Does anyone have any experience with it? Is it available for purchase for those without any special licensing?
Yes, I was able to run a course with one from falcon ops group. Great gun, extremely soft shooting and well balanced. They specialize in ferfrans equipment and can get you the upper and I think you can use a standard AR lower. The upper will run you $1500 or so alone, but the benefits of the soar is really only seen in full auto. Shooting a soar in a semi only is a bit of a waste as the 5.56 round doen’t have much in the way of recoil. Full auto is where the ferfrans really shines.
FERFRANS looked interesting but I believe most of it’s usefulness would be lost on me since I don’t own an M16 lower.
They talk about a “patented Independent Sear Disconnector” to slow down the cyclic rate and the velocity of the reciprocating mass, but how does it do that? Add drag? Increase spring rate? Add mass? Delay bolt unlock? Decrease velocity and/or volume of gas?
Where is this Sear Disconnector? Is it in the upper? Is so, where? At the gas key?
If it works, it works, but how?
mistwolf - i mentioned the ferfrans rate reduction system back in 2004 in a writeup:
http://www.militarymorons.com/weapons/ar.access.html#ff
back then, i signed an NDA about how it worked, but it’s out in the open now. the bolt carrier is modified to house a sliding weight/sear trip. it doesn’t add any drag or change the volume of gas or anything like that.
on a regular full auto bolt carrier, the leading edge of the bottom rear part trips the auto sear just before the carrier gets to its forward-most position, releasing the hammer and firing the weapon. on the RRS-modified carrier (usually a semi-auto carrier), the sliding trip acts just like the weights in a buffer. it’s a reciprocating weight inside a reciprocating part.
as the carrier moves back, the trip is at its most forward position, held in place by a small detent. when the carrier stops in the most rearward position, the trip over comes the detent, then moves back, slowing the carrier down in that position. the carrier returns forward and the trip is in the rearward position, also held by another detent. when the carrier is in full battery, the trip overcomes that detent, then moves forward on its own momentum and trips the sear.
in other words, it trips the sear with a delay, from an unmodified carrier. it’s purely mechanical, and the only thing different changed is the bolt carrier, which can be used in any DI gun.
the gas system, buffer, spring etc are unchanged. it works with suppressed or unsuppressed weapons, and will slow down the cyclic rate in both. how much slower depends on the rest of the components in the weapon and the gas system. in a semi-auto weapon, it functions just like a regular carrier, but the RRS properties are then useless.
I understand. It does not decrease the velocity (unless it’s from the added mass) of the BCG as it moves rearward, but increases the dwell time of the BCG at “bottom dead center” and the time it takes for the entire mass to brake to a full stop so it’s less sharp.
On the return to battery, it allows the bolt to be locked in place longer before the sear trips the hammer again.
The downside is the weight impacting inside the carrier which may not enough to be worth worrying about. TANSTAAFL
Very interesting
no more worrying than the carrier impacting the barrel extension, or the weights inside the buffer. remember, when the weight slides forward, it doesn’t slam into the front of the carrier with it’s full momentum - it first has to trip the auto sear, which is spring loaded and is also holding the hammer back - make sense?
okay, i dug up a RRS carrier that i have and snapped a pic - you can see the sliding trip in the rearward and forward positions. pics of the mechanism have been on the net for a while, so i’m not showing anything that can’t be found with a quick google search.
Yeah, I realize now that it’s next to impossible to possess one of these as a full-auto. What a pity.