re: $499 AR 15 at Primary Arms right now

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There’s a plethora of youtube vids and blog reviews demonstrating various issues throughout the years. Maybe they’ve got their act together these days, who knows.

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I watched several reviews on Radical Arms AR's in recent days. The ones with issues were from 3+ years ago and the issues all seemed, to me at least, to be related to the reviewers putting the guns through torture-type tests.

One reviewer put 4000+ rounds through one without cleaning or lubricating and gave it a glowing review until it did fail on round 4310.

Here's his review from 4 years ago at 4000+ rounds. He gives it great reviews.

Here's where he has a bolt failure at 4310 rounds. The bolt rings were worn badly and the cam pin broke at the firing pin hole. Remember though, if you watched the above video, he never cleaned or lubed it once! Your average shooter will clean and lube every 500 - 1000 rounds. Your anal shooters (me) will clean after every range trip. AR's typically like too be run clean and wet(lubed). Rings, cam pins and cotter pins, etc are items that most owners should be looking to maintenance around 5000 rounds or so anyway.



Here's a follow-up he did after replacing the bolt where he's still happy with the gun even though it is a budget AR-15. Most owners that purchase a budget rifle go into it knowing they will eventually upgrade internals and add accessories. I don't see anything truly upsetting or bad about bolt rings and a cam pin breaking at 4300 rounds after someone purposefully went that long with no cleaning or lube.

Here's a different reviewer with a video from 1 year ago that mentions the prior issues R. A. had and he addresses it starting around the 5:25 mark. He also mentions the new testing processes R. A. uses in testing their bolts (magnetic particle inspected and proof tested) which are now built in-house.