Les Baer AR-15 fun!!

[Super 91]

Well, it appears I have a new favorite rifle, my Les Baer Ultimate Varmit AR-15 chambered in .204 Ruger. Here's a pic of me with the new rifle...




And Scott as well. We got consecutively serial numbers guns, which I think is pretty cool.



We got them in Friday evening, and even though we had to finish the sight-in by spot light, we got Scott's ready for the next days hunt. We headed to our farm we have to hunt, and Scott scored a nice yound bird. He wasn't being picky as he wanted to see what this new gun would do.



After a little lunch and short nap (we didn't have 2 hours sleep between the two of us from the night before due to sighting in and the excitement of the new guns), we headed out to sight mine in and do a little shooting. Right before we hit the bench, we stepped into the field by the house to see if a whistle pig was out. No luck there but Scott did take the head off a small tweety bird at 100 yards.



So then I hit the bench and proceeded to shoot some of the best groups I had ever shot. We did the break-in which was a regimen of shoot 5 and then swab the bore till clean, then shoot another 5 and do that for 50 rounds. I have 5 more to go to finish mine out, but I have to re-load some more first.









Well, as you can see, all but one of my groups fit under a dime easily at 107 yards. I have not killed anything with it yet, but oh the things that are going to get poofed with this gun!!

This gun is a real joy to shoot, and even my wife had fun popping off a few rounds! I think this is going to be a rifle I spend a lot of time behind.

[Super 91]

Well, one shot, one kill today. Bloodied the LBC. I was sowing orchard grass and rye in my folks pature, and since it was just cut last week I was able to see a few ground hogs. I knew it was time to see how she would do.

140 yards, I see a nice one. I get off the tractor and head to the truck. Get the rifle and get back into position only no pig. I watch the dirt mound for a minute, and off to the right in the scope I see something move. Something WHITE........

I am guessing at this point the neighbors cat musta came by to check out the ground hog. I zero in on the "cat" only to see it is a yes......WHITE ground hog. Wow! Haven't seen THAT before. I watch for a minute, and see another come up and stand up. I put the crosshairs on him and POOF!! Nice red mist.......that's gotta hurt, just not for long.

I put the gun up and head down the field. As I reach the den, the white one pops his head up, stands up to check me out. Then I notice a SECOND white one across the field. Now THAT is wild. Not one, but TWO white ground hogs in the same field, and it appears separte dens a good 150 yards from each other. Must be all the lime I put out..... ;D

Anyway, the rifle did it's job perfectly, and it was really cool to see the impact in the scope. Double back flip and hulled him out. I think I'm gonna like this gun!!!!

[Super 91]

Had ta do it.......

Took the .204 turkey hunting today. Shot a younger bird than I would have liked, but today being the last day I decided I had better go ahead or I might not get the chance again this year.

Shot him right in the neck and broke it like a twig. He was only 75 yards so I know it wasn't sporting..... ;D ;D ;D Ha!

Here's me "hiding" in the woods with ole sweet "Black Death"... ;D ;D




Here's a pic of the bird crumpled up by the fence...



Plinking at 150-175 yards was blast in the field. Scott brought along his youngest son, and I brought my middle daughter with me. We all had an absolute blast!

One thing that was cool was when were sitting in the field and shooting at rocks, etc, huge earthworms came up all around us. I guess the percussion of the gun caused them to come up thinking it was a thunderstorm or something. It was cool, and these worms were huge!!

[WrzWaldo]

Excellent!

WW

[joghotrod]

It looks like another black rifle addiction. Great shooting. What weight bullets are you shooting in it. Factory or reloads.

I am heading to Co. in June to shoot PD's again with my AR's. I can't wait.

They are fun.

Jimmy

[Super 91]

So far I have only shot reloads in mine. Basically because it was all I had. I bought a pack of Hornady's 32 grain v-max's, but we used them up sighting in my bud's gun. Well, he needed the remainder the next day to hunt with anyway.

I am using Winchester brass, Fed Gold Match GM205M primers, 25.1 grains of Reloader-10X, and Sierra 39 grain Blitzkings. OAL 2.248 for proper feeding in the magizine to gun. 2.250 will work, but I got good results from the 2.248 so I stuck with it for now.

I am finding that I have to full length size or the shell will stick in the chamber. I neck sized some of the cases of once-fired brass, and so far 50% of the time the case sticks in the gun. But all the full length sized cases are just fine. New brass I just neck size and haven't had any problems at all. .226 bushing in the Wilson neck die.

But you are right, I am HOOKED, bad.....

[Sub-caliber]

What barrel length is your LB AR-15? Thanks

[wadevb1]

I had the opportunity to shoot the same rifle. Les Baer has to be the nicest AR platform made. A lil heavy but they are a work of art. My safe has an opening for one in the future.

[Grayfox]

Super 91 and Scott.

Congradulations on some fine AR 15's. You will really enjoy shooting them especially in 204 Ruger.

Last year I used the same load that you are useing on our PD shoot in South Dakota. A very accurate load in my AR15 and Savage 12VLP. I shot over 700 rounds in the AR15 and about a 100 rounds in the Savage bolt rifle. The AR15 was way more fun to shoot!!!!

There was one problem I noticed with that load in the AR15. Once in a while it would pierce a primer. This ruined my fireing pin as the hot gases cut the tip into a "c" shape instead of a round shape. My Savage never had that problem, only the AR15.

The primer pierceing was caused from a smaller diameter fireing pin in the AR15. The Savage fireing pin is .008 thousands larger diameter than the AR15's.

Because of this I had to find a primer with a thicker cup. Remington 7 1/2 BR, CCI 450 mag, and Mil Spec #41 primers were tested. The Remington 7 1/2 BR primer gave me the same accuracy and a few FPS's faster velocity. The CCI 450 mag primer came in as the next most accurate, but had more extreme spread between rounds. The CCI Mil Spec #41 had the worst groups. This primer has an offset anvil in it to prevent military slam fires when loading the M-16's. This probable hurts the accuracy of the load.

So far from all my testing the Remington 7 1/2 BR primers are the answer to my pierced primers. The also cost less than the FED GM205M and CCI BR primers.

I have one more note of interest to share. To make life easier on the brass cases and the rifle, I had to slow the unlocking and rearward movement of the bolt/carrier system. So far I tried a chrome silicone buffer spring, a carrier weight system, and an Enidine recoil buffer.

My AR15 in 204 Ruger likes the chrome silicone spring and the lightest weight of the CWS. I have a Alexander ARM's 6.5 Grendel that will only work with the Enidine buffer. The cs spring had to much tension and it would not feed or lock the Grendel open after the last round.

The drawback to the CWS will not let you open up the upper and lower unless you pop both pins and pull the upper foreward. It is good to have for a PD shoot where you fire 300-400 rounds a day. Otherwise forget it for deer hunting or self defence.

The chrome silicone spring is alot longer than a normal buffer spring. The sides that compress are flat so it can be made longer. They say it's rated for 20% more tension and should never wear out. So far the claims they made about it are true and I really like it.

The Enidine is a hydraulic, rate-reducing buffer that really works. This is the most expensive of the three options. So far this has worked in every AR we tried it in (5.56, 6.8 SPC, and 6.5 Grendel).

Hopefully this will be of some help.
Greyfox