The Build Itself or More Fun With Belt Fed Guns In The Sun, As God Intended.

Greetings and Salutations!
OK
First off, I’m waiting for my upper. It has/had an 8 week lead time to a 16 week lead time in a worst case scenario. I was willing to chance it, as… I dunno… as reader Jay Dee commented “investing in functional metals.” is a perfect description of what I did.

So I figured I’d break it down like Barney so y’all can see what I’ve gone with. I do have to say that this’s the most expensive build I’ve ever done hands down. I thought the $2200 for the National Match M21/M1A was pricey…

Whoo-wee! I knew not of what I was getting into.

Now… firstly, when I started this project, I knew it’d be spendy. Most good/great toys are. When I initially went to the Lima Six website, almost everything was sold out. Like nada-nichts-neinte. I signed up for the “Notify Me” when back in stock, and let it go. That was mid January.

Mid February, I got notification that a bunch of the cool kid stuff was back in stock. One of the things was a $99 buffer and tube kit. I bought it, as I figured this would mentally ‘lock me in’ as it was the correct tube and buffer weight for the Lima Six upper.

Sure, I could have probably gotten it cheaper piecemeal, but I wanted to know I had gotten the name-brand so to speak exact right tube, spring and buffer, even if it was slightly overpriced… It’s a ‘my mental thing’ so you’d have to be inside my head to ‘get it’. It meant I had committed building this fucker.

And Lo and Behold.
I managed to ‘choose wisely’ in the Silver Market, and liquidated at a price that made me happy, and also allowed me to buy the upper, completed, with the Inconel gas tube, which according to my intel, a high-strength, corrosion-resistant nickel-chromium superalloy which for a Belt Fed is a great choice I’m thinking. It raised the price to $3074.98. Call it with shipping $3100.00 roughly.

Then came the lower.

Now, this thing can clip onto ANY AR lower, which gives it it’s appeal. Turn any baseline AR into a belt-fed Squad Automatic Weapon… what’s not to love?

Well… my own research made me realize I didn’t like the distance the ammo bag/box would have using the standard adapter. The adapter:

gets inserted into the magwell, and then the ammo bag/box adapter clips onto the bottom of that:

Now, to me?

That’s quite a distance for the belt to travel. This (to me) is a bit far… lots of chances to snag the belt or allow shit to get in there as if one is ‘running and gunning as opposed to a situational dug-in defense…

That happened one time during a CALFEX where we were running through the woods, and when I ran through some particularly thick brush, the branches ‘grabbed’ my ammunition belt, pulling it out of the box… the belt didn’t snap but a bunch of the rounds got all fucked up, and I had to re-align them to make sure I didn’t have a jam, as well as re-stuff them into the box.

That took time to fix.

Plus, the adapter is 3-D printed.
I’m all for 3-D printing, but I know that the PLA does have long term issues with use, UV breakdown and the like. Granted that Lima uses SLS Nylon, I’m still very wary.

So… because of this, I started researching.
And found a Lower specifically designed for Belt Fed ARs

Link to it is HERE
Yeah
A bit pricey… but hey, If you’re going to go Retard with Weapons, You Always Go Full Retard.

Now… this was originally made for the FlightLite MCR series of belt-fed uppers. Thing is, the MCR STARTING PRICE is a grand more, with the higher end models starting at $7000.00!!! Like Holy FUCK!!!

Considering a military contract FN SAW costs only $4100?

Yeeeeeah… porking the consumer IMO.
ESPECIALLY that the reviews on the MCRs in general are VERY metsoo-metz. Lots of complaints about tuning it, lots of complaints that the belt has to be practically soaked in CLP…
Yeah… to an old SAW Gunner like myself?
Hard Pass
Even if I had “Fuck You” Money.

So…
I got the Black Widow lower, as well as an adapter specifically designed to move the ammo box/bag to it’s ‘proper feeding’ location. Seems the MCR (which the BFAR was designed for) has a different feed distance and angle. That adapter moves the ammo forward about 1/2 an inch, which allows the Lima Six to feed without having a minor ‘twist’ in the belt:

When installed, well… it works beuatifully.
And so here’s the Reveal:

I went with a Tapco SAW Grip. Tapco got bought out back in 2021, and most of their ‘stuff’ is now just a memory. This one is the real deal that I found from a guy on Reddit. Link is HERE.

He apparently has black AND tan CAGE stamped genuine SAW grips, as you can see on mine. The SAW grip is a chonky-boi compared to other grips, which allows big pawed dudes like me to rock on a SAW or equivalent. Love me that grip IMO.

The Adapter for the nutsack, when installed looks like this:

It slides in, and locks in with a set-screw, which I squirted with some Locktite 222 as I don’t want it coming loose. The trigger assembly is a standard AR until I can figure out the FRT side of things, as the legality here in Florida is retarded. I’m also waiting on the bolt catch/release as you need one that will fit, as the upper sticks out over the edge of the lower, so a standard paddle release gets in the way and needs to be either cut, or in this case, a proper flatter longer turned release is installed.

Without the nutsack attached (that BTW is a 200 round DotMil Issued bag, $150.00 retail) looks like this:

The rear stock is the highly adjustable Magpul LRS.

Adjustable comb, as well as length and even the recoil pad is adjustable. My only complaint about it is that it doesn’t come with instructions, so I had to youtube the vidya to get the intel for installation and function. $99.00 on ar15discounts dot com.

Add on the 1500 in M27 links, the ammo and whatnot ‘stuff’ like a good bipod (which is an absolute necessity) that’ll eventually get added, it’ll break the $4500 level in the end.

Which I’m comfortable with.

So that’s my night.
Hope everyone else is cool.

More Later
Big Country