[Guest]

I weighed myself, then I weighed myself holding my AR and I gained 8.5 lbs. The upper alone is 6 lbs. Is that overly heavy for an AR? that is without any ammo. It's a RRA, and I believe A4 flat top? It is a mid length, and has the yankee hill free fload quad rail.. not the lightweight one, which only saves about 5 oz over the one I have. I'm guessing that the barrel and quad rail are just heavy as you know what. I don't know that there are any other barrels I could put on this.. if there are, please let me know! I'd love to lighten this thing up in the front!

The last AR I held other than mine, was the S&W m&p which I think was a mid length. I know it had the barrel that was I think the r4 profile? the one that is milled a bit to make it slightly thinnger. Anyways it was so much lighter than my gun, it wasn't even funny. my gun is very front heavy.

So anyways, see if you can figure out how much your gun weighs.. without accessories all over it if possible. I know accessories add weight, and if you have them on there.. you gotta live with the weight. but i want to try and figure out basic weight of your guns.

 

[Guest]

My AR weighs 6.0 pounds with no magazine.

Bushy C15 Model 4
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[Guest]

i think what I really need to do, is look into a lighter weight barrel if I can find one. your whole rifle weighs as much as my freakin whole upper does. that's just not right.

 

[Guest]

Jed, not to steer this off topic but what front sight are you using? Is that the YHM flip-up sight / gas block combo?

 

[Guest]

too heavy... I'll have to weigh it when I get back.

 

[Guest]

That quad rail just looks like it weighs a ton. My Stag Arms M4nagery was right around 6 pounds on the postage scale.

 

[Guest]

My homebrew flattop M4 style AR is 7 lbs without mag or optics. I do have a postban stock so I believe my buffer and buffer tube are a few inches longer and therefore heavier than that of a true M4 style collapsible stock.

 

[Guest]

Jed, not to steer this off topic but what front sight are you using? Is that the YHM flip-up sight / gas block combo?

yes it is

 

[Guest]

That quad rail just looks like it weighs a ton. My Stag Arms M4nagery was right around 6 pounds on the postage scale.

I believe they state the quad rail is right about 17 oz. Their lightweight version they make is 12.4 oz. I really don't know that saving 5 oz is going to make a huge difference. I really think it must be mostly the barrel that is making it so heavy. underneath the quadrail the barrel is fairly thick the entire length.

Other quad rails I see, seem to be around 11-13oz at the lightest for aluminum ones. I can't seem to find a polymer one in the mid length. I still don't know if I want the normal handguards on my gun or not. I like the quad rail, but that combined with my barrel just makes it a tank up front.

 

[Guest]

Mine, according to RRA website weights in at 8.4lbs empty without sights. This seems pretty good to me.

I suspect most of your weight is in that HBAR barrel profile. Look inside your hand guard and see how thicker your barrel is than in front of the gas block. Personally I like the weight it makes the gun more stable for off hand shooting but that IMHO.

Rambing
mcb

 

[Guest]

Mines at 7 and a halfishl; is yours with a fully loaded magazine??

 

[Guest]

Mines at 7 and a halfishl; is yours with a fully loaded magazine??

mine is without a fully loaded magazine. And it's not somuch the fact that it's 8.4 lbs that bothers me the most, it's that it's just so front heavy. Say the worst possible situation comes down, civil unrest, etc.. and you're forced to travel with your gun on foot. One handing this thing, in any position other than up is a problem. If you need to open doors, etc.. you can't easily keep your gun in a good position to be able to use it quickly. Like they say, when using a long gun for defense you're better keeping it muzzle down, otherwise with it up it's easy for someone to prevent you from bringing it back down just by grabbing it.

