Larry's a big fan of the FAL, as am I. It balances reliablity, accuracy, and ergonomics in a damn good package.

http://vickerstactical.com/tactical-tips/battle-rifles/

I personally think that the best barrel length for a FAL is the 17.75" barrel that was found on the original FN Para 50:63.

I'm not a fan of the short gas system that DSA came up with for their "Tactical" carbines for a couple of reasons.

#1....I'm not an engineer, but my personal knee jerk reaction is that they're increasing the gas pressure and wear and tear on the whole system putting the gas system closer to the receiver. I might very well be off base here.

#2...Proprietary parts. That's probably my biggest beef with it. DSA makes damn good stuff, but there are literally tons of parts for the standard length gas system.

FN had a lot of years to work out the best length for a FAL carbine, and they settled on the 17.75" (18") with the standard gas system.

DSA makes the best over the counter FAL rifles and carbines available currently in the US, period. If you want the real deal, a FN FAL 50:63 will set you back about $3.5K or more.....while you can get the same basic rifle from DSA for about $2K.

The DSA rifles use Badger barrels that aren't hard chrome lined. FN would make whatever the end user wanted when they were producing FAL's, some countries did not use chrome lined barrels and they worked fine.

While having a chromed bore is a good thing for wear and ease of cleaning, they use a quality barrel that will last a long time with semi auto fire.

The DSA 16.5" barrel carbines work, but I really like the 18" more. You have an adjustable gas system on the FAL, and with the 18" barrel, you can usually set it to bleed more gas and thereby lower the perceived recoil and cut down a bit on the wear and tear.

There's a ton of info on the FAL, and I'd give a lot of weight to what Vickers is saying.

I know I'm kind of rambling....beyond the short vs. the standard gas system, throw some more questions out.

Buck is also a RKI on the FAL system, especially the pre 1989 imported stuff.