CNC Milled AR-15, The Test Firing

Jason and I made it out to the range Christmas Day to try out the AR-15 pistol that Jason turned out on his CNC mill, documented here and here. After fussing around a bit dealing with FTEs, it was determined that the pistol just likes hotter ammo. Using either the reloaded ammo Jason was using, or my reloads, which I don’t load very hot, it had FTEs all too often. But it worked rather flawlessly with NATO spec 5.56×45, which the upper is rated for. Here’s the video I took:

I think the best way to shoot an AR-15 pistol is to get a good cheek weld on the buffer tube. The tube is too short to use as a stock, and is not designed to be used as one, so it avoids being an SBR, but the recoil is so low that a good cheek weld helps in aiming. It is entirely comfortable to shoot the pistol as a pistol, one handed, or with both hands, but you can get better accuracy resting your cheek on the buffer tube.

Mechanically, for some reason, the buffer retaining pin got sheared off, but I think Jason has decided not to bother replacing it. With this modified lower, it requires tools to remove the upper, so it’s not a huge deal to just hold the buffer in while the upper is put back into place.

This goes to show the fallacy of gun control. All it took to manufacture this was a CAD drawing downloaded from the Internet, a Linux machine to control the mill, a block of aluminum, some time, and a willingness to spend a few days cleaning aluminum bits off the floor of your shop.

No doubt our opponents will call this a “loophole” in the law, which allowed Jason to manufacture a high-powered pistol out of a block of aluminum, with no serial number, no background check, and no government official overseeing the endeavor. But make no mistake, it’s not unregulated. This was made for personal curiosity. It would be unlawful to make firearms for resale, without a manufacturer’s license, and would also be unlawful to make this firearm with a stock, which would make it a short barreled rifle. All those legal issues were avoided in this endeavor. But I can promise you, there are individuals out there for whom this is appalling, and who would likely try to restrict this technology.

But the genie has thoroughly gotten out of this bottle. None of the equipment used in this project is so horrendously expensive that it’s out of the reach of hobbyists in terms of price. Jason is not a trained machinist, and neither am I. My message to our opponents is to give up. Gun control as as fantastical now as unicorns. Technology will just no longer allow it to work.

7 thoughts on “CNC Milled AR-15, The Test Firing”

  1. I’ve been toying with the idea of an AR pistol. Oly makes a Glock lower, I think one of those with a 9″ barrel, and a railed gas block with a laser on top and a light on the bottom would be the shiznit.

  2. I thought gun control was pretty much dead as a practical thing when the Smithy was invented. Altho it takes more knowledge to do it on a smithy than a CNC machine I’d suppose.

  3. Ban Homo Sapiens brains! Is there no end to their horrific creativity and ingenuity!?

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