I don't have a vise to be able to hold my gun tight to disassemble my quad rail to take it off. That'd be a good way I could see how much that is causing the problem. I suppose I could always just take it to the shooting range. The one guy there is huge into AR's and when I picked it up.. even though I did a FFL transfer to them and they didn't get money off of the sale.. he still said if I have any questions at all with the gun, feel free to ask him. So I figure maybe I might get charged a small fee if I have them remove my handguard so I can test the feel of the gun without that extra weight.

 

[Guest]

Here's probably the lightest barrels I could find. Carbon fiber. Add a carbon fiber handguard and you might come in around 5 lbs. Expect to spend close to what you paid for your rifle.

http://home.alltel.net/mdegerness/prod01.htm

I have a RRA CAR A4 with the YHM freefloat, standard front sight, a Streamlight TL-3 flashlight, the RRA Dominator mount with an Eotech 512.A65 on it and mine weighs in at 9 pounds even.

 

[Guest]

Right at 10 lbs with an empty mag...

I'm not planning on carrying it anywhere.

 

[Guest]

If you need to open doors, etc.. you can't easily keep your gun in a good position to be able to use it quickly.

Get a 3-point sling.
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[Guest]

I don't have a vise to be able to hold my gun tight to disassemble my quad rail to take it off.

Which quad rail do you have? A quick check of the RRA site seems to show that some (most?) of them aren't real free float tubes, they use standard delta packs. You should be able to remove them by hand with some effort, or invest $15 in a handguard removal tool form any major online distributor.

Oh, duh - Yankee Hill. I should read the entire post! Still, the handguard should unscrew from the barrel nut without too much effort unless they use loc-tite.

 

[Guest]

I'd say that a lot of your weight is in the barrel. IIRC, RRA uses HBAR barrels; Stag uses M4 profiles; and other companies offer configurations in BULL and lightweight profiles.

These numbers are for bare Colt barrels.
16" Hbar 2lb 4oz
16" M4 1lb 12oz
16" Pencil carbine 1lb 7oz

 

[Guest]

Colt says mine from the factory is 5.9 lbs. I'll have to weight it when I get home and see what it is now with the mods.

LE6920: Barrel length: 16.1 in (41 cm), Length: 30.4in/34.6in (77cm/88cm), Weight: 5.95 lb (2.67 kg)

 

[Guest]

I'm just wondering if saving 5 oz with a lighter quad rail would even be worth it. That's not even 1/2 lb. But I suppose it might help a TINY bit. For normal shooting, the weight doesn't bother me one bit. But, seeing as how my friend who has been in the marines almost 9 years, served almost 2 yrs in Iraq, trained security forces for other countries, been a firearms instructor, been in security forces, etc.. when he holds the gun and says it's a tank.. it really got me thinking.. I need to make this thing lighter. I had always been somewhat annoyed by it being so heavy up front. If you really had to use the rifle in a situation that requires you to be mobile, the balance is thrown off to the front. I know that if you are in a situation where you have to use the rifle, when it comes time to using the charging handle you don't want to take your shooting hand off the rifle. with the balance of my gun, that's hard on my wrist to hold the gun any way except mostly pointed up or mostly down. I see on tv all the time, soldiers holding their weapons at probably a 20 degree down angle, with apparent ease. And I'd believe it too, again since my friend mentioned how much heavier mine is than what they all have.

I'm really starting to think that it MIGHT be worth it just to ditch the quad rail, put the normal plastic handguard and just add some picitanny rail so I can still mount the vertical grip, a light, and my bipod when I want to use it. That'd take about 1 lb off right there. I know that would make a hell of a difference. And it wouldn't cost me that much either.

 

[Guest]

curious, would it be worth sending my barrel off to be fluted? It's not a chrome lined barrel.. at least not as far as I'm aware. I'm just wondering if maybe it'd be worth buying a different barrel, a chrome lined fluted barrel. my gun doesn't see a lot of shooting. I know the thicker barrel like on mine is better if you do a lot of shooting and get the barrel hot. But I rarely shoot my AR. and when I do, I'm lucky if I even put 100 rounds through it.