads. This is an inexpensive buttstock with a very nice pad on it. I have one on my .223 AR. I have one I plan to put on my LR-308. Milspec AR-15 buttstocks dig a hole in your shoulder when fired prone, and the Fuddly buttstock that came with the LR-308 is heavy, ugly, hard, and non-adjustable. You can get expensive buttstocks for AR guns, but I don’t know if there is any point. I shoot about 0.5 MOA with the factory stock on my RPR, and everyone hates that stock. I don’t think the stock makes much difference unless you’re a super-precision shooter. I mean, 0.5 MOA is pretty good by most people’s standards. I think that if you can shoot a gun that well, you can do just about anything it was ever designed to do.

I still need a sling and a doodad to attach a swivel to the handguard, so I have ordered these things.

I had a 4-14x Primary Arms scope on my other AR-15, but back when BLM and Antifa were really raging, I put a mid-range red dot on that gun so I would have one more gun I could use in a zombie situation. Now the Primary Arms is on the .204. It’s very, very nice for ranges under 500 yards. It’s no Nightforce, but then the .204 Ruger doesn’t shoot very far, so expensive glass seems wasteful to me.

I had to find .204 magazines. You can use .223/5.56 magazines for .204 Ruger, but you may have feed problems. I got some 10-round aluminum mags made for this round.

I’m hoping to get accuracy that beats my regular old AR-15. I like accuracy. If I can get below 1 MOA consistently at 100 yards, I will be as happy as a clam. If I can get close to that at longer distances, so much the better.

Ammunition is now the problem. I have a pretty decent amount of Fiocchi varmint ammo, which is pretty good, but I don’t know when I’ll be able to replace it at any price. Maybe I should be brave and shoot a box every couple of months.

With this gun, in my area, I should be able to kill anything that walks. We don’t seem to get deer or bears here. Everything else is smaller.

I would love to use this gun on squirrels, and I may do it. The season is nearly here. Dissolving a squirrel at 150 yards would be satisfying.

Today, in addition to installing the trigger, I used Mobil aircraft grease to lube everything that should be lubed. I also used Hornady One Shot and a Boresnake on the barrel. There isn’t much left to be done.

I hope I get around to shooting. Marriage and trips damaged my enthusiasm this year.

I wish I could go back to Altus Shooting and take another rifle course. To do that, I would need a lot of good 6.5mm ammo. I have cheap 1-MOA FMJ, and I have the makings for a lot of precision hunting cartridges, but I have very little match target ammo. I would like to redeem myself after showing up for the first course with a badly chosen gun and malfucntioning scope. I did fine, which was miraculous, but an RPR and a Vortex Viper would have made me look much better.

Maybe I should consider a better .223 barrel for my other AR-15. The one I have is good, but it’s not White Oak Armament, and I wonder if a high-end barrel would make it shoot better. The ammo I have is highly regarded, so I don’t think I can blame it. The last time I shot the gun, the old buttstock started gouging me, so I quit. I got the scope zeroed and then shot 4 groups. The first three were not much worse than 1 MOA, and the 4th, which I shot after the pain started, opened up. I don’t know whether the pain, the barrel, or the difficulty of shooting a gas gun well did me in. I should have shot more after changing the buttstock.

Maybe I shouldn’t complain about shooting well enough to hope to kill a coon at 200 yards, but where is the fun in shooting if you don’t keep trying to improve?

I also broke down and bought a new Gerber knife. I know. Gerber. But hear me out.

I realize Gerber is not what it once was, but they still make a few neat things. One is the Gerber Gator II lockblade knife in 154CM. This is what I bought.

I have two Gerber Gators in 420HC steel, which is a cheap steel that both sharpens and dulls quickly. But for the softness of the steel, these are great knives, which is why I have two. Sharpening a knife is not a long job for me, and these knives are very tough and comfortable to use, and they cost very little. I don’t carry them any more, but I used to. They were okay.

The Gator II I bought is similar to the Gators I have, but the steel is better. My first good knife was a Gerber in 440C stainless. About 35 years ago, I used it to whittle on an oak stick for about an hour, and when I was done, I was amazed to see it would still shave hairs. These days, 440C is considered somewhat outmoded. You can spend a lot on fancy new steels and get way better performance. You can also spend a little, but not much, more on 154CM and get considerably better performance. This steel is made by a company called Crucible, and while it may not be the latest and greatest, it should outperform 440C, which is similar to it, and bury 420HC.

The new knife has a big rubbery handle, and it seems pretty solidly made. I thought it would be nice to have something I wasn’t afraid to use for things that would threaten the beauty of my higher-end knives. I guess that’s silly, but there it is.

I paid $50 for the knife. For comparison purposes, you pretty much have to spend twice that much to get a really neat steel, unless you come across a bargain, like the $87 Cold Steel Swift in CTS-XHP I found on Ebay. I think it will turn out to be a great buy, and if I lose it or break it, I’ll get over it fast.

I thought I might get out and shoot today. Looks like that won’t happen, so I’ll walk instead, armed with a knife, pistol, and rifle. God bless America and the freedoms he gave us. They may be gone soon, but today I will indulge